Recently, during a visit to my parents' house, I found these two old miniatures, which are the first miniatures I have ever painted (back in 2001, I think):
I bought these minis (and a few other ones) from a man who was visiting illustration & comic book workshop that I was attending back then. That workshop was a magical place where (besides learning how to draw comics), I met a lot of interesting people and learned about many cool games (including Warhammer). So, this person was selling recasts and he mentioned that these miniatures are used in a game called Warhammer (and basically, that's how I found out about the game). He also agreed to show us how the game is played.
So, next week he brought a fully painted 6th edition starter set (the one with empire and Orcs) and a bunch of us played a battle on one of the tables in the studio, with artbooks and comics used as hills and obstacles :) I really liked the game, but at that time, it was very hard to find Warhammer miniatures in Serbia and they were really expensive (and the country was recovering from economic sanctions and bombing campaign, so the whole economic situation was not very good). So, I bought a dozen of recasts - I understood they were not the "real" miniatures, but they were cheap and it was a first step, anyway. At that time I also learned that there was a set of fan-made rules in Serbian, called "Sword & sorcery". These rules were used for playing small skirmish games with just a handful of miniatures (much like Age of Sigmar Skirmish or Warcry rulesets). I managed to find copy of those rules as well and played a few battles with my brother using these miniatures.
Some time later, I learned about the "White Dwarf" magazine - also from a guy that visited the studio from time to time. As far as I remember, he was not collecting Warhammer miniatures, but he liked the miniatures in general and he liked the magazine as well. So, I borrowed a few issues from him - one issue every week. I would look at the pictures of miniatures and battlefields for hours and I started reading lore articles, rules articles and painting articles. I carried the WD to school as well, and read it with a firend of mine during the breaks between the classes.
By reading painting articles in the magazine, I actually learned the basics of miniature painting. I found a bunch of oil paints that my mother used while she was painting and decided to paint a few miniatures using them. Both of these miniatures on the picture above were painted with oil paints, using some god-awful brushes (and I did not wash the brushes properly, so I destroyed a few of them while painting these Orcs :D). I remember that I tried to make my own washes by diluting paint with water and applying it in the same way as wash (actually, it somewhat worked) and I also used tea and sand as a flock for the base.
I am glad that I found these two miniatures, because they remind me on those days when I discovered this beautiful hobby (and how amazed I was with all the possibilities it offered). Today, I have several armies for multiple game systems, but back then, when I was a teenager - it was a distant dream. And I also love them because they remind me on my first attempts at miniature painting - so I can see how my skills have progressed since then.
