A big one to start with

 

I love Tony Ackland’s artwork, and I consider him, along with John Blanche, to be the artist who defined the classic period of Games Workshop. However, I never particularly liked his miniature sculpts, although I must confess I had never seen one in real life.

Despite this, when I saw an Emperor Dragon going on eBay for under £50, I simply could not resist. Sure, it’s a little unsophisticated when compared to dragons by Nick Bibby or Tom Meier, but at that price… Then I received it and I was very pleasantly surprised.

Firstly, it weighed a lot. I already owned a Great Imperial Dragon (not yet painted) and a Kegox (in progress), but this felt double the weight (it’s not – I weighed it - but it is a lot heavier!).

Secondly, while it was perhaps a little less detailed than the aforementioned dragons, it was very characterful and has a wonderfully dynamic pose. I particularly like the very long curling tail.

Thirdly, the schoolboy in me remembered that it was the biggest dragon, and I think biggest miniature, you could get when I originally started in the hobby. I liked that I now owned the biggest.

Building it was no problem, except the wings. These are very thick and weigh a lot. I needed to drill and pin it with brass rod to hold them effectively. Painting it was straightforward enough, although it did take a long time.

I used Wargames Foundry paint triads for the purple and red but did find that on such a large model I needed to push the shadows and highlights beyond what the three paints offered. I went for a purple and red theme as it is ‘The Emperor’. I had looked for painted examples already out there to see what has and has not worked for this model. I really liked the one on Stuff of Legends and loosely based my paint scheme on this. I made my mind up long ago that if I liked someone else’s paint job, I would shamelessly copy it for my own minis.

I considered all sorts of options for the base but ultimately opted to keep the sculpted base it came with and mount it on some perspex for stability. I decided at the outset of getting back into miniature painting that everything I painted would, at least in theory, be useable as a gaming piece so would need to be suitably based. Whether I ever use any of them in a game of Warhammer is a moot point. My last game was around 1994, and we didn’t even manage to finish it. Still, I live in hope.

Anyway, here is The Emperor in all his glory:

Coming next, some Tom Meier dragons.