Symrivven's Dark Elves and Vampire Counts

[Symrivven]

Dark elves and Vampire counts

My first project log here on warseer. Generally I have a hard time finishing projects and I'm often working on multiple units at once so I piled both my active fantasy armies in one log so I can at least have updates at a more or less regular basis.


The Two Armies:

Dark Elves:
This is my second fantasy army (I more or less dropped lizardman). I always loved their play stile and fluff. I don't have a lot of conversions in this army because the models are so great, and when I started this army I didn't have a grand scheme or theme in mind. Just to state the obvious it eventually got to be a winter theme (though I think you'll notice).

List of finished units:
Characters:
Manticore
Master (for Manticore)
Anointed
Sorceress on Dark Pegasus I II
Sorceress on Dark Steed

Troops:
Harpies I II III
Black Guard I II

Special:
Shades
Black Guard I II

Rare:
Hydra and Beastmasters

Crystal tutorial part: I,II,III.

Vampire Counts:
I really like vampires so it was just a matter of time before I started this army. Unfortunately while I liked the stories and the game play I really don't like the better part of the VC model range, the good news is that this gives me ample opportunities to make conversions.
For now the theme is eugenic and biological experimentation with a bit of necromancy to make it all work. And probably a caste system, with the vampires and ethereals being cursed upper class. And the rest of the army being the unfortunate results of their experimentations. If I have a more typative day (yes that is a word ) I'll try to translate the chaotic bits and pieces in my head into a decent background story.

List of finished units:
Characters:
Vampire on "Hellsteed"
Vampire duellist
Banshee

Troops:
Skeletons II
Ghouls I II III
Zombies Animated Brooms II

Special:
Spirit Host - Hans von Landgraf

Rare:
Blood Knights


If you like this you might like some of my other projects to:
Dark Eldar: Eventide Estates
My cabinet of curiosities (random project log)

A tutorial on stereoscopic (3d) images of models.

What's new:



Enough talk let's start with some (edit: by now old) pictures , Dark Elves in the next post:

[Symrivven]

Lets start good, my manticore.

This one is clearly based on the one in the back of the bretonians army book. Body of a carnosaur, wings of a dragon, some green putty in between and crystals from sprue leftovers.

To be honest initially I made this as a dragon, but when I saw it on the table next to real dragons it was just to small, so it got demoted to a manticore.

The rider got knocked of at some point, I never really liked it so I didn't glue it back on, I intent to make a new rider some day. Maybe soon now I come to think of it, it isn't that much work.

[AlltoEasy]

Since I'm about to start a DE army I vote for step by step please.

Dan

[Symrivven]

My manticore post should be arrive before this one if I get this right.

Here is an old anointed, I dont have any wip pictures of the old stuff but I can give an ingredients list. The body of a daemonet, the arms of a pleasure seeker, skirt nose and hair of greenstuf and a howling banshee blade.









p.s. the green patch on the skirt is just a damaged part.

[Symrivven]

"Dark" riders, well they aren't exactly dark.
(VC after all the elves, so a few more posts)

[Symrivven]

Shades:







Yes the shade in the front is missing a part of his x-bow, I have no idea where it went

Sorceres wip:





Her tail is a bit odd, when I sculpted it I didn't took into account the angle on which she was riding her dark steed a well better next time.

One more DE then VC

[Symrivven]

Two more Wip's

One a Black guard champion, I really had to convert that one. The only time I ever saw someone holding a great-sword with stretched arms was during a worlds strongest man contest on tv. On top of that his sword was ugly:



Now the hydra, I really didn't like the pose of the original model. Instead of running forward to tear the enemy apart it more looks like its strutting around, with its nose in the air.





What I did:

Bent the hind legs and feet to make it walk erect.
Changed the position of the front right claw
Saw most necks to pieces and pinned green puttied them back in a decent position
I cut of the slot for the fifth head and filled it up with an extra spike and scales.
The tale was elongated to make the model; look more balanced.
and I reinforced the based and pinned it really really well so it wouldn't break of (again) there is quite some weight on those two hind legs.

[Symrivven]

Now some Vampire counts pics:

Vampire on "hellsteed", I had two old lamia models laying around one this one is one of them:

[Symrivven]

Vampire on foot:

The lamia blister came with two models this is what I did with the second one:





The rose at the base broke of, tip: don't make things from melted and stretched sprue's they are to fragile for a war-game.

And a Wip shot:


This is it for now, I've got some more pics lined up but I don't have time to post more now (new years celebration with the family).

A happy new year to all of you .

[Mr.chair]

Wow, that's such a huge improvement on the hydra. Must have been a lot of work, but it's completely worth it for the outcome.

[Symrivven]

@AlltoEasy: Most of the stuff I've posted now is a bit older and I hardly have any wip pics for that, but I'll try to make mare pics for future projects.

@MrChair: Yes it was a lot of work and I still need to paint it . In the end it will be well worh it (I hope).


Now some skeletons, My initial idea was to model the mayor blood vessels with metal wire to create a korperwelt like effect. Knowing that I had to do a minimum of 20 and probably something more like 60 of those, I decided against that plan to preserve what's left of my sanity. Instead I painted the mayor blood vessels.




(sorry for the suboptimal pic, but my camera is hell-bent on focusing on the banner )

[Symrivven]

Ghouls: This is where the real experimentation starts. The idea is that these are captured humans and have gone trough all kind of different experiments most of these failed. They are kept "alive" so in times of war they can be modified and sent to battle . All models have two "hand weapons" to justify the ghouls two attacks and and when painting I'll try to make sure the weapons look poisonous and infectious enough.

The champion, caries a tank of a foul burning liquid and his hands got turned into small flamers, he's the most technically advanced member of this unit:




They tried to make this poor girl into the image of a daemonete, she is still recovering from her facial reconstruction:



This assistant unfortunately got addicted to lab chemicals, he'll be sent into battle with the rest of the ghouls:

[Symrivven]

Ghouls continued:

This woman has been killed and raised as an undeath while still pregnant, the only way to save here child is by extracting bodily fluids from living beings. But what kind of monstrosity will she give birth to?



And those containing less green stuff:



This is it for now, I'm also working on my Eldar army atm so I can't say when the next update will be but I plan to get at least the hydra or ghouls painted before the end of the month.

[bob_the_small]

Fantastic work here! I love the dark elves especially, your green stuff work is excellent and your painting is brilliant! The repositioning on the hydra blows my mind, you've turned a mediocre model into an amazing model... I'm going to run oout of superlatives and adjectives soon...

[Symrivven]

Thanks for the nice remark bob, its always a good thing if others appreciate your work. Especially because when I look at my models I see the stuff that could be better, isn't perfect or didn't turn out exactly as I have it in my head.

I also found this older wip pic of my hydra, it in between the normal hydra and the wip shots I showed earlier. And if you look at the feet you can see the pin with which it was pinned to the base and a piece of the base still attached to the hydra (though no longer atached to the base )

[Joeli]

well m8.. i have to admit you got some psych0-insane idea''s with the fase masked girl, the bald mother and the flame hand guy, and lats but not least, the skeletons! its insane and deranged, and guess what, i like it alot!!! keep doing crazy things with your models, and i ensure you you will not regret it!!

gl!


joelii

[Symrivven]

@Joeli, I really like this dark and twisted fantasy/sf that GW managed to create, especially the twisted part is more prominent in 40K,fantasy on the other hand has a bit more humor. If you like it keep an eye on this plog, I've got a lot of nasty idea's for vampire counts incoming. I don't have a real idea when I'll be able to do it all, both time and funds are a bit limited but expect some painted ghouls soonish (once I decided on a new colour scheme)


Atm I'm working on the hydra (and playing a lot of mass effect.) Its a lot more work than I expected, for those that are interested in my progress here are some wip shots.

[Durloth]

I love your use of light colors on your Dark Elves. The lahmian on a broom is amazing! I also like the skin tone on the hydra. Espcially the tail is great.

[Darkritual]

NIce stuff u have here!

Like the ice themed DE!

[morray]

Really cool original **** man! Good job!