For the Dark Gods! And possibly the Emprah!

[Finn]

I'm beginning several scratch-build projects, mostly for my Chaos army. However, I may also post stuff from my Imperial scratchbuilds as I complete them (several/most are WIPs that are almost complete).

I have to admit I'm partially inspired by The Damend Artificer's Dark Mechanicum log, wishing I could do the same quality work... At the moment I'm working on a Warhound. I've got plans for it, so it's pretty smooth sailing so far, no major glitches except for the fact that the hip joints don't work out very well. I'll have to make new ones. I'd tried these plans once before but never got past the foot. This time I decided to start from the top and work my way down, so that I'd have more motivation to finish once I started .

I'll magnetize the weapon mounts, as well as make them removable/interchangeable. At the moment, I'm planning to construct 2 Vulcan Megabolters, a Plasma Blastgun, an Inferno gun, and a Turbolaser. If construction on this one picks up, I may even make a second chassis...

Full album here

The beginnings... Taped together to hold position and make sure the pieces will work with each other.


Mock-up of the leg. I salvaged these parts from my previous attempt, and I'm not sure how much I like them. I may make a new leg.

Assembled torso/shoulders, awaiting filling of cracks and detail work.
Also visible are the rods for the leg joints, along with the cut-outs of the toes and the main body of the foot at the bottom of the photo.

And the Raider that is also occupying a corner of the table, painting in progress (almost finished, just have some armor highlights left...). I'll take a better quality photo when it's finished, probably along with some of the other painted models so that you guys can get a grasp of the paint scheme.

[eltanko]

That is a very interesting colour scheme on the land raider. It looks really good. Will that be continued across the army?

ElTanko

[Finn]

Indeed. The picture really doesn't do it justice, the lighting and focus are terrible. I have a handful of marines done, almost 5 terminators, and a Rhino so far.
And a Demon Prince that I'm not too sure about.

That lightning takes ages to paint. I find myself wishing I'd done a larger motif on the Raider though, rather than simply the same as I did on the Rhino (which looks fine, I think). I will certainly be doing some large freehand on the Warhound, but that's a ways in the future.

[Finn]

More progress on the 'hound. Finally got over the hump and built all the small foot pieces, as well as the missing leg pieces. Means I can tape together a mock-up and see if it works! Thought posing the legs more dynamically would be a bit of a challenge, as the plans were designed to have both legs in the same pose, but it only took a couple of minutes to get the proper angles worked out.

Here's what it looks like!

One shin armor piece resting on the foot, more or less in the proper place.

Best pose for balance, at the moment.

The waist joint is a few degrees off level, but I haven't filled in the gap yet to make the axle rest higher up on the right side and level it out.


I plan to mount the torso and weapons on rotating turrets. The torso might be difficult, I'll have to see how sturdy the legs are after I actually assemble them. I plan to pin them together in several places, so I'm hoping it'll be OK. At the very least I'll mount it like a turret anyway, simply for travel purposes. I'm OK with the pose in the pictures. Also still need to make new hip pieces to go between the legs and waist proper....

Looking for feedback on the feet, however. The plans call for 'toe joints', basically hydraulic-looking extensions between the toes and the main body of the foot. These raise the foot off the ground about 1-2mm, and make the footprint (heh, footprint...) tons larger. Do you guys think the toes are long enough as it is? They're just resting in place at the moment.

Now I'll have to decide whether I want to start work on the weapons, or assemble the legs permanently. I'm leaning weapons and neck (I have complicated plans for the head...so maybe a stand-in temporarily), as I can then tape the whole thing together to make sure it balances properly . Plus I could root out any other weak stress points once all the weight is there.

[eltanko]

Its taking shape really nicely. Great stuff so far.

ElTanko

[Finn]

Warhound hasn't progressed much I'm afraid - giant Apocalypse game last Saturday, and a tournament this Saturday for which I need to build four Obliterators. From scratch.

I'm on a sculpting break, got lots of pictures to show, including some WIP shots of other units in the army and the Marauder Destroyer scratchbuild that I'll finish someday (it's on the docket below the Warhound).

First up, some Obliterator stuff. I need 4 for my tournament list, and I'm not terribly fond of the GW models. I want them to look like hulking cyborg-type dudes. I'm not fond of mutations really, except in special cases, so I decided they'd just have a multitude of gun barrels for different roles. Plan to have a Plasma Cannon mounted on the backpack centerline, two weapons to either side, and a hand flamer on the left hand. On the right, I plan to have a plasma (lightning) cutter inspired by the design of a hot wire cutter. Originally planned to build from modified Terminator parts, but was unable to acquire new molding material to cast them. So I'm bulking up normal Marine parts.

Size Comparison, most torso work done. Once finished, he should be as tall as the Terminator (including spikes) and as wide. I'm debating adding skeletal supporting to the legs, but I don't have time to do it before Saturday so that will have to come later, if at all.

Plasma Cannons, 3 of them about half done.


I've got a lot of parts in various stages of completion, I want to get them individually near finished before attaching. I'll have more pictures of these guys either later tonight or tomorrow.

Next: Noise Marines. I hate the look of these GW versions as well. Decided I'd just give them bigger-looking guns made out of tubing, wires, and greenstuff. Usually field them in a unit of 8, I have some left to build. Only completed model is the Champion, and I've named him David Bowie.




Now, for the unit I plan to make once I get some spare cash: Raptors - Chaos Marines riding Discs of Tzeentch. All I've got so far is a mock-up disc that I plan to cast. I need to acquire some molding rubber beforehand, but here's what I've got. Including the spikes, it's almost as wide as a 60mm base. I plan to mount them on BFG-style flying bases of varying heights so as to keep closer to a 28mm footprint.
Upside-down in this photo.

[Finn]

Now some shots of other, more complete units from the army!

Terminators. Arms are magnetized on all but the combi-melta. Have 6 more I need to paint yet, and there are 2 in this photo plus the power mace that I need to finish the lightning motif on.


Land Raider, Daemon Prince, and Rhino group shot. There is some touch-up painting I want to do on all 3 yet, but complete enough for now.

I need to figure out a way to take pictures with my camera using lighting that brings out more detail than just the lightning. It tends to get emphasized with the flash on, but with the flash off nothing comes out very well. I think what I'll try next is a dark blue backdrop (a towel) and use the flash from a distance of about 4-6 feet, using my camera's zoom to compensate.

And lastly, the next big project after the Warhound! Marauder Destroyer! It's been in this stage of completion since January '09, except the wingtips fell off...

[eltanko]

I have to emphasise again how much I love that 'crackling energy' paint scheme, fantastic!! The Termies and tanks together really do look great. Will be interested to see how the noise marine conversions turn out aswell.

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ElTanko

[Finn]

Thanks for the support! I have some other models that are finished and based, but I haven't taken any pictures yet. I'm still waffling on whether to do blue- or red-based lightning on my Berzerkers and Noise Marines.

I think I'm also going to add some smaller "sparks" spreading out off of the bigger arcs of energy on the tanks, especially the raider. Although I played in a tournament this past weekend, and despite having an admirable show (was in the final game for 1st, but due to losing it didn't place) the last game I played was just uncompetitive due to extremely subpar rolling on my part. My newly-built Obliterators were a massive disappointment. Kind of sucked the motivation out of me to work on anything Chaos for a little while, so I probably won't make any modeling progress while that lasts.

Might do some touch-up painting though.

[Finn]

K, so I got some painting done recently. These shots are a little behind what I've got done so far, but here we go. Hopefully I'll have an army shot I can take by late next week, just have a LOT of normal Chaos Marines to paint. And at that point I'll be a little more careful with the pictures themselves! Get some better shots and all that.

Berzerkers - going to the store today to get paints and a palette for mixing so I can do their lightning, once I finish the 3 in progress that is. Still a little touch-up to do on the ones that are based, as I had to finish 5 of them quickly for a team tourney a while back.



Noise Marines - not sure I'm going to like how the paint scheme for these guys turns out. I've inked 2 of them heavily with Purple Ink on top of the basecoat, and it's all going to depend on whether my matte varnish takes the shiny away.



A group shot of completed and nearly-completed marines:

[Finn]

Sorry for the lack of updates, I'll have some coming sometime later this week - summer and all its athletic glory got the better of me for a while . Though before the modeling hiatus, there was some frenzied progress on the Noise Marines and Oblits, huzzah!

And what's that? A Defiler being painted on the sprue, you say? (Lightning on him is going to be tricky as all get-out, very daunting).

[Finn]

Ok, so I've finally got enough of my crap moved to Maryland that I'm able to do some work and rehabilitate my hobby skills. I've made some progress in the last, uh, year. Documented below:

Also have a Hellblade and a Defiler to work on, but I want to get the core squads of my army fully painted first. So, here are the updates:

Sadly, these are the only models from the CSM units that have been fully painted. I have a couple that just need lightning and my 3 fist champions just need the last layer on top...and my PVA glue got buggered on its way here, so not able to do any basing just yet.

Another shot, worse lighting...

Disc of Tzeentch cast! (did it a year ago, finally a pic ) Champion included for scale. Eventually I'll have 9 of these spiky babies, with Raptor-like marines riding atop them...and a Tzeentch Lord!

Another scale pic

The only two painted Noise Marines I've got so far...David Bowie and some mook (who needs his eyes done)...the other 6 are assembled, with 4 basecoated...

Here is another angle of these two.

And the usual Terminator unit, painted. Just need to get some working PVA-type glue to do the bases on those two...and eyes on another...


Also of note: an Obliterator sculpt/bash that has all the big gubbins on it. They're kind of a back burner project. Probably finish them if/when I need them for a painted tourney... Next step to these guys is to bulk out their legs and smooth out the chestplates.

As before, the full album of progress can be seen here:
http://s976.photobucket.com/albums/a...aos%20Marines/

Oh, also started working on the Warhound again. Am assembling the legs...one joint done, should be able to get another one or two done tomorrow.

[Overlord Krycis]

Some really nice looking stuff here Finn.
The Lightning really stands out...I agree that you might need to get yourself a Light Box or something, as the models seem to only have the lighting and nothing else.
Will be keeping an eye on this...

[Finn]

Yeah, a light box for sure. I have a flexibly tripod on its way from Hong Kong, and once it gets here I may start puzzling out how best to construct one that won't cost me oodles of money (I work for a nonprofit). That said, the most recent pics are a step in the right direction.

In other news, I wish I'd titled this thread "Ride the Lightning", as work on Chaos occupies more and more of my time spent modeling...

Thanks! It would be dishonest of me not to admit that at least 50% of why I've got this thread is to make me work more on the army (preferably through votes of confidence) rather than sharing some kind of modeling/painting wisdom I (don't) have.

[Overlord Krycis]

For a lightbox:- Cheap canvas squares with frame...the kind you paint on,
3 of them and a decent bulb in a lamp is what i used to use.
Even buying all of that together previously (Lamp+bulb+canvas) I think it cost me about £20...so not resource-drainingly expensive.

Although, White card+tape+lamp is a fraction of the cost, can fold up and works just as well :P

As for 50% reason for the plog...pretty much why I have one too...need motivation to paint my ungodly horde of grey plastic.

[Finn]

Been making some really steady progress over the last couple of weekends. The legs themselves are now fully assembled, here's a pic!


Have some sanding to do on some spots of the joints themselves, GS isn't smooth everywhere... Only the leg on the left is attached to the waist axle. I need to make a trip to the hardware store and get some 3/4" inner ring washers before I do anything else with the waist. Shin armor is also assembled...and I found out the pose works out perfectly, after over a year of being disassembled . No needing to mess with ankle angles for me...

Also ordered a boatload of Evergreen Plastic. Will be able to do armor details (rivets, nuts, and so forth) whenever that gets here - can't wait. It will really start to look awesome.

[Overlord Krycis]

Looking good...can't wait to see that titan progressing.

[GodlessM]

Fantastic stuff, keep it up.

[Finn]

Was going to wait to post more photos until I had the legs assembled, except for the toes, but I'm going to be out of town this weekend on a home visit.

Incidentally, some of what I need to complete the foot and the rest of the model is there so I'll be retrieving it... Until I get back, then, here is a picture of the progress thus far. Took it the other night with my phone, but it should be adequate:



Does anyone know where I can get some other Chaos stars/iconography? That one came from the Defiler sprue, and I have some really small ones from Rhino doors and such, but is there anywhere I can find something that's in between? Or even larger?

I am also on the lookout for bigger skulls/daemon head iconography. Any tips there?

[Finn]

I thought I would post a little progress tonight. I've nearly run out of 1/8" plastic strips (for the armor trim), and I don't have enough left to finish the feet not to mention the weapon arms. I will have to order more. I completely underestimated how much linear distance I would be covering with this stuff.

I still don't want to take pictures of the Warhound until I've got the legs at least put together, which will be soon. I just have some trim detail left on the left leg, and I can go ahead with assembly. I have successfully "turreted" the waist joint for the upper body. I may need to reinforce it when the body is finished, but that shouldn't be a problem.

Here is some of the iconography I'll be attaching to the thing:


That star is actually extra - I haven't decided where to put it yet, and I may just save it for something else I've got planned. I like the demon head, however, and have proceeded with making several others. I may be able to vary their styles with creative GS molding...

My next purchase will be a box of 10 CSMs. Here's why:


That's my Raptor (or will they be bikers, using cav bases?) concept, tacked together. When I pulled the parts out tonight, I was going to just use that Champion as my future Raptor champion but have decided that I need to go from scratch to really give them the dynamic poses (that one is leaning forward a bit) they need to not look completely silly on such huge discs.

Because of the size, I'm actually thinking that they'll end up being counts-as Bikers. I just hope a Lord or Sorc on Bike is viable with the next book. Thoughts?