Saturnine Terminators

I just had to get these, so I ordered the Heresy starter box even though I do not play, as I figured it was a very good deal on the amount of models, instead of waiting for the separate release. I sort of remember the old original but it was not a model I like then, and I am not sure I like these now but they have something I can't put my finger on. Anyway, I just had to have them as they looked like nice models to paint with a lot of details and it would be a great opportunity to paint some more Heresy Dark Angels.

I read a comment someone made somewhere, that GW models are getting more and more like scale models, and I would agree. These models require a lot of assembly of quite small and fiddly bits. But that is also what makes them great models as the 3D feal is much better. It did however take me one evening sit down to build each one of them. Just getting everything of the sprue, clean up mould lines and assemble to an absurd amount to time.

Normally I would have done just one, and then perhaps one more at some time later, but I really need to get better at batch painting so that I can get through the pile of grey. The experience with the death riders were positive as I managed to paint five large models in parallel to an ok level, so I thought I could do it again. I did beak it up by painting the bodies first and the shoulders and weapons after before final assembly. This also helped with getting access to the shoulders of the arms and also made it easier to try to get some freehand on to the plates.

I decided to do the black in the same way I did for my fallen Dark angels and other heresy era models I have painted over the years. I start from a black base and dry brush up with blue tinged grey before washing with nunoil. This is very similar to how I paint my rusted metal so I decided to do that and the black at the same time. It was a bit fiddley to not over "spray" in the drybrushing but it blended quite well. This process was done twice before I painted the free hand symbols and patterns. I still need to figure out how to do this properly. I think I need to experiment with some other brushes, because I can't get the details I like. It all comes across a bit clumsy, especially the Dark Angels symbols.

But I am ok with how they turned out (It will be better next time). I had to dial back a bit on the use of red details (the chest eagles were red at one point) as they stated to look to much like Night Lords. This is also true for the black which can very easily turn into Space Wolves if the grey become to dominant. At some point I thought of testing this by painting three models with the same base and just use different accent colours to see if I could turn them into the three different legions.

Another thing that became quite obvious when building the models is that the legs and arms are robotic, as the joints are literally the same as used in the Imperial robots. This means that the marine is fully enclosed by the torso. Not sure if that means that the arms and legs are amputated or if they are folded upp some how. GW has not given any details on this as far as I know.

I still have three more to go, but that will have to wait a bit as there are other things in the pipeline. Also, October is soon here and that means I have to do a dreadnought size model...

Death Riders of the desert

After some time, as usual, I have managed to finish the Death riders. These models are truly magnificent with all the details, but that also make them very hard to paint, and very time consuming. As a collector I appreciate this, but if I had to paint a viable army of these I would despair. That aside I enjoyed the experience but would probably not paint another five at the same time again. And that is my second point in all of this. I do normally not batch paint, but focus on a singular model and try to make the best of it, but this time I decided to go for the whole squad at the same time. This ment that I had to go back and forth on the models as a continually discovered things I missed. I guess that if you are a seasoned painter or commission painter this might not be a problem as you probably already painted a stuff of them, but as a first time experience it is a bit daunting. But, with the amount of back logg that I have on things that I do want to paint, batch painting might be the way to go to get it done with in my life time.

For the riders I did the same as for the "horses". I went with a tan armour and grey robes and trousers. The robes do nicely tie in to the "horses" grey bellies hand feet. This makes the over all model look cohesive and the grey of the robes does still give enough of a connection to the original Death riders of Krieg colour theme. In the end I think this tied in nicely with the desert theme of my imperial regiments with out losing to much of the grim darkness of the Krieg theme. The only thing I am a bit uncertain about is the glowing power coils of the spears as they are not typically part of my palette.

But I am happy with how they turned out. Now I just hav the Marshal left to do, but that will have to wait a bit as I am very keen to start on some Saturnine terminators and a dreadnought for the first legion.

Death Riders WIP

The summer is nearing its end and I am returning to work. I did have high hopes of getting some time to sitt down with my hobby stuff as I have quite a large back log of models I would like to paint and things to do on Opus and the flight wing. But even if the weather has not been super great it has not been bad enough to motivate me to stay indoors when there has been literal tons of things to do in the garden. So instead of painting models I painted the house. Instead of building stuff for Opus I built walking paths around the property. That and barbequed with my wife and spent time in the lounge set on the patio and read books late into the night. So progress has been slow, but that is ok as the summer has felt very productive over all. But as autumn is coming closer and it is getting darker I am hoping to have more time in the evenings for painting.

Well, I have been able to squeeze in a few hours to finish up some old medels and to start some new. In this case the Death Riders I got for my birthday. I absolutely love the models and have been looking forward to painting them. The detail is superb and they have a lot of character. I opted to go for the full out fit with rifle and sword on the "horses" and the lance held by the rider. I also added some extra stakes and broken concrete to the bases to give them some more texture.

When it comes to the colour scheme I stuck with pale skin on the "horses" but opted for a similar desert tan colour on the armour as I have on my desert rats to keep the theme on the Astra Militarum troops. To make the skin a bit more interesting I decided to make the feet and belly a darker grey shade while the top and head is more bone white. I am really happy with how the toning turned out. Basically it a mix of wet blending and dry brushing. Tack and sadels got the standard brown leather treatment and the gasmask a black rubber tone. Now I just need to find some time to paint the riders. I am thinking to do a similar colour on these, with a grey uniform and tan armour instead of the box art that has black armour. We will see how it turns out.

The Lord of the Northern Forge

This is my first post in some time, but that does not mean that I have not been hobbying, it just means that I have not finished anything in quite some time. But here is at last, the Lord of the Northern Forge with his riding beast.

This is a model that has been years in the making. The idea behind this is that it should represent the Lord of the forge that does all my conversions for the Northern Knights and Northern Ghosts. He is an outcast member of the Mechanicum, banished from Mars because of his tempering with the divine STC designs. He is also an avid collector of arcane technology, be it imperial or xenos. There is a quite complex backstory to all this including the knight world where the forge is located. I might write it down at some point. But this model is supposed to be the centre model for my (dark) Mechanicum forces. So I really wanted it to look the part.

The base model is a Mechanicus Tech-Priest Dominus that I turned around and added a Kataphron torso and head to. This was done a few yeas ago with some left over bits. I also made some back mounted tentakels from the Mauler fiend, but I thought they were a bit to massive so the model got stalled. Then for Christmas this year I got a Lord discordant from my wife (which were the second try as she discovered I already had her first option), but as it turned out I already had one painted up. So she said, why not make a cool conversion of it? This made my thoughts returned to the Forge Lord. One thing was clear, if I were to do this it could not just look like a Lord discorand, but had to be a unique model. So instead of using the rider I decided to see if it was possible to mount the Dominus based model I started with on the back of the Helstalker. As it turned out it is actually quite a good fit with some minor cutting and greens stuff filling. But the main model of the Forge Lord did still lack some gravitas. I tried using different arms with guns, shields etc... but in the end I felt that the Mechanium staff and a power fist with a shield generation worked best. I also added some halos from some electro priest around the shoulders to beef him up. But not even this worked as well as I initially intended. I was missing the tentakel things that were still around in my head, but then I remembered that I had some Canoptek Wraiths that had some thin tentakels in the alternate build that i was not using. After a quick test fit it all came together.

The rest of the build was to make it look more Mechanicum and less Chaos Space Marine. So I cut away all the spikes on the hell stalker and removed the tail which were replaced with some smoke stacks. I also added a lot of cabling to the legs and head to make it look more mechanicum. I used a armiger face plate instead of the more organic chaos one. I also replaced the space marine back mounted weapon with some left over mechanicum Kataphron weapons (dual mount). Once the modified Hell stalker was done I thought it look very cool on its own and decided to make the Forge Lord dismountable and give him an optional base so that I can display him either riding his beast or walking beside it.

Painting was done to resemble the rest of my Mechanicum forces with green armour and red robes. The stalker got a green and rusted metallic look. Basically my standard recipe.

I am very happy with the model, perhaps I could have worked a bit more with the posing but I think it is ok. Next for these guys it to start with his entourage, which should consist of liaison officers from the Northern Ghosts, Northern Knights, Skitarii forces, the Legio Cybernetica, together with his personal aid and chief strategist, and his Domitar body guards.

The Dark Commune and Apostle

I finally managed to finish the Dark commune by painting the demagogue. I am very happy with the result. The models are very nice to paint, not to much detail but still full of character. I tried to reverse the colour scheme on the demagogue, with purple leggings/shirt and grey over coat instead of a purple overcoat as I have on the rest of the models. This turned out nicely and emphasise her body a bit better. 

I also tried to tie them into the Dark Apostle that I painted some years ago. I think they go well together as they have the same design philosophy. 

Next up will probably be the other model I got for Christmas if I can finish the conversions and the base/bases. Otherwise it will be my birthday models (I am starting to realize that I no longer buy my models, my wife does).

Dark commune, and Opus Storm speeder

This spring has been crazy at work, so I apologize if I do not update as often and don't have the much to show. This means that what i usually do in a week I now do in a month. So this month I did the two guards for the Dark commune. These look more like some fantasy models rather than scifi models, but I do like them. The helmets are reminiscent of the Nazgul helmets from LoTR and the poses are equally threatening.

For colours I choose the same as for the standard bearers, grey under robes and purple over robes. The armour was done as rusted metal with some bronze. When taking the photos I realized I need to go back and work on the blades and hands a bit more. Nothing that will change anything drastically though. 

When not painting I have been building on the opus. This is also painfully slow. I have finally managed to get the internal panels pinned to the external, which means I can start with the details as they are now related to each other.

I have also started work on some gunboats, in the for of some Storm speeder. These will be defending the ground around the Opus and pick up any downed pilots, at least until I get a nice recovery ship (haven't figured out what would be best for this). The buy was a bit of a mistake. For some reason I still had the old Land speeders in my mind, and that was also what the opus was built for. So the loading bays on the sides, blew the deck, where I first intended to dock undock these is now to small and they can not fit through the doors. So I will have to find another purpose those.

Well, I did not really like some of more Primaris like designs of the storm speeders, so off course I had to make some alternations. First of was the air intakes for the jets. The grills were a bit to restrictive, so off they went. I will add some visible turbines inside that I have as leftovers from the aircrafts. I also added som cowlings to define the air intakes a bit more. Then I also added some larger exhausts for the jets as the original ones looked a bit small. Then I exchanged the winglets for some larger wings and added hinges to them so that I can fold them for storage. This meant that I could use to original wings as vertical stabilizers. I think these alterations brings a better balance to the model, less front heavy as there is now more going on at the back.  I will also remove the extra gunner from the turret and exchange him with some targeting arrays. It thought it would look strange with a guy sitting in there while it is in storage (I made the pilots removable). I also added some landing gears for the same reason. They can not just hover all the time. There is still more details to add but so far I like the build.

I guess that this version of the Storm speeder is more of a flyer that the standards ones, and it ties in better with the rest of the aircraft I have (it is also as big).  Even if it would have been nice with a canopy for the pilots.