New fleet - Starting with Plastic Trygon

[sinsinatus]

Well, having built a rather large Kraken fleet 2 codexes ago, we think it is time to evolve. Taking some inspiration from the painted Forge World Hierophant, we have a new color scheme and plans for a whole swarm of new gribblies. Fortunately for us, we get the privilage of painting up the store preview Trygon. To garner some good will before the devouring begins, we have decided to share with you some tips from our experiences with the new kit.

Part I:

Most of you have already seen the sprues for the new Trygon kit so we wont waste the bandwidth on them here. If you havent seen them, check out our Photobucket works in progress photos.

Quality: The sprues are nicely detailed and the lack of major mould lines make cleaning quite easy. There was one armor plate about halfway down the tail that appeares slightly buckled. This may be by design (though there is no other damage modeled on the kit) or a partial fill during the casting process. Either way, it is in and obscure area and is of no real detriment to the model.

Bits 'n stuff: On the sprues are parts for 3 types of heads and tails to make the major variant from the new codex. Unfortunately, the design of the heads makes it nearly impossible to magnetize for making multiple variants. You will find that there are several spare armor plates, at least 2 pair of scything talons (there are 5 pair of various sizes), and many glands and spines left after construction. For a kit of this size though, there is a disappointing amount of bits left over at the end.

Construction: For our first attempt, we have chosen the Mawloc variant but without the screaming mouth (fear of dentists you see). Examining the kit shows that a subassembly method of construction and painting will probobly save a LOT of hassle. The assemblies we will build are head, torso, body/tail, and weapons. Here are the pieces cut out and arranged by subassembly...

Head (Mawloc variant with non-screaming mouth)...


Torso (Mawloc spines not shown)...


Body and tail (Mawloc pincer tail shown)...


Weapons (all 5 pairs shown - only 3 pair needed)...


Next we will do some assembly...

[sinsinatus]

Part II:

Assembly is pretty straight forward and the (unusually good for GW) instruction booklet gives the guidance needed to build the variants without having the codex to hand.

Head:
The head is a simple build and consists of 2 mandibles, jaw, tongue, head crest, and two head-halves. All of the parts except the head-halves are version specific - Trygon, Trygon Prime, or Mawloc. Very little cleaning is required and there was no gap-filling needed. We chose a different jaw than the standard one for the Mawloc. The screaming mouth seemed a little Predator-ish.



Torso:
The torso would seem to be very simple - consisting as it does of 2 halves, 3 back plates, chest plate, a neck socket, 6 vents for the back, and a handful of spikes. The Mawloc also uses 6 spines/antennae. They have no fixed location and are added after the rest is assemled. There are also more spikes available than there are sockets for. The spares have a flat attachment point so they can be added onto the body wherever you find yourself inspired.

The difficulty comes when adding the center back plate. There is little support and it is easily misaligned. Also, the other halves of the back vents come very close to joining the back but not quite. The gap is not very noticeable but we filled them with greenstuff anyway. Placing the Mawloc spines parallel to the line of the body will make painting much easier. The canted out angle we placed ours at cause a few instances of painting awkwardness.



Body/tail:
This is where we learned a hard lesson. The body and tail should have been built and painted as separate assemlies. The way the tail curls back on itself and the body resting above greatly complicated painting This would be doubly true if the body/tail were attached to the base prior to painting. Some parts would be impossible to reach without a curved brush!

Construction is straight forward and neat. The only version specific part is the tail-tip. Have some sturdy rubber bands or clamps around the body though to ensure it is a gap-free. The halves required a little encouragement to come together. With its socket joint, the tail attaches easily if snugly to the body. After priming and painting, the joint will require some shaving to fit. Either mask off the area or just trim it down beforehand. There will be very little gap to the join. Ours required no filling. Besides the 6 socketed spikes, you can add more as you like on the body.



Weapons:
The Mawloc is the least close-combat oriented Trygon variant so we chose the 3 smalles pairs of talons. There is no assembly needed but I drilled the shoulders for pins anyway. Corresponding holes were then put in the shoulder sockets.

Priming:
The only difficulty here is that the spikey bits get in the way. Take your time and prime from several directions to get good coverage. We used GW primer and got an unusually smooth finish, similar to what you get on a tank. If you use a drybrush technique for models like these, you may want to start off by using GW Roughcoat spray. You will get a better texture to paint on.

[sinsinatus]

Well, the big gribley is done except for the basing - we still have to decide on a theme yet. Here are some pics...

[sinsinatus]

Here are the test models and a couple others that were finished with the Mawloc. We are trying to decide what basing theme to use. The list is down to woodland (standard GW basing), cityfight (medium grays), or ice and snow. Desert is out because the skintone is too close to the colors of our desert table. C&C welcome...

Enjoy.

Test models for the new paint scheme...


First new-style Biovore...


First new-style Zoanthrope...


Mawloc vs Defiler size comparison...

[twistinthunder]

hi,

your army looks like its off to a good start, but i think your going to need to rebase the biovore, from what ive seen gw are now using 60mm bases for biovore.

[Vineas]

Pyrovore is on a 60 as it's slightly larger than the biovore.

Love the talons, how did you do it?

[Thud]

Awesome stuff. I love the paint scheme.

[Gorak]

nice work like the snakey marking on the mawloc

[Reaver_hive_tyrant]

I love the size next to the soul grinder. You should take one next to a Carnifex.

[St. Apollo]

Nice scheme, almost same colours in my theme too, but I have darker. But I was wrong. Light colours fit nicely to nids, especially to yours Can I ask you what wash are you using?

[sCar[Sandstorm]]

Lucky guy, getting a early trygon -_-.

Love the scheme, and the idea of putting maccrage scenery on bases is a good 'un

[sinsinatus]

I love the size next to the soul grinder. You should take one next to a Carnifex.

Well, we haven't done a new 'Fex in the current color scheme yet. However, we did finish this fellow yesterday...







We haven't seen the new codex so we're not sure if he's playable as "Old One-eye". If not, he'll just end up in the swarm as a close combat 'fex.

Enjoy

[razormasticator]

A question, I am wondering how you did the spots? I like that effect and I was wondering how you did it.

thanks

[igenstilch]

wonderful paint job, I'm inspired.

[pluch87]

That Trygon makes me want to drop everything and pick up a load of Nids...

Stunning work! Excellent colour scheme!

[sinsinatus]

A question, I am wondering how you did the spots? I like that effect and I was wondering how you did it.

Are you talking about the spots on the carapace itself or the ones on the skin where the carapace joins?

If it is the skin spots...

then the short answer is different brush sizes. I used a basecoat brush for the large spots. Placing them first, I used a "dotting" or dabbing motion... similar to how badly painted eyes are usually done.

Next, using a standard brush, using the same stroke, I placed spots offset from the large ones and spaced loser together.

Finally, I switched to a fine detail brush. Fill in the spaces between and below the medium spots with irregular clusters of very fine dots.

The technique isn't very hard but it can be time consuming. The spots on the 'fex took 5 minutes maybe. The ones on the Mawloc were over an hours work. Practice on a scrap of cardboard and you'll find that it's pretty easy to master.

If you are asking about the carapace spots...

then you are in luck. I just lay out and irregular v-shaped pattern in Calthan Brown foundation paint.

Next, fill in all but about a 1/32 to 1/16th inch edge of the "v" with slightly thinned Tausept Ochre foundation paint. You can skip this if the spots are very small.

The last foundation paint used is slightly thinned Iyanden Darksun and you fill in all but the same thin edge of the previous layer.

Finally, fill in almost all of the lightest "v" with Bleached Bone. A second coat of this may be needed on the larger "v"s for opaque coverage.

If you are washing the model (as I did) then the color transition will appear seamless even up close. If you arent washing the whole model then you may want to was the spots with Gryphonne Sepia to nlend the colors. Do this lightly.

I'll try to do some step-by-step photos on my next med to large sized gribley. Right now I am working on my Ripper Swarms and Mieotic Spores. i hope to have some pics later in the week.

[Brother Alexos]

Did you do any fluff for this fleet? If so, I would love to hear its name.

[razormasticator]

Are you talking about the spots on the carapace itself or the ones on the skin where the carapace joins?

If it is the skin spots...

then the short answer is different brush sizes. I used a basecoat brush for the large spots. Placing them first, I used a "dotting" or dabbing motion... similar to how badly painted eyes are usually done.

Next, using a standard brush, using the same stroke, I placed spots offset from the large ones and spaced loser together.

Finally, I switched to a fine detail brush. Fill in the spaces between and below the medium spots with irregular clusters of very fine dots.

The technique isn't very hard but it can be time consuming. The spots on the 'fex took 5 minutes maybe. The ones on the Mawloc were over an hours work. Practice on a scrap of cardboard and you'll find that it's pretty easy to master.

If you are asking about the carapace spots...

then you are in luck. I just lay out and irregular v-shaped pattern in Calthan Brown foundation paint.

Next, fill in all but about a 1/32 to 1/16th inch edge of the "v" with slightly thinned Tausept Ochre foundation paint. You can skip this if the spots are very small.

The last foundation paint used is slightly thinned Iyanden Darksun and you fill in all but the same thin edge of the previous layer.

Finally, fill in almost all of the lightest "v" with Bleached Bone. A second coat of this may be needed on the larger "v"s for opaque coverage.

If you are washing the model (as I did) then the color transition will appear seamless even up close. If you arent washing the whole model then you may want to was the spots with Gryphonne Sepia to nlend the colors. Do this lightly.

I'll try to do some step-by-step photos on my next med to large sized gribley. Right now I am working on my Ripper Swarms and Mieotic Spores. i hope to have some pics later in the week.

Thanks man, I was talking about the skin spots not the carapace.

Gracias!

[Vineas]

Old One Eye is indeed usable. Killer rules too. I still like the model. Might use him as a 3rd heavy

[sinsinatus]

Well, we have the Mieotic Spores fairly done and here they are...







These are Forgeworld models. You can find them here.