What I Saw at Nova Open 2026

 Number Three and I headed over for a couple of hours yesterday to see what there was to see. Yes, the parking was obnoxious and far away. My preferences are definitely suburban: pull up to the venue, park, walk in. Not drive around, hunt for an open space up one block then down another, finally surrender and find a lot. Pay over 20ish dollars, walk half a mile up/down hill in the heat. Arrive sweaty and uncomfortable. There was a time when city living was all I wanted, but having had plenty of it over the years, my tastes have evolved toward comfort. More importantly, I value my time more than ever and resent having it wasted. I've got plenty to do without having to cushion events for finding parking, let alone dropping that kind of cash for it. 

In any event, the distribution of crowds was a bit different this time around as we entered. For once, we had easy access to the painting contest area, usually a space that's too crowded to approach without patience. That and the crafting area seemed especially quiet. The main GW ballroom was relatively light compared to the independent room that has all the LOTR, Star Wars, Age of Sigmar, and Trench Crusade games and all that.

I mention all that as it determines what I can comfortably shoot without disturbing any particular pair of gamers. The crowds were thick, and it was difficult to navigate the narrow lanes among the tables. My camera roll is significantly smaller than it has been in the past. 

There seemed to be fewer oddball angry trans folks around this time. We also saw fewer YouTube famous people: no Uncle Atom, no Vince Venturella, no Miniac, nor Ninjon. Maybe they didn't go this year? We were only there for a pair of hours, but we did see and talk with Brent of Goobertown Hobbies and Goblin Games. He was busy demonstrating his stampin' kits. I was on the fence and bought new brushes and some new Pro Acryl paints instead. I may still get some of that stuff, but not this month.

Like the HMGS cons, Saturday seems to be a bad day for vending (my principal pursuit at these); a lot of stuff I was looking for was out of stock. There is a guy who carries Krautcover, for example, but he had a skeletal supply left when I got there. No Your Hobby Place this time, nothing really interesting for Number Three either - no whimsical or brightly colored 3D-printed toys that she was hoping for. 

Increasingly common, I had no purchase list at all but still found some impulse buys. 

Overall, I cannot judge the health of this side of the hobby. YouTube is always harping about how GW sucks, and the new rules or miniatures are expensive and /or unavailable. People are quitting left and right. Maybe attendance was down, or I'm there at the wrong times. Seemed solid to me, especially in the non-Warhammer games area. 

On to the pics! And, wow, I did not take many. First up - the Capital Palette, the painting competition:

Oh - oh - oh! A Colonial thing! Well done!

More historical things!

Jolly clever with the gunman's shadow telegraphing his fate. Really well done!

So that's it for the painting competition - on to the competition spaces

This was in the main competition ballroom, kinda neat. Most of the stuff in here is pretty ugly sci-fi industrial-type stuff. Despite the similarities, not really my hobby. 

Some have some crossover appeal - like this cool adobe building- but not much. 

 

... And ... that's it. I didn't find a lot that excited me much this time around. There may have been crowds around some of the other things I would have normally shot. The place was rotten with the younglings and the generational divide between us remains fairly wide. That said, the grognards don't care for my take on fantasy much either, so I have to wear a snowflake badge with some pride, as usual! 

As always, thanks for looking - questions, comments, and followers are welcome and encouraged! I'm doing more and more on Facebook so follow my page there too! https://www.facebook.com/One-of-My-Men-Became-Restless-100659928063858

25/28mm Citadel Wood - (Bonus - Monster Fight Club Tree Scatter and More)

 I was working on two sets of Citadel Wood and had other dead trees lying around unfinished, so did this whole lot together.

Let's do the miscellaneous first: 

The two standing trees I bought at what is usually the Miniature Building Authority at Fall In. Now, that booth is kind of a hybrid thing, with painted and unpainted stuff as well as product not yet (or never to be) on their website. Not sure what all is going on there, but I did get some lovely bits: pre-painted topiary/hedge pieces seen in the background here. That's three of seven pieces of Edwardian-era manor house hedges. 

These - a stump and two fallen trees are from Monster Fight Club. I have six standing (and healthy) trees to do, which, as you may know, come with a separate canopy that rests over what are leaflesss limbs. 

That's a Warlord Napoleonic figure there for comparison. These are not great trees to me, but when mixed in with the rest of my Haunted Forest collection, they will be cool to have alongside them. The print lines are evident, the bark is not quite right and the design suggests long feces rather than a tree branch. For a Haunted Wood, they look suitably uncanny.

Ok! On to the Citadel Wood!

My hobbying practice often, as you may have gathered, involves starting a project, losing interest about halfway through, then moving on to something else. This was one such endeavor. The canopies were stolen to make these: 

Then, I primed the trunks and the bases and made quite a bit of progress with the bases before getting distracted for a few years.

I broke another brittle Wargames Atlantic printed model of Napoleon's Women Camp Followers and was so pissed, I pushed those to the side and did this instead. How many have to break before I finish painting them? 

The bases were easy enough to finish. I remember quitting as I was uninterested in painting all the skulls, roots and details. But I had done the stones, and all the earth so this was easy to pick up where I left off. And there's the rub: I only buy what I'll use, so it was inevitable I would circle back to this. But rather than starting from scratch, the project was half finished - a couple days work! Breaking up a big project into smaller pieces is sound advice, but it usually doesn't require years of delay before picking up the next few tasks. 

In any event, la!:

They look "busy." 

Let's look at them in their component parts: 

The Bases: 

One thing I'm glad I did ages ago was to make pints of my three layers of earth paints at Home Depot. I've put these into dropper bottles so I always have the exact same colors to build up, giving all my basing a consistency that would be hard to replicate today. 

Like all my basing now, I try to combine at least three different textures and colors to all my ground cover. These had grass sculpted on that I had painted and highlighted but once I added tufts, grass cover, and clump foliage (Woodland Scenics in Olive and Light Green), the sculpted grass looked awful and unnatural. So I pulled what is called "Steppe Grass" from Army Painter and just glued it over the sculpted grass. It's a terrible color for Steppe Grass, honestly, but works fine here. 

You'll recall I did a post about Leaf Punches from Greenstuff World. For the leaf piles I used generic "dead leaves" but, on the stones, I glued those nicely shaped punched leaves so that when you look, it suggests all the leaves are actually leaves and not just flat irregularities. 

Let's look at the trees themselves:

In two sets of Wood, there are three unique trees. Assembly can make them even more unique as there are many options when placing the lesser, smaller branches. 

I don't want duplicates, so all are different. 

I basically copied the techniques I used on the big bases on to the individual tree bases. I did not get the stones exactly right, but they are close enough. Note the odd leaf highlighed on the stones. I covered up the painted grass with the Army Painter Steppe Grass to match. 

They look nice enough on their own, I think. 

All together now: 

Though they look busy and cluttered, most woods do. Mission accomplished! I do need to seal them up when the weather warms up a bit. 

Work traveling this week, so not sure what is next. Camp Followers? Napoleonic odds and ends? I need to finish some quantity of half-finished projects. Perhaps 18mm Blue Moon Pirates? A second unit of Oathmark Heavy Dwarves?

As always, thanks for looking - questions, comments and followers are welcome and encouraged! I'm doing more and more on Facebook so follow my page there too! https://www.facebook.com/One-of-My-Men-Became-Restless-100659928063858