Miniature Painting Part 3

Wow, it's been a year and a half since my last post about mini-painting. If any of you were following me for that, you must be gravely disappointed.

For those who don't remember, about two years ago I started a new hobby - painting gaming miniatures. I don't play Warhammer, but I do a lot of roleplaying game minis (Dungeons & Dragons, Star Wars, etc) and I'm branching out to some other things. I did a whole series of posts about painting and modelling for the 2023 A-to-Z Blog Challenge. I meant to continue using this blog as a place to share some of my creations, but I've been really irregular about it. 

So anyway, let's get back to it. For reference, I think this batch are all models I painted about a year ago.

It's nice to see how far you've progressed. Below are two models. The one on the left is one of the very first I painted, well over twenty years ago. The one on the right is a new one. I think I've doing pretty good.

These are from the first painting contest I ever entered last summer. The character, the "Red Scribe," is from an actual play podcast set in the Lord of the Rings universe, featuring a bunch of notable gaming folks, such as Reggie Watts, Deborah Ann Woll and Luke Gygax (Gary Gygax's son). It also featured Sala Baker, an actor and stuntman who played Sauron in the Lord of the Rings movies (he was the guy inside the sharp pointy armour), as well as numerous orcs and other monsters, and an appearance by Elijah Wood. It was in support of Children's Miracle Network, and anyway there was an associated painting competition. The scene I depicted was when the heroes encountered the new villain at the Grey Havens (years after most of the elves had gone West over the sea). 

I did not win anything, but I thought my entry was pretty good and I was happy with how it turned out. It was fun to have a set goal and a deadline, as usually my painting is pretty laissez-faire. 

Here are some random baddies I made for nothing in particular, just because they would be useful for any D&D game. I used mostly Army Painter Speedpaints (I talked about these last time), which makes it very quick and easy to get a decent outcome, but I continue to notice how bad I am at taking photos. 

Here are some minis that were inspired by a specific game. I was playing D&D with my kids and nieces, and somehow the bad guys ended up as this organization that destroyed forests just for the fun of it - they called them the "Anti-Environmental League." So I made some models to match, with even a some custom-painted coat-of-arms. These bad guys were also featured in the yearly Christmas book last year, which I'll probably talk about at some point.

Finally, I'm quite proud of these models of Rincewind and Death from Terry Pratchett's Discworld. They're a little larger than the miniatures I usually paint (about 10cm tall), so on the one hand it was easier to paint some of the detail. On the other hand, there was also MORE detail than usual, so it took a lot longer as well. 

Anyway, that's an update about where I'm at with my painting (or where I was about a year ago). Maybe next time I'll show some of the larger pieces I've done, or maybe something about the terrain you see in the backgrounds (all those pretty trees and stone walls). 

Hopefully I'll see you sooner than 18 months this time!

Hugs & Kisses,
-CDGK

Still Blogging (#IWSG April 2024)

Busy, busy, busy... It's the craziest week of the year at my day job, so I have to keep this short. Which is too bad, since I actually had a story cooking about the monthly question.

Writing and revision have been slow due to how busy it's been at work, but it is plodding along slowly. Hopefully when I'm over that hump I can jump back into it and finally put Gale Harbour 3 to bed (or at least off to the editor).

April Question - How long have you been blogging?

My first blogging experience wasn't with this blog, but with a tabletop gaming blog called RuleoftheDice.com. I wrote about role-playing games and tried way too hard to be edgy - some of the early posts are particularly cringy. 

I won't go into too much detail, but suffice to say I do miss the community. The RPG community at the time was very vibrant, and despite the arguments between "Old school" and modern games, there were a lot of great conversations to be had. A lot of it took place on the now-defunct Google+ social media platform, which I also kinda miss because I never found those same groups again. I mean there are also gaming groups on Facebook but OH MY GOD those people are obnoxious.

How about you? Anyone else lament to the changes to blogging and social media over the years?

Hugs & Kisses,
-CDGK

The first Wednesday of every month is officially Insecure Writer’s Support Group day. Writers post their thoughts on their blogs, talking about their doubts and the fears they have conquered. It's a chance for writers to commiserate and offer a word of encouragement to each other. Check out the group at http://www.insecurewriterssupportgroup.com/

My Miniature Painting Journey (Part 2: Speedpaint and Etsy)

This is an ongoing series about my newly re-discovered love of painting miniature gaming figurines. To read part one, click here. It was mostly about old lead minis and how I didn't thin my paints properly.

The last thing I shared in my previous post were a couple of Stormtroopers I painted, which were a pain in the ass because white is a really hard colour to work with. The reason I painted those Stormtroopers was because I was hoping I would be running a Star Wars roleplaying game. I've probably mentioned it before, but I'm a huge fan of the old Star Wars roleplaying game, and I was going through a phase where I was trying to convince my family to play a game with me. It... still hasn't happened, but it gave me an excuse to paint some Star Wars minis, which is lots of fun.

This batch were not official models from Lucasfilm, but from a designer called Black Remnant Studios. I bought the files from his Patreon and then had them 3D-printed on Etsy. After buying a couple of dozen of these is when I realized I should probably get my own 3D Printer.

After my poor experience painting Stormtroopers, I tried this Imperial Admiral using a dry-brushing technique. It worked pretty well, but it left a dusty texture on the mini which I don't like. I've since learned that this is caused by the material you use to wipe the paint off your brush, so I'm hoping the next one works better. There's also a little drip of red coming off his rank insignia that drives me nuts—I can't remember why I didn't fix it. I think I tried several times and each time I added white I messed up the colours, each time I fixed the colours I messed up the white, etc... sometimes you just have to know when to quit.

These Ewoks were done mostly with Army Painter Speedpaints. Speedpaints are a type of high-viscosity contrast paint that contains different weights of pigments, so the the darker, heavier pigments sink to the recesses of the models, and the lighter, brighter pigments sit on top. Basically it has your contrast layers built in, allowing you to paint your model much faster. In theory this is great, but it's a bit trickier than than the advertisements suggest. First, you really need to put this paint over a light, preferably white, undercoat in order for the colours to come out properly. It's hard to tell from these pictures because I messed with the brightness so much, but I used a dark grey primer on the Ewoks so they came out REALLY dark with the Speedpaint, which I was not happy about.

The other, even worse drawback is that Speedpaint never really dries. When you paint over it with anything wet, it reactivates and the paint mixes with your new medium. There are ways around it when you get the hang of it, but it's a huge headache when you're first using the stuff.

This batch of models was also some of the first I tried with custom basing (decorating the base the minis are sitting on). The Ewoks have "dry moss" material I got from the dollar store, which worked out okay.

These Jawas also used Speedpaints, which I was starting to get the hang of and worked a bit better. There are much nicer contrast gradations on their robes and belt pouches. The sand on these guys also came from the dollar store, but I painted it this time so it gave it a passable desert-looking appearance. 

This is the Crimson Corsair, a character who gets like 15 seconds of screen time in The Force Awakens. Still, it was one of my favourite paint jobs for a long time. I used a combination of regular acrylic and Speedpaint and I think it worked well. This was my first time using some gloss varnish for the helmet to give it a little extra pop (usually I use matte varnish for everything). Varnish is important for minis to protect the paint job from scuffs and scratches when you're handling them on a game table. I use matte varnish, which cuts down on glare and light reflections, which can ruin the details on such small figures.

Something varnish doesn't protect against though is the fact that 3D printer resin is really brittle. My daughter knocked this guy off a table and broke off the end of his rifle (it should be sticking overtop of his shoulder). I never found the broken piece and it irked me for a long time.

Speaking of my daughter, she picked this figurine out at the game store and asked me to paint it for her. This one is not 3D-printed, it's made of cast plastic (which is why the sword is bent—I've since learned how to fix that). It turned out pretty well—the blue is Speedpaint, which explains the really nice contrast there. The armour is a metallic silver with some darker wash in the recesses, which came out nicely. 

My daughter wanted her to have purple hair, and I bought purple metallic paint by accident, but went with it anyway. The sword was also metallic purple, but I tried to add a red tint to it and turned it completely red instead. Oh, well. My daughter liked it like that so overall I call it a success.

This is a dwarven toilet paper salesman. It was also 3D printed from Etsy. I bought it because it was hilarious and I don't regret it. Painted entirely with Speedpaint except drybrushing for the white, I was mostly happy with this one, and I was starting to get the hang of the Speedpaint...

...so with Santa Claus  I didn't use any Speedpaint at all! This is another Etsy special... I paid a lot of shipping leading up to Christmas. For Santa I used all straight Vallejo and Army Painter acrylics, and tried to shade and highlight it by hand. I used a bit too much wash, but overall I was super happy with it, until I put on the varnish.

Up until this point I used Army Painter Anti-Shine Varnish, which comes in little 17ml bottles and is very forgiving. I was getting low on the AP stuff, so I bought a larger bottle of Vallejo matte varnish, and this was the first model I used it on. I shook it up well (which I guess you're not supposed to do) because it went on with tons of tiny little airbubbles. I noticed it but didn't think anything of it, until the air bubbles hardened and popped, leaving ugly craters ALL over my Santa Claus. They're hard to see in the picture above, so here's a close-up:

Apologies to anyone with Trypophobia.

Finally, since I did the knight above for my daughter, here's one I did for my son. We have a little pug named Grimm that he adores, so of COURSE I had to paint a pug dressed like a Grim Reaper! It would have looked better if it was a beige-coloured dog, but since our guy is black I had to work with what I had. I was also pretty pleased with this one, especially with the wrappings around the handle of the scythe, as well as the blade itself.

I've discovered as I go on with this hobby, I often find little things that I like or did well with specific models, and I try to incorporate those things with future paintjobs. I learn something everything time I paint a mini (especially at this point—I was in the middle of a rapid learning curve when I did the models collected here), so I am slowly add new skills to my toolbox. This Grimm the Reaper was also the first time I was happy with the eyes of a mini. You probably noticed from most of my models that I don't usually paint eyes... because it's REALLY HARD when the eyeballs are like half a millimeter wide. At least Grimm's were a bit bigger. 

All that to say, painting eyes is NOT something that's made it into my toolbox yet...

Anyway, that brings us up to Christmas, when I got my 3D Printer. Now I've started printing and painting ALL KINDS of stuff. Stay tuned for the next update!

Hugs & Kisses,

-CDGK

My Miniature Painting Journey (Part 1: The Beginning)

 I've been spending a lot of time painting miniatures and models lately (more than I've spent writing, honestly), so I thought I would share some of my passion here. I would probably be better off doing this on Instagram or Reddit or something, but I've got a platform here, so I might as well use it!

I got a 3D printer for Christmas, so there are A LOT of models to paint. And this just shows the finished or nearly finished ones. I have several dozen more waiting in the wings.

Below are some of the very first minis I painted, about 20 years ago. I had no idea what I was doing - I didn't have the proper paints, I didn't prime them first, I used crappy brushes. I bought them cheap at a comic and gaming store in Toronto (the store that was actually the inspiration for The Spider's Parlour in Hell Comes to Hogtown), and they're all metal - unlike today's minis which are usually plastic or resin. The little goblin I believe is actually made of lead.

Though I enjoyed painting them at the time, I got busy with other things (not to mention frustrated because I didn't know what I was doing), so I didn't do much painting for many years. Flash forward to this past fall (October 2022), when I picked up a paintbrush again on a lark. I don't even remember what spurred the idea, I just decided one day that I wanted to give it a try again.

I started with some old Star Wars minis, which I bought the same time as the fantasy models above but were even older (they were originally sold in the 80s and I'm pretty sure they're all lead). I repainted them, using some of the knowledge I gained from the YouTube and other sites on the Internet. They still aren't great, but they're miles ahead of the originals.

I actually primed them this time, but I was still using cheap, lumpy, dollar-store craft paint, which is very hard to work with on stuff this small.

From there, I bought some new, plastic minis, and discovered that these models have progressively gotten larger. The old Star Wars minis above were true 28mm scale, meaning they're barely an inch tall. Nowadays the standard seems to be edging toward 32mm. The new Star Wars Legion Stormtroopers I bought were closer to 40mm (like 1-3/4 inches), which made them easier to paint but also made them look like giants compared to my old models.

They're a slight improvement from my previous models, but still not anything to write home about. Painting solid white is hard, especially since I still didn't mix or thin my paints properly.

Plus, I was really sick at the time so my hands were not exactly steady. The Stormtrooper on the right was painted while I had COVID, the one on the left was after I got better. There is a noticeable difference in quality.

So have I gotten any better in the ensuing months? We shall see! You'll have to wait with baited breath until my next update. 

(Spoiler: Marginally. I've improved marginally.)

Hugs & Kisses,

-CDGK

May the 4th Be With You (And Roll to Dodge)

NERD ALERT: This post is mostly about role-playing and table-top games, and features lots of stories of me playing with my friends when we were teenagers. Your interest in the topic may vary tremendously.

For those who don't care about RPG's, I throw in a few funny behind the scenes pictures from Star Wars. Those are always good for a laugh.

I wrote a long post last year on the 40th Anniversary of Star Wars so I won't bombard you with that again, nor will I get into a debate about whether The Last Jedi was good or not (I quite enjoyed it, and it's FAR from the worst Star Wars movie). I did want to at least recognize the passing of this most holy day on the Jedi calendar in some way, though.

Last year I mentioned that in my early teens my friends and I played a Star Wars role-playing game (think Dungeons & Dragons but with lasers and spaceships instead of swords and monsters) obsessively for about a year and a half. We were always playing something, but Star Wars was probably our favourite. We played at least 2 or 3 times a week after school, and any time I wasn't playing I was thinking of ideas for our next session. We played so hard I actually wore-out the hardcover rule book. I still have it, with a broken spine and a ripped cover and half the pages dog-eared and falling out.

This guy. Except my copy looks like something that was pulled out of a 1000-year-old urn at from the bottom of the Dead Sea.

There was a number of guys that cycled in an out of our group, and some memorable characters cycled in-and-out. The core gang was myself as game master and four players, who I think I mentioned in my last post. They started out as a gang of rough, travelling hobos and stoners who grew up to be famous heroes that changed the fate of the galaxy. The original characters were actually based on characters from The Stoned Age, a coming-of-age movie set in the 70s.

Our de-facto leader was Wookie Nookie, a 7-foot tall human who looked like Jim Morrison crossed with Jerry Garcia. He was a "Quixotic" Jedi, an old stoner who claimed he had learned the ways of the Force from Yoda back in the day but had been in hiding since the rise of the Empire. No one really believed him, but of course it turned out he actually was a Jedi and eventually became Luke Skywalker's right-hand-man in a new Jedi Academy decades later. Yes, he had a terrible name but remember, these characters all started out as stoner jokes.

This picture creeps me out for some reason.

His side-kick was a Jedi Apprentice named Kan Saga, who had learned a bit about the Force before losing his original teacher and being forced to follow Wookie's teaching. He was the young naive guy who was corrupted by Wookie in both the ways of the Force and lifestyle, but eventually both became powerful and respected Jedi Knights. But Kan was always itching to defeat a Dark Jedi in single combat, which leads us too...

Chris Bahn was our cocky but straight-laced pilot, a Rebel fighter ace who had such a broad story I don't even remember all the details. After helping the Rebellion win the war against the Empire he got married, had kids, ran a successful galaxy-wide shipping business and even found time to start training as a Jedi, too. He was never as powerful as Kan or Nookie, though, which ultimately led to him accidentally turning to the Dark Side. I say "accidentally" because it happened on a random, really unlucky roll (remember, this was actually a game with rules and dice). It could have been fixed but Kan Saga saw his chance to fight a Dark Jedi and immediately said "You're evil. I have to kill you!" and he did. It was an epic and heart-breaking conclusion to our years-long story arc and we pretty much stopped playing after that. I think Kan was actually probably the evil one in that situation, and perhaps the story warranted a sequel where Chris' daughter came looking for revenge, but we such resolution was never meant to be.

Little-known fact: Obi-Wan Kenobi was actually Luke Skywalker's babushka.

They flew around in Wookie's starship, The Blue Torpedo, which was a beat-up old shuttle that was only intended for one person, yet they regularly carried 4-8 people in it. It had a Blue Oyster Cult logo painted on the roof. They had a droid, a giant, obsolete repair droid they called Snot Rag that was completely useless and spoke in a Robbie-the-Robot voice. They gave it a blaster but it was so terrible with it there was a better chance of it shooting one of its allies than any stormtroopers. The players of course thought this was hilarious.

A few other players came and went through our adventures, including another Rebel pilot who kept a sex bot with him for those long, lonely, interstellar flights. Then there was an actual wookiee, who had an awesome and surprisingly mature story arc for a 15-year old where he disgraced himself in combat in order to save his friends and then had to go on a trial and a suicide quest on the wookiee homeworld to redeem himself. Of course he survived and everything was happy in the end, which was a hell of a lot better than Chris Bahn's fate. He recited the lyrics to Gowan's "A Criminal Mind" during the trial.

George Lucas is so pleased with himself.

She's not one of your special effect props, George!

We tried to go back and play Star Wars again last year, but it wasn't the same, even with a couple of the original players joining on Skype. Part of it is that the rules of the game felt clunky and weird (RPGs have evolved a lot in 25 years), but I could have adapted that, tweaking and fixing them over time. The bigger problem though was that we're not 14 anymore, and we don't have to play 10 or more hours a week, and live and dwell in our characters and stories all the time. We only played a handful of times, and the sessions were weeks or even months apart. And we were always distracted by other things. I really envy people who can still find time to have regular gaming sessions into their late 30s and beyond, because so far it hasn't worked for me.

Recently I started playing a very low-key "roleplaying game" with my 6 year old son. We use his LEGO Star Wars figures and roll dice to decide who wins fights. I even give him simple choices to let him decide how the story will go, or to make strategic choices about how his characters should handle problems. It's pretty primitive right now, but I hope as he gets a little older we can go even bigger. HE LOVES the idea of it, and has a fabulous imagination for making up characters and stories. He's been asking if his best friend from school can come over and play with us. One of his cousins is a little older and is way into fantasy and games, so I think we could recruit her as well. Maybe in the near future my gaming group will consist of me and a bunch of pre-teens. Is that weird?

They do not look impressed with the chaperons for their high school dance.

That post turned out to be way longer than I expected, and I don't even remember what my original point was. Something about Star Wars, and how it influenced my gaming (and story-telling) preferences, and continues to colour my life until this game.

Man, I put a lot of stock into that friggin' movie.

How would the story have been different if Luke accidentally hit the wrong button right here?

May the 40th Be With You

May 25, 1977.

Forty years ago today, a film was released that would forever change movie-making and fandom in North America. I'm not going to go into an in-depth discussion of that movie, you can get that at countless sites around the internet. Instead, I'm going to reminisce on my personal experiences with that film and how it affected my own life. Plus I'm going to share some of my favourite backstage set photos.

Sir Alec Guinness celebrating his birthday on the set of Star Wars. Fun fact: Mark Hamill, still playing Luke Skywalker, is now older than Guinness was when they filmed the original movie.

Star Wars came out a few years before I was born. Return of the Jedi came out when I was only three, so I didn't get to see any of original trilogy in theatres during it's original run. I first remember watching Star Wars on broadcast television when I was about five or six. I was in my room watching it on a 12-inch black & white TV. I must have been sick, because I didn't usually have a TV in my room, my parents must have put it there because I was stuck in bed. I vividly remember watching Obi-Wan on Tatooine, a scene probably not far off from the one they were shooting in the photo above.

The next time you complain about CGI, remember that poor Kenny Baker spent YEARS inside that bucket for these movies.

I don't remember many details about it, but I remember I must have liked it because I had my parents tape it the next time it came on and then I watched it repeatedly. I loved the space ships and lightsabers and wanted some of my own, though by that time the toy craze was waning and the action figures and models were hard to find. When I visited my older cousin a few months later and discovered he had literally HUNDREDS of the figures, plus the Millennium Falcon and a TIE fighter and gads of other stuff, I was SO jealous. The biggest shock I got that visit though, was when my cousin told me that Darth Vader was Luke Skywalker's father.

I couldn't believe it. I got mad at him for lying to me. He swore it was true. I of course hadn't seen The Empire Strikes Back yet, and my tiny mind could not process this new information. When we got home I made my parents rent Empire and Jedi (video rental was a big deal in the mid-eighties) and watched them as the ever-expanding universe exploded my mind. AT-AT walkers. Yoda. Ewoks. Jabba the Hutt. A GREEN lightsaber. I never did get any of the toys, but those images were permanently seared into my impressionable young mind. 

The thing I love the most about the original movie is how earnest everything is. The cast and crew really seemed to be having fun.

Eventually my interests moved on to other things. I got into other movies and cartoons, starting playing baseball and collecting hockey cards, got big into LEGO. Star Wars was always there, but it wasn't an over-powering central focus in my life. But then, in the early nineties when I was about 12 years old, it all came crashing back in a torrent.

Several events came together in a perfect storm for me. New Star Wars novels started appearing, featuring the continuing adventures of Luke, Han, Leia, and an ever-growing cast of supporting characters. New toys started popping up, too. I was actaully get a little old for it, but I wasn't going to turn up my chance to finally get a lightsaber and a Darth Vader action figure. 

Oh, Chewie, you giant hairy pervert.

The biggest thing though, was that I had started to get into roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons, and I discovered that Star Wars had a roleplaying game, too! I could create my own adventures and characters, and tell new stories with my friends. It was glorious! My friends and I played every day after school for months on end, crafting a broad, decades-spanning epic about our own rag-tag group of heroes: Kan Saga, the serious, studious Jedi student. Cris Bahn, the rebel-pilot-turned-businessman, who ran a galaxy-wide shipping business, settled down with a family, and then went out and started training as a Jedi. Wookie Nookie, the loser/stoner/artist/musician Jedi who had survived the Emperor's purge and eventually went on to become the greatest Jedi master of them all, taking over Luke Skywalker's school for him.

Our adventures went on for over a year (of real time, like I said, it was decades in the game), until in the epic climax Cris Bahn turned to the Dark Side and Kan Saga immediately murdered him. Our stories always ended that way.

You try to do this without laughing.

Now, because I had forged personal connections and bonds to it, Star Wars had dug even deeper into my soul. I was a massive, unabashed Star Wars nerd. I would not only celebrate the release of Star Wars every year on May 25, I would also celebrate September 25, Mark Hamill's birthday. I actually put up a picture of Mark on my locker one year for "Mark Hamill Day" and got beaten up for it. 

I don't know if nerd bullying still exists today, but it was certainly alive and well in 1994. 

Jump ahead twenty years. My interests and obsessions with Star Wars waxed and waned over the years, but recently something amazing has started to happen. My kids have started getting into Star Wars, and I'm getting to experience it for the first time all over again. 

Two Christmases ago, my son, just shy of four, got a little toy X-wing and TIE fighter. He was visiting me at work on Christmas Eve, and we ran down the hall together, saying "pew pew!" as the ships chased each other back and forth. Over the next year he got more toys, and Star Wars LEGO, and books, and pretty soon he was super into it. I didn't need to force (no pun intended) it on him - he picked it up quickly on his own and started to ask for more. I don't know if he just saw how excited I was for it, or if it genuinely touches some deep story-telling part of kids. Heck, even his 2-year old sister is getting into it, and she already knows all the characters - Leia, Dawth Vader, Chewie, Yoda, Awtoo, Treepio. It just seems to strike a chord with kids.

An incredibly rare sight: Harrison Ford laughing.

This past Christmas, I watched Star Wars with my son for the first time. He sat on the couch and snuggled into me as the Star Destroyer roared across the screen at the beginning, watching enraptured as the stormtroopers burst through the doors, blasting away at the rebels. It wasn't long before he was on his feet though, and I'll never forget the sight of him bouncing up and down in excitement as the X-wings attacked the Death Star at the end. 

A few weeks later, when we visited Legoland for his 5th birthday, we found a life-sized LEGO model of R2-D2. He insisted I give him my debit card, because he wanted to "protect the secret plans!" and re-enact the scene were Leia loads the Death Star plans into the droid.

It's all come full-circle. Star Wars, as a cultural phenomenon, has grown to unfathomable size. And as long as it keeps making money for Disney, new movies will keep coming out. And I'm okay with that. It's become something bigger than George Lucas, bigger than the original fans who loved it in the 70s and 80s. It now belongs to millions of people, and while it brings them all together it means something different to every one of them. 

I'm perfectly happy with that. I don't know if my kids will grow up to be Star Wars nerds or if they will show the movies to their kids with the same relish I did, but that's okay. It means something different to everyone. For me, I think my memories of watching my kids watching Star Wars are even better than my those of me watching it myself. 

Thank you for giving joy to my family and I for forty years. Here's to forty more.

Also, any time you start to take Star Wars too seriously, just remember that there's a sweaty, tanned dude in pink hotpants just out of frame.

BONUS PICS

Vanity Fair released a wonderful article and series of photographs by Annie Leibovitz yesterday about Episode VIII: The Last Jedi. You should go check them out here, but a couple of the photos were just so poignant I had to steal borrow them to share here. Enjoy.

Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill with Last Jedi director Rian Johnson and Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy (probably the most powerful woman in Hollywood). Also, Carrie and Mark's dogs are there, because of course they are. I love this picture.

Mark and Carrie did this for forty years. Go back and look at some of those pictures of them as kids and try not to get choked up at this one.

Carrie Fisher with her daughter, Billie Lourd, who plays Lt. Kaydel Connix in The Force Awakens and the upcoming The Last Jedi. Sigh. We're still getting over you, Carrie.