My name is Manuel Hautz and I am a miniature enthusiast and artist from Düsseldorf in Germany. I love to play miniature board games and paint miniatures that go along with them.
This blog has been created to share my passion for miniature painting with the community. Apart from showing off, I’d like to use this blog as a platform to share my hobby approach and the thoughts behind it and try to cover the following topics:
- Finished paint jobs
- Tutorials of painted miniatures
- Work in progress updates
- A tactical insight of the games I play
- Other general hobby related ramblings
Hobby Bio
The beginning (2010-2011)
Like most painters, my passion for tabletop began with Games Workshop`s Warhammer Fantasy, marking the beginning of a new hobby. In 2010, I became especially involved with painting miniatures, not only the gaming aspect of the hobby. I began with my first army project, called "The Klingenberg Legion." I painted my Vampire Counts army at a basic tabletop level and due to my limited experience, I repainted them over and over again trying out new techniques I have learned on the way and from other painters. In 2011 I found a new challenge: Infinity, the game.The difference in the nature of the projects is evident: painting just a few selected miniatures from Infinity the game compared to the mass units of Warhammer Fantasy required particular dedication to the individual miniature and their details – and believe me, Infinity miniatures have plenty of them!
During this time, my painting skills rapidly improved and I became very involved with my new hobby. I regularly searched the Internet for painting tutorials and other army projects, which strongly motivated me to become a better painter. Since then, my collection of painted Infinity miniatures grew to a full force of the Combined Army.
Deep dive into miniature painting (2012-2015)
By 2012, I was fully immersed in Warhammer Fantasy and attended many tournaments. Regarding my projects, I began thinking about creating something new, something I hadn’t seen so far, in addition to my Vampire Counts army. To improve and develop my painting skills, I wanted to paint with vibrant and light colours, compared to the dark ones I had used for previous projects.Since I’ve always loved the Games Workshop models of the Asrai, I started working on a Wood Elves army, “The Cherry Blossom Grove”. After a year of painting the Wood Elves, I finished all the favourable units and waited for the new army book, but at the time it wasn’t released. As a result, I decided to extend the Cherry Blossom Grove army to be playable by the rules of the “High Elves” army book. This created new opportunities for additional units and characters that could be painted!
The perish of Warhammer Fantasy and hobby time-out (2015-2016)
After Games Workshop killed Warhammer Fantasy in 2015, I lost any motivation to paint or even get some games in – leading to six months break from my hobby. In October 2015 I slowly got back into the hobby. What eventually brought me back and I considered my light at the end of the tunnel was Mantic's “Kings of War 2nd Edition”. A great game with mass-battle characteristics: quick and very tactical, easy to learn, but hard to master – and lots of fun! Change of game systems mainly drew me back into the gaming aspect of the hobby and less into painting. Additionally, changes in my personal life forced me to neglect my hobby and I nearly went a full year without playing or painting, until November 2016.A new beginning (2016-2020)
Vacation means spending time on the things you feel passionate about and for me, one of these things is definitely my tabletop hobby. Visiting an old friend, talking about our mutual hobby and playing some new game systems, I immediately became infatuated with tabletop again!This phase in the evolution of my hobby is the most thrilling one because it seems there are endless opportunities for new projects and gaming involvement. I've been extending my Infinity Combined Army and even started a new one, dived into a new, amazing game called Malifaux and unexpectedly got back into my old love Warhammer. After painting different Malifaux warbands and enjoying the game with friends, I started to extend my old Warhammer army The Cherry Blossom Grove into the new Age.
COVID-19 (2020-now)
When the Coronavirus hit the world everything changed. This had also a huge impact on our hobby. Meeting with friends at the local game store or at home to enjoy games was not possible anymore. At the same time the other part of the hobby, painting and sharing ideas in the community online, became even more important. For me personally, this part of the hobby has made this crisis a little less crap. Also, I became a father and got married. End of 2020 I also started to get into the lore of Warhammer 40k and decided with my gaming group to start my first army.
The journey as a tabletop hobbyist and painter has just begun and there is much more I hope to learn and discover...