Orks for Orktober

Sometimes someone comes up with a 'thing' and it sticks. I can't remember who first suggested painting orcs/orks during October (was it Erny?). I don't know who first called it Orctober/Orktober (Erny?). I don't know why Orktober continues to me an annual thing, where Slannuary isn't. I do know that about three years ago I did actually paint some greenskins in October for Orctober. I also confess (again), that I don't fully understand the attraction of all things orc/ork.

"Got any big gunz?"

This year however, with some Orktober action happening in various Facebook groups, I decided to use it as motivation to get some more figures painted from one of my 'collectible sets'. The set in question comprises the very first fourteen 40k figures released from back in March 1987. I actually have all of the figures and am slowly working my way through painting them.

Orktober seemed like an excellent opportunity to tackle the Space Goblin and the Space Orc with blaster. Both figures were integrated into the later, larger Ork range, and neither are particularly uncommon. I decided to paint them as a matching pair (a anti-hero and sidekick perhaps?), with a colour scheme loosely based on the Bad Moon clan.

I found the goblin a much nicer figure to paint than the orc - he has clearer details and a much more interested face. I preferred the greater proportion of exposed skin too. The orc is stacked with layered details, which made him a much more tiresome figure to paint.

Overall, I kept things dull and dingy on these two - grey with a dull yellow and a desaturated green. I borrowed the recipe for the skin from Stuart Bannister's excellent tutorial over at The Lost and the Very Damned. I much prefer the muted green to the heavily saturated greens that many orks sport.

A selection of the first 40k releases. I forgot to include the Dark Elf Trooper in the photo.