Getting Some Models Painted by a Commission Painter: My Story part 1

Hey everyone, BeeCee here.

I wanted to share my experiences with a commission painter and the thought process that went into my decision to allow someone else to paint my models.

Firstly, I am an old school 40k player from way back in second edition. The people I used to game with back then didn't place a huge emphasis on painted models, We were more interested in getting them put together and on the table playing games as fast as possible.

In the beginning, there were four rulebooks.

Fast forward twenty years and I am back in to 40k, While cleaning in my basement, I stumble on my 40k armies and feel the urge to get back in to the game. After a demo game and a not so hard sell, I convince three friends and coworkers to jump headfirst into this game and we haven't looked back. It was then that I stumbled upon a review of a tournament in the twin cities called the Darkstar GT. I had never been to a 40k tourney before but after jumping in to this great 40k community we have by listening/reading Fritz40k, our friends at Forge the Narrative, Frontline Gaming, the tournament discussions on Dakka all saying, "go to a tourney, you WILL have fun!", I decided to give it a try.

The painting blitz I went on will go down in the annals of my hobby life. At the time I did not know what the 6th edition Tyranid codex would bring so I just started feverishly painting up everything I could to get a headstart for the tourney. That's how I made it on this blog; the 40k views painting contest helped me to stay focused on the task at hand and I found the rest of the Grey Tide folks really fit with my vision of what I wanted to do in this hobby. After more late nights than I care to admit, I had my first ever fully painted army. The corner had been turned and I never wanted to play with unpainted models again.

She is not an actress, those tears are real!

So why am I telling you all this?

I know there are many of you out there who read this blog that are just like me, You are a table top quality painter, you are trying to improve, want to take the next step. But more importantly, you are proud of what you've accomplished, whether it be getting your first army to a three color minimum, or converting your first models, etc...

Like me, you may have thought about having someone else paint some models for you but decided against it because you felt like you were selling your hobby out. Maybe you thought if you had one model painted up it would make all your others look like crap.

I agonized over this decision. Was I selling my hobby out? Would I be able to make eye contact with other gamers when they told me my army looked great, knowing that I didn't do it? What would my mom think if she knew I farmed my work out to someone else?

Then I reached the breaking point. I am not sure if I have ever posted my entire grey tide up on the blog before but thanks to selling off three other armies I had when I got back in to the game, Ebay, and overspending on the Tyranid release, I have roughly 9000 points of Tyranids. 380+ models in total. I wanted to focus on my Tyranids. But I also have a sizable Eldar force I wanted to get on the table and get some games in.

This is just a portion of my grey tide.

I needed some help with my eldar...

Next up- choosing a painter and the results.