Monday, 11 November 2013
The Bryan Ansell collection: Bob Olley's undead
There are many figures that Bob Olley produced for Citadel/Iron Claw back in the day that I absolutely love, and are among some of my favourite figures from that time. But there are also some which I...don't...quite...like...so...much...These undead fall into that second category. But hey, each to his/her own and it would be wrong of me not to post these just because of my personal tastes. So here goes:
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Bob Olley undead. I have most of the range and I can't understand why I love them so much. There are some details that I'd normally hate on minis, and his cloth can be the devil to paint, but I just love these lads.
ReplyDeleteI find myself quite liking the cavalry, not so sure about the infantry though.
ReplyDeleteIt's the mounts for the cav that do it for me....they are excellent. But them I'm no great lover of undead figures so I'm a bit bias.
ReplyDeleteNot a fan at all.. sorry Bob!
ReplyDeleteLooking at these with fresh eyes, I actually quite like them. I always hated the original photos of them, and I think that I have said so in the past. But seeing them in HD has made me change my view.
ReplyDeleteThese Ollies were subjected to a rather casual ink wash; I think that they would look altogether more wonderful with a three stage shading job by Mr Dalimore or one of his followers
ReplyDeleteGreat to see these up close and I think the paintjobs look good and suit them nicely.
ReplyDeleteI'm not the most avid Olley fan but I have a few of these and I happily mix them in with my Naismith and Marauder undead for variety. I have to say, though, they are enormous so more than a few and you'd have a unit of giants, and a challenge to rank up if you're using 20mm bases.
Like most of Bob Olley's models, these are quite demanding models, the typical "ring eyes", nose holes and floating clothes need a lot of attention. His "too fine to paint" details and "how am I supposed to paint this" textures make them look not at their best with just a tabletop paintjob.
ReplyDeleteGive them the extra attention they need and they start to shine !
The steeds are really great I think and these models tied with a uniform paintscheme and an attentioned paintjob would look stunning and perfectly creepy as need be !
I usually love Olley's sculpts, for instance his goblins are amongst the finest there are (heresy, I know). Then, there are a few ranges that just make me cringe. His undead is one of those ranges. The black orcs another. They're a bit too close to his Essex roots.
ReplyDeleteModern OIley is amazing though. Look at the dwarves he did for Metal Magic, or the giant trolls he did for his own range. I have an all-Olley chaos warband, led by the despicable black orc brute Bab'ahlé. It's a mishmash of citadel harpies, giant trolls, metal magic chaos dwarves, citadel beastmen, ral partha chaos marauders and chaos warriors and a citadel ogre.
I agree. I'm happy to admit I don't like these undead because there is so much of Bob's work I love - beastmen, ogryns, adeptus mechanicus to name a few.
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