The Tyrants Claw - Red corsairs

[__Maelstrom__]

Good afternoon Warseer,

After nagging me for ages it seems that Mr Feral has succeeded in getting me to post some of my work on here again :P

I've been rather inactive on the hobby forum and blog front for most of the past year, but some of you may know me from the Ammo Bunker where I also go by the username Maelstrom. Over the past year or so I've stumbled from one failed project to another. That is until recently where some Red Corsairs have actually been holding my interest, inspired by ADBs work in Bloodreaver amongst other things I set out to try and make a really nice squad.

My aim is to make them different from the Word Bearers I already have so this has meant less of the traditional chaos trim, horns etc and more loyalist marine parts and GS modifications. I've also tried to add beads and trinkets on thread to each marine to give them a bit more flavour.

Anyway enough of my talking heres how they look so far(will split this across 2 posts due to pictures):






These are some of the WiP shots of the conversions I have been doing to each marine. that have all been truescaled with 1mm spacers in the torso and legs, this was inspired by a method I saw Dan the Daemon use over on B&C which I have gradually modified to suit my way of working.

The downside to making each marine individual is the fact it takes a long time to convert each one, so updates for this log will likely be very slow

I do have some plans to make this into a small army, with the recent addition of allies to 40k (I have yet to get the new rule book ) I am thinking of making up a few mixed squads of human/xenos/mutant pirates/mercenaries mainly as i think they would make a rather nice modelling project

I shall put the painted pictures into the next post

[__Maelstrom__]

Now onto post number 2 and its painted pics:





corsair symbol:




the model in the last picture still needs some work doing to his face, though I want to try out some of the new glazes GW have released and still need to order those yet. With this squad I am having some of their right shoulder pads displaying their previous chapter heraldry with a red cross through it.

This is a bit of a nod to the old corsair schemes and also works as a nice insult to Imperial marines :P I've also converted and painted the aquilas on the chest of 2 of the corsairs to appear shattered again somehtign pinched from ADB

Ive got a few more marines in the process of being converted and the next one to be painted will be an ex-executioner who changed sides during the badab war(been doing a little fluff blurb for each squad member to keep me motivated)

Well thats it for my opening posts, any feed back or ideas for members of chapters you wish to see turned renegade are more than welcome

[duffybear1988]

I like them a lot. In fact I was planning something very similar myself.

Do you plan to use the chaos codex or the space marines book to represent them?

I would love to see a chap with a heavy bolter - You don't see many heavy bolter wielding warriors these days and actually it isn't half bad in 6th edition.

[Mr Feral]

Nag? I did no such thing! You asked for a better place to display your project and I suggested here.

You should put that group shot and the individual fluff pieces in like from you-know-where...

I second the call for a Heavy Bolter operator, it's something I'm working on as well so it'll be cool to see how yours turns out!

[__Maelstrom__]

Cheers guys

@Duffybear: thanks dude, codex wise it is very rare that I play however I will likely just be using the chaos marines dex at the mo. As for a heavy bolter I did have that planned for the squad I was actually thinking of using the Heavy Stubber from the IG vehicle sprue as some sort of trophy weapon and counting it as a heavy bolter

@Mr Feral: You did nag :P , I will probs post up the fluff when the full squad is painted

as to the group shot you mean this one:



I'm just finishing off some GS work on the next corsair so i should hopefully have a pic of him up tomorrow

[Inquisitor Engel]

These are lovely! The cracked and worn look on the armour is fantastic. I also love how you've taken the "cross out the old livery" stuff to a new level and had them leaving only the shoulder pad. Excellent work!

[SacredBoltgun]

They are truly awesome, a perfekt combination of your impressive skill and the old and new corsair fluff.

[__Maelstrom__]

Cheers guys, I was originally worried that having the one shoulder pad painted in former chapter colours would make them look a bit disjointed and clash with the red, but it seems to work some how haha

As I promised here is the pretty much finished conversion for corsair 5:





This guy is going to be a former executioner who changed sides during the Badab war and then fled with the remaining astral claws. I was toying with converting the wolf skull into some kind of nid skull but decided to leave it, think this guy is now my joint favourite so far alongside the melta gunner.

Thats it for now I shall go back to the mix of guns I'm tatting with to use as a heavy bolter for the squad, its between a converted plastic loyalist heavy bolter and an IG tanks heavy stubber at the moment which would you guys go for?

[Inquisitor Engel]

I like the green-stuffed MKV helmet!

[__Maelstrom__]

Cheers sir, I'm a bit of a cheap ass and dont really want to fork out for the FW one , that and I'd be kind of afraid to cut up expensive resin models in case I ruined them

right I have a small update managed to get the ex-executioner painted up though the pictures have shown a few things I need to touch up and the odd mold line on the bolter that has escaped the knife:





Really pleased with this guy plus I now have painted my first game legal squad in years This guy has got the urge to do executioners that I've had since the badab IA bookscame out, out of my system at last too haha

Its back to the GS now though as I need to get the next few marines up to the the stage where they are ready for painting. So I shaould have an update in a few days

[SacredBoltgun]

I love him!

[Mr Feral]

Very nice, I like the use of a standard axe and the freehand is as well executed (hurr hurr) as usual.

How many will be in this first squad?

[__Maelstrom__]

Cheers guys

@Mr Feral: Shall be a squad of 10 dude, aiming to get 2 10 man squads done and then will build around that. Got a fair few ideas for human/mutant pirates in my head now, as well as some other elements such as an eventual sorcerer as well as my lord/reaver captain

Seen as im here, here is a WiP shot of one of the next batch of marines:



Atempted a Chain blade bayonet for him, not to sure if it works though. this guy will be next in line to paint Ive also got another 2 marines to a decent level of work done conversion wise, but i shall get pics of them when they are closer to completion

[__Maelstrom__]

Evening guys,

Quick update time, after bouncing a few ideas off that scoundrel Mr Feral, I settled upon chaplain Cassius as the base model for the leader of my merry group of pirate scum. been working on him as of when tie has permitted the past few days and have got him to a level that I though I would show.

Here is the still heavily WIP conversion:





Still alot to do on him but you can get an idea of where he is heading, for his face I'm going for a bit of a dark knight two-face style. In his fluff he will be a bit of a pyromaniac so the bruns make sense.

On the subject of his face do you guys thing I should remove the bionic eye and resculpt that side of his face to be unscarred?

Weapon wise he will be keeping cassius' combi flamer and getting a cutlass or sabre styled power sword. Should have another update in a few days, aiming to get another corsair painted up this week.

Let me know what you think

[Mr Feral]

I think I mentioned this but I think this interpretation of Two-Face is the most appropriate inspiration for you - http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ne131-agd3I/TohHcxeT2yI/AAAAAAAAAXM/TYIrLtfoa1c/s1600/Arkham+Asylum+ASHOSE+%257E+Two-Face.jpg.

You of course could go for the classic red-raw burn or you could try out the bizzare green, with the empty eyesocket (perhaps add some creepy OSL?) and a few wispy branch-like strands of hair on the messed up side. You could explain this by suggesting the fire that cause his horrific injury was cause by some daemonic effect or otherwise (perhaps a backlash for some deadly Daemon weapon or someone from a rival warband?). Also, a subtle splash of green will contrast well against the red armour, just sayin'.

Alternatively, you could just ignore everything I said and do your own thing!

Yes, remove the bionic eye though, cause I think it's an integral part of the original Cassius sculpt.

[Red Skullz]

This plog just makes me happy

The Cassius conversion is inspiring to say the least!

R

[__Maelstrom__]

@Mr Feral: I do like the idea of having the burn as the side effect of some warp fire. Might have it as being caused by a rival sorcerer within hurons inner circle. Infact we can't have him just gettign burned no he will of course have seperated the sorcerer from one of his hands so i might add that as a trophy.

I decided to remove the bionic eye in the end too but you already know that :P

@Red Skullz: cheers sir


Right small update time, the corsair lord is progressing nicely heres the latest pic:



Hes getting there very slowly main work left to do now really is to clean up the combi flamer arm.

In other news on the corsair front I have finally gotten my hands on some instant mold off ebay, the results of my initial experiments with making a mold of a head will be appearing very soon. Needless to say that the stuff is incredibly useful, far better than my normal method of using GS to make my push molds. I ordered some of the open and pointing hands from the grey knights sprue as well as the pouches and accessories from the thunder wolf kit to use with the instant mold, should make for a few interesting poses.

I won a squad of terminators for a decent price too, so a unit of Hurons inner circle of warriors will be on its way before long.

And in general hobby news I had a bit of a shock last night when I was browsing the blogosphere only to find a link to my blog appearing on Dave Taylors latest post of blogs worth checking out. My work getting noticed by as a high a level hobbyist as him is kinda a proud hobby moment for me

Well thats it for now, I do have a corsair very nearly finished paint wise so expect him to pop up rather soon

[precinctomega]

Great conversion work!

R.

[Mr Feral]

You're right, that is a better picture!

Well done on the Chaos Lord, it shall be rather impressive when it is done.

[LokkoRex]

sweet looking red corsairs you've got here, keep it up!