Sunday 18 December 2011

Studio Miniatures Zombies 11 - Wedding Zeds

As a special Christmas treat to you my next two posts are going to concentrate on reviews of the latest Studio Miniatures 28mm scale zombie sets. I know that many of you agree with me that Studio Minis make the best sculpted zombies on the market. These five figures that I'm reviewing here come from their Till Death Us Do Part set.

As the name of the set indicates, what we have here is a zombified wedding party. How tragic! At the far left is the priest or minister who was supposed to marry the happy couple. I painted him as an elderly chap with grey hair. He looks to be fairly intact although I did paint on a small bite wound to his right cheek. The blood splatters on his frock are probably from other victims.
Next in line is the bride. She has a row of scratch marks on her left lower arm, a cut to her right upper arm and a deep cut to her left lower leg. She wears a silver tiara, which keeps her veil in place. There is something very sad looking about her face, but is that really surprising? What should have been the happiest day of her life has turned into her worst nightmare.
The groom has fared far worse. His left eye has been gouged out, leaving him with a bloody eye socket. That's going to spoil his looks for the wedding photographs! Whenever I paint my Studio Miniatures figures I generally copy the colour schemes that they provide on the packaging and their website. For this figure, however, I painted his clothing much darker.
For the pageboy, I totally changed his colour scheme. I painted his trousers in the same light brown as the groom's waistcoat and his shirt in the same lemon as the bridesmaid's dress, just to unify them better. The pageboy doesn't look to be wounded at all, although his head is leaning slightly to one side. I have smeared his mouth, chin and neck with blood to indicate that he has recently fed.
Finally, we come to the young bridesmaid, and again, she doesn't appear to be wounded either. I used the same technique on her as the pageboy by smearing the area around her mouth and neck with blood from one of her victims. She also has blood covering the fingers of her left hand.
This is an unusual subject to chose for a set of zombies but as you'd expect, Studio Minis have pulled it off with aplomb. My favourite figure out of the group is the bride, but to be fair, they have all been beautifully and expertly sculpted. It is always a joy to receive a new set of Studio Minis zombies because I know they are going to be a real treat to paint. So it was with this set.
My only criticism of this set is that I'd have liked to have seen even more figures included in the set; specifically, the best man, the father of the bride, the wedding photographer and maybe more family and guests. bridesmaids and pageboys.There's enough choice there to make at least two more sets.
The Till Death Us Do Part set costs £12.99 and is now only available in white metal. It looks like Studio Minis have stopped making resin versions of their zombies. What can I say about this set other than highly recommended? Next time, I'll review the Halloween Horrors by Studio Minis.

19 comments:

  1. Great review and paint jobs! I only have a couple of sets of Studio Miniatures but have always been pleased with their figures. As time and money allows I plan on adding more of their sets to my collection. Hope these guys make it into a batrep someday!

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  2. You are right, they are most likely the best company right now to do zombie miniatures.

    Well done on these mate, they do look lovely!

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  3. @Mike. One thing I can guarantee to you is that any Studio Minis zombies I buy will make it into a batrep. They're simply too good not to use!

    @Johnny. Not only do Studio Minis make the best zombies available but they keep churning them out. Long may they continue to do so!

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  4. Another great set from Studio Miniatures (and I still agree that they are amongst the best, if not the best Z-sculpts out there, though their survivors leave me cold). A larger wedding party aas you suggest would be great, but we do still need a decent church model, I haven't seen one that i particularly like.

    Another great paint-job too, as always.

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  5. @Joe. I agree that some of their survivors are hit and miss but there's no denying the quality of their zombies.

    That's an interesting point you raise about a decent 28mm scale church. I've got a few in my collection of card buildings waiting to get built but none of them cut the mustard. WWG's Cathedrae Noctis is probably the best, but I notice it has been withdrawn from sale, presumably whilst it gets converted to the TLX format.

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  6. Very nice Vampifan. JP will be jealous you beat him to it with this set :D I am going to make a new years resolution to get some Zombies

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  7. they look great, studio make the best zeds

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  8. Thanks, Simon. Some of you may be unaware that Jonathan (JP) and I were having a race to see who could paint this set and the Halloween Horrors set first. JP finished painting a few of them and posted pics of them before me but he's yet to complete both sets. We decided it was only fair to call the result a draw, and I'm happy with that.

    Oh, and Simon, we'll all be hoping that's one resolution you do keep! Good luck, mate!

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  9. @Shintokamikaze. Agreed, they do!

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  10. Those are very nice. Excellent paintjobs as usual. I just recently got my first set of Studio Miniatures Zombies, set #2. I've wanted the Chicken Mascot ever since I saw it on your blog a while back. I was really impressed not only with the quality of the scuplts, but with the packaging. The minis came packaged in a VHS case, and looked like a Zombie movie.

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  11. I have GOT to get this set for the clergyman alone.

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  12. @Luckyjoe. Studio have surprised a lot of people with their packaging. I think the VHS case and the faux movie poster is a great idea. It's just another reason why they are the best at what they do, which is make superb zombie figures.

    @WQRobb. He is good, isn't he?

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  13. @The Extraordinarii. Many thanks.

    @WarRaptor. And more thanks.

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  14. Kill Bill...the zombie version, lovely work my friend.

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  15. Well done Bryan, I think I really need this set... and then a church to go with it! :)

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  16. @Zombie Ad. If you find a good one, let me know, please.

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