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:

The Bryan Ansell collection: Night Horrors (Citadel Miniatures)

The "Night Horrors" range is one of my personal favourites and was released in the late 1980s, presumably to tie in with Games Workshop's Call of Cthulhu games license. It is one of those ranges that is very difficult to complete, partly due to the number of figures it includes, but mainly due to it having a small number of figures which for one reason or another are very difficult to acquire.

The range appeared in various adverts and mail order flyers but has never been seen painted. To date I have managed to find approximately a quarter of the range in Bryan's collection, some of which have very imaginative colour schemes!

Bryan's cabinets of chaos 2

So the good news is that I've got loads more pics of Bryan Ansell's figures, enough material to keep this blog going for a good few months!

Today's post will be taking a closer look at some of the figures from Bryan's now famous chaos army that appeared in the Warhammer Armies (1988) book. Bryan is currently homing the majority of these figures in his display cabinets, but there are remnants scattered in his figure drawers that have yet to make it to display. By the way, he's hoping to bring this army to the Oldhammer Weekend.

The exact figures from Bryan's army are scattered among other chaos and non-chaos figures from the period. If you are feeling particularly beardy why not get out your copy of Warhammer Armies and see how many figures you can spot?

In this post I'll be showing some pics of the main bulk of the army, the Broo (plus some preslotta beastmen), plus some of the army characters. I've taken pics from slightly different angles: my photography skills aren't great but I hope these pics are good enough for you to get a feel for the oldschool charm of the figures. The Broo figures are derived from the following Citadel ranges: C38 Beastmen; Runequest Broo (loose/blistered figures); Runequest Broo Box 3 (v2) Attack of the Broo; Runequest Broo Box 4 (v1) with separate heads and weapons (a great set for conversion possibilities); and Runequest Broo Box 4 (v2) with fixed heads and weapons.

Bryan's cabinets of chaos

In my last post, private wierd (check out his blog if you want to see some truly inspiring Oldhammer battle scenes) asked if I could post some more pics of Bryan's chaos army from the Warhammer Armies book. I couldn't find any more images from the Armies book on my PC, but I did find pics of some of the chaos units currently on display in Bryan's cabinets, which I'd like to share with you. Bryan's display cabinets - as I'm sure you can imagine - are seriously impressive.

(Incidentally, if you're planning on getting married then you could do a lot worse than hire Stoke Hall as a venue. If you're now wondering, "Where the hell did that comment come from?!" - Stoke Hall is Bryan's home and its where these cabinets are on display, which wedding guests are able to view.)

A couple of shots, mainly of beastmen, to start with. Not all of the figures on display here are Citadel but most are: