World Eaters Praetor

Work on my World Eaters is progressing slowly but surely, today I put together my force's Praetor using the Forge World Legion Champion kit. I thought he'd actually look more a little more menacing looking away from the sword. I also dropped the fancy back pack and pauldron and added a vexilla to mark him out on the battlefield.

Christmas Inspiration...

Inspired by reading through my new copy of Forge World's Horus Heresy: Betrayal book I've managed to squeeze a little Christmas hobby time in by finishing assembling the beginnings of a Legion Tactical Squad to go alongside a Legion Terminator Squad (in custom armour) and a Centurion for my main project for 2013, a World Eaters Legion force. Assembling Angron is on the to do list as is gettin the second half of the Tactical Squad done (should be here by the end of January)...

Anyone else gearing up forward new project for the new year?

Merry Christmas!

Well, we beat the apocalypse and Christmas has finally arrived. I'll be downing my tools, brushes and mini's for the next couple of days but just wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas... hopefully there'll be some great hobby goodness waiting for us all under the tree in the morning!

Plague Marine WIP - II

Well, this is now more fun than scary. I'm really happy with how this mini's shaping up. Still need to sort the base but I have a few ideas for that now. I'm actually enjoying painting the corrupt pestilence of Papa Nurgle's children so much that I've decided to get some more if I can...

Plague Marine WIP

This entry for another competition is something of a departure for me as I generally aim for very clean finishes on my miniatures but I think that this plague-ridden hulk  is starting to look suitably disgusting...

Dark Angels Veteran Sergeant - Completed

Got this fella finished up last night. Having seen some of the other entries in the competition I'm not really rating his chances but I'm still pretty happy with how he turned out:

Despite having to work out a couple of colour issues this mini was a joy to paint and I was mightily impressed with how easy it was to assemble too, in fact if I didn't know better I don't think it'd be possible to tell that this was a push fit mini from a 'starter set'.

Dark Angels Veteran Sergeant WIP

The guys over on World Wide Bits Traders on Facebook are running a competition just now where the only qualifier for entry is that the miniature must be from the Warhammer 40,000 Dark Vengeance boxed set. I had originally planned to paint up one of the cultists for the competition but in the end I had a complete change of heart and decided to go with Lion El Johnson's sons:

He's still a Work in Progress although I'm pretty happy with the progress I've made so far as there's only a few areas to finish up now. The competition closes on the 14th of December (next Friday) so I'll post some pictures of the completed mini up then.

Ivanus Enkomi - Completed

After a break from painting over the weekend I got this project finished this afternoon:

This is a fantastically detailed mini that was really good fun to paint. For a while to begin with I wasn't sure that the bronze plating idea I'd had was going to work but I think that it looks quite striking now it's completed and fits well with greco-roman theme of the Minotaurs chapter.

Ivanus Enkomi Update II

The finish line is now in sight for this mini. I just need to highlight up the black and he'll be done. With better light outside today I thought I'd get some photos from different angles to show him off a little.

Ivanus Enkomi Update

Progress has been kinda slow on this mini mainly down to me not feeling like painting as the cold I've got is playing havoc with my sinuses. But I've finally got to a point where there's something worth showing. I'm hoping to have him closer to completion by the end of the week.

Minotaurs, Ho!

Spent a few hours this evening cleaning and assembling one of Forge World's fabulous Ivanus Enkomi Minotaurs Chaplain mini's that was very kindly sent to me by a good friend in the US of A. The detailing on the mini is astounding and it fit together with the minimum of fuss. I decided to reverse his pose on his base to make him more intimidating as befits one of the spiritual leaders of the Adeptus Astartes. Although I've had the mini for a few weeks now, its taken.me this long to decide how to paint him, but after a lot of thought I think I've figured it out, suffice to say, although it borrows elements from and is influenced by the 'official' Forge World scheme, it'll be something a little different yet wholly fitting...

And now for something completely different...

It doesn't happen very often, mainly because I don't play any fantasy set games but I do like to paint the odd fantasy figure now and again as a complete change from the inhabitants of the dark millennium. This mini's been sat around for a while so I decided to try an experiment on it. The plan was to base coat and highlight each area of the mini (except the face) before using washes and glazes to finish the mini off. I then went back and applied some supplemental highlights to a few areas and painted the head of the general. For about 5 hours work I don't think the results are too shabby:

Completed RUSH Competition Entry: Sons of the Burning Flame Traitor Marine

Well, it's definately been a rush to get this done but my entry is now complete:

I have to give credit to must be given to RazakelXIII on the B&C for the inspiration for the crimson colour of the armour plates as Ron Saikowski from From The Warp for inspiration for how to build up the colours. 

Now all I and the other entrants have to do is await the judges' decision... If I can get their owners' permission, I'll post some images of the other entries over the next couple of days too.

RUSH! Painting Competition

Brother Ludovic over on the International Brotherhood of Hobbyists Forum is holding a 48 hour painting competition this weekend call the RUSH! After a lot of agonizing I've decided that since I've got significantly less than the 48 hours allowed I wouldn't over-complicate things, with this in mind I've plumped for one of the push-fit Chosen Traitor Marines from the Dark Vengeance set. This was actually one of the mini's that sold the set to me so I can wait to get to grips with him. I've made a minor modification to the mini by removing the horn from his head and adding some sand an slate to his base.

 The competition runs until 12 noon on Monday so completed pictures will be up sometime after that. Good Luck to all the other competitors, I'll see you on the other side of the weekend...

World Eaters Veteran WIP

Still very WIP (and likely will be for some time until i can get a hold of the next lot of bits i need for him) I didn't come up with the idea of a legionnaire leaving the field of battle victorious until after i bought the legs/torso of the Forge World Captain but I think the idea is working fairly well. Most of the inspiration came from a piece of artwork in the World Eaters Index Astartes article showing a World Eater Legionnaire carrying his chainaxe in one hand and the heads of his enemies in the other.

Betrayal at Istvaan III Quartet Complete

As you can see from the photo above, after a slight mad dash for the finish I managed to get both the World Eater and Emperors Children Legionnaires completed last night:

I've really enjoyed doing this 'mini' project. It's been great fun trying to build characterful miniatures and experimenting to come up with fitting paint schemes for the individual legions. The mini's are now bound for my local Waterstones where they should be displayed alongside their Horus Heresy novels. More images and angles of the Death Guard and Sons of Horus miniatures can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pigofsparta/sets/

 I hope to add a Contemptor Dreadnought to this merry band in the next couple of weeks as well but have yet to pick a legion for him. Will I be doing more Heresy related projects in future? Well I've a couple in the works just now so the answer is a resounding yes, as for the details of them you'll just have to stay tuned...

Betrayal at Istvaan III update

Just about finished with these guys now. I need to put the Legion marking on the Emperors Children marine and build their bases to match the first pair's but I'm pretty happy with how they're looking.

 I feel I might need to 'redden' the armour of the Emperors Children marine a little though, I went with a more regal purple than the one that Forge World, or indeed Games Workshop have used on theirs as I feel it fits more with the feel that the EC have in the book series but I think it still needs a tiny bit more depth to it. I've deliberately kept the highlights on it subtle so as not to detract from the gold so I think a glaze of Baal Red might pull the armour into line.

I'm really pleased with the World Eater. The now that the blue's offsetting the white I think he looks much better. I think the flamer looks pretty good with a nice simple paint scheme too. I figured that the Legion wouldn't concern itself with things looking pretty, only functional so that's what I went with.  I've free handed the Legion symbol on his pauldron but the photo I took was out of focus and it's now snowing outside so I'm not going back out to photograph just now... 

Crusade/Heresy Era Death Guard Painting Tutorial Part I - Worn and Dirty White

 

I was asked if I could do a tutorial on how I painted the above Death Guard Cataphractii Terminator by one of the Fraters on the Bolter and Chainsword so armed with my paints, brushes and camera I've set out to tryand do just that.

 Before we start, these are the paints you'll need to replicate this colour scheme exactly*:

For the White:

*I say exactly because I've used a combination of 'old' and 'new' Citadel paints here. If you're just using 'new' paints then the following conversion chart will help:

Chaos Black = Abaddon Black

Khemri Brown = Baneblade Brown
Dheneb Stone = Rakarth Flesh
Devlan Mud = Agrax Earthshade

First up we're going to paint the White armour plates. We're doing them first because a) they're the largest area of colour and b) because we're drybrushing which will be messy...

Undercoat your chosen mini(s) with a Black primer of your choosing. I used Chaos Black spray because that's what I have but feel free to use whatever you're happy with.

Next Basecoat the mini with Khemri Brown

Then Wash it with Devlan Mud

Now comes the messy part. We're going to build up the the white over several layers of paint which is what helps to give the dirty, chipped, well-worn look to the armour plates. You'll notice as you build up the layers of Drybrushing that some of the details on the mini are beginning to lose definition, don't worry as final step will fix that. 

Drybrush the mini with Khemri Brown

followed by a Drybrush of a 50/50 mix of Khemri Brown and Dheneb Stone

then pure Dheneb Stone

then a 50/50 mix of Dheneb Stone and Ulthuan Grey

followed by pure Ulthuan Grey

then a 50/50 mix of Ulthuan Grey and White Scar

and finally pure White Scar before finishing off the white plates by glazing them with Devlan Mud.

In Part II I'll show you how I painted the green armour plates and finished up the detailing of the mini.