The Watcher in the Water Showcase

Earlier last summer, I was browsing the LOTR selection (very limited selection at that) at my local GW.  Finecast had just come out and after reading the initial reviews on the net, I was very hesitant about purchasing any newly casted finecast models, let alone any top end\expensive finecast models.  Alas, my eye was instantly drawn to one boxset though, and that was the Watcher in the Deep.  All you could really get before was some lame tentacles to represent the model and play the scenario with that.  To say the least, 5 tentacles on 25mm bases to represent such an awesome monster really didn't appeal to me, but the entire model (including the body and head) in all its glory.... hell yeah.

So, I dropped a pretty penny down for it, brought it home, cracked it open, and started fidgeting with it.  Apparently all the rumors were true, as it was a terrible cast and needless to say a pain in the ass to put together.  The two halves of the creatures body alone had a terrible gap which took a significant amount of greenstuff in fill.  The outer shell of the beast was litered with air bubbles and various imperfections that not even Stevie Wonder would miss (I know, I know, tasteless/insensitive joke).  Each of the tentacles require TLC to fit correctly and a fair amount of sculpting skill to get them to match into the body with little noticeably.  One of the tentacles even had a major flaw, missing one of its fingers which I had to re-sculpt.  It literally took the better halves of 3 nights to assemble this model.  Apparently the tentacles are supposed to go on a certain way as to not obstruct the front of the model so units could be pulled into the spot where its face was looking.  I didn't figure this out until I had 95% of the model completed, and basically said "the hell with it".

Despite all the issues of the lack of quality with this casting in this particular model I bought, I think it turned out pretty decent.  Problem being is after my 3rd and final day of fiddling with this model, I placed it on my shelf and didn't look at it for weeks afterwards.  A few months passed, and after painting some odd 70 fighting uruk-hai for my Isengard army, I wanted to paint something completely different, and so I set out to paint Watcher.  I found it alot easier to paint than it was putting it together.

So I finished this model sometime around November and have only played 1 game with him, as Moria isn't an army I often use.  Anyhew, on to the pics....

 

 

Anyways, judge for yourselves how it came out.  It was my first time using water effects for anything, so it was interesting to say the least.  My biggest beef with this model is that anyone starting into the hobby will have issues with this particular model, as it isn't for the faint of heart or inexperienced hobbyist.

So this is an older showcase, and I have a few more I'll be sharing in the next few days so that the blog doesn't appear stale while I work on bulk Minas Tirith troops.