Here’re some photos!

The Big Mek doesn't carry much in the way of weapons, but that's a fully armed and operation 'kustom force field' on his back!

A shot of the kustom force field, with his 'choppa' blade tucked underneath it.

This Big Mek is also wearing 'eavy armor, which I detailed using various bits with metal plates and the full-face helmet.

More to come!

Sigismund, tactical marine from the Black Templars, holding his power sword aloft.

Calibos, Librarian of the Dark Angels.

Phastos, Devastator of the Salamanders.

Catallus, Apothecary of the Ultramarines.

Some cleanup is needed, but these have come along pretty well so far (especially since I feel like I couldn’t paint well at all a year ago). Hooray!

Note that the base is painted, and detail was added to the scrolls hanging from his wasit.

Reverse angle!

Later this week – modified Chaos Cultists, and a Deathwatch squad!

So, here’s Privateer Press’s photo of Ghetorix:

Notice his left wrist? I don't like its angle. It is goofy.

So… I had to change him. And that meant cutting his axe in half, then sculpting new handle wrapping in Green Stuff, and then pinning him together… and then taking terrible pictures of him because his axe is heavy and he’s not based yet.

Oh man, what a crappy photo of my work. So crappy. Bad angle. He's leaning. What was I thinking taking this photo? What I am thinking posting it here?

This is a much better picture, which shows how badass this axe is, and it shows that my sculpting work isn't too bad.

Next, Ghetorix needs a FABULOUS base, because all special character werewolf types need a FABULOUS base. I just have no idea what that base should be…

Coming soon… some posts with painting, and some things not about minis, but about some other aspect of gaming… hopefully.

I have a small Cryx collection that I really ought to spend more time finishing. The centerpiece, of course, is the dastardly Deathjack. I love the Deathjack model, but it’s notoriously hard to keep together, it’s top-heavy, and the “official” pose leaves some things to be desired.

So, I set out with some goals in mind:

1. Deathjack’s clawed fingers would be turned inward. Out of the box, they point straight out, which looks dumb.
2. Deathjack’s head would be in the top half of his body. The hunched-over pose suggested by the instructions and box photo is awful, placing his head at the level of his waist, apparently.
3. Deathjack’s head would be positioned so he strode into battle with his chin up, and not so that he was dejectedly looking at the ground.
4. Deathjack would be pinned all over. His spikes, his chimneys, his shoulders, his arms, his claws – everything would have pins and whatever adhesive necessary to make him solid. Pieces would not fall off.
5. Deathjack’s pose would be as dynamic as I could manage.

In the end, I declare success! (mostly)

Here is how he looks right now (pending a little bit of cleanup and gap-filling):

The right arm's pose looks slightly odd here - otherwise, his head is held high, his fingers and thumbs curl inward, and (trust me) he is pinned to death.

The right arm looks much cooler here. You can also see how I bent his toes so that his left foot is almost gripping the base.

And Now, the Horror

This wasn’t easily accomplished. Here’re some of the horrors I endured while accomplishing this:

• Pins in every joint, including a finger and a thumb, the spikes on the back of the hands, and the outstretched rib cage bits on his chest.
• Big pins holding his legs into the base. The base is Super Sculpey glued to the plastic base, with craft matchsticks to create a “hardwood floor” or “deck” look, along with some bits of broken plaster for debris.
• Gorilla Glue. The big pins in the legs weren’t enough to hold Deathjack still. Since there were gaps between the feet and ankles, I filled it with Gorilla Glue, which expands as it dries. This filled those gaps, holding Deathjack fast and steady to the base.
• Once I found out how well Gorilla Glue worked in the ankles, I poured it into the hips, too. I had flared Deathjack’s legs out a bit, and that made them impossible to secure to the pelvis part. But the expanding Gorilla Glue closed the gaps and secured it. I did have to cut and file at the excess Gorilla Glue to clean up the gap, though.
• Gorilla Glue helped secure the goofy wrist poles into the two-part claw pieces.
• Apoxy Sculpt filled in the gap under the head to help me attach the head to the neck at the angle I wanted.
• Liquid Green Stuff helped me fill smaller gaps and secure things like the spikes on the backs of the hands, the thumb that had broken off before I even started bending it, and the gaps left in the hips.
• Most remarkably, I broke six or seven (very tiny) drill bits while trying to make pilot holes for pins. All of these bits remain in Deathjack, some of them acting as de facto pins to help keep him together.

It took a lot of time, and there were several moments (especially as drill bits broke) where I wanted to throw Deathjack against the wall, but in the end, I think the finished product speaks for itself, and makes the frustration well worth it.

Now… I should probably paint it…

These pictures are not very good, but these guys are hard to get good pictures of.

Yeah, another bad picture.

This one looks better!

I started to put some plasticard armor on this guy. I'm not sure how I feel about it yet.

So, those are works-in-progress! Obviously, they are not quite cyborgs yet, but I am going to slap orky bitz on them, including exhaust pipes, shootas, good ol’ scrappy armor, and probably some wires and hoses.

The fifth cyboar rider will be a Painboy (an ork “medic” for the uninitiated), so he’ll need some more customization – mostly a mask, a syringe, and possible a buzzsaw for an arm.

Your comments are appreciated! Well, possibly…

So, here’re some shots of him:

I am getting better at taking photos!

That picture is dark, but it’s a good angle. Note that the base isn’t finished… but it does have loads of skulls, so there’s that.

Actually, this might be a better angle.

And his back!

And a side angle. Figures with tons of black are hard to take good pictures of...

Hooray for painting! I feel pretty good about the Chaplain. He needs some work on the skull decor, and I want to scrawl some Litanies of Hate on the scroll at his waist, but otherwise he is good to go.

More to come!

If you’ve been reading Save vs. Blog, then you know I avoid painting for no good reason. Earlier this year, I started to really push myself to paint, and I’ve been pleased with the results. Well, while I haven’t blogged about it, I’ve still been doing nerd stuff in the time I have. One thing I’m doing now is starting a game of Deathwatch, the Space Marine RPG from Fantasy Flight Games. I really wanted to have nice miniatures for my players to represent their characters in the game… and that means painting minis.

To get back into it, I decided to paint up an Inquisitor who will be an NPC in the game. Plus, when he’s not pulling NPC duty, he’s a great Inquisitor for use with my Grey Knights. While I figured this would just be a practice run, I’m happy with the finished product. Let’s check him out!

Here he is after priming. His hat, as always, is casting his face in shadows. Foreboding, right?

First, I sprayed him over with good old-fashioned automobile primer. These spray primers are much cheaper than the ones you’ll find in a gaming store… and since I really like to start from a neutral color, rather than black or white, being able to use gray is strongly preferred. So far, they’ve worked out just fine.

Now, the real problem wasn’t painting – the real problem is that I still don’t have a macro box set up to take pictures of miniatures. These pictures, as a result, have awful lighting. You have my sincere apologies.

Yuck. I tried to light it with an LED, and man, this picture is gross. Unfortunately, I don't have time to take a better one right now.

Terrible picture, but you can still make out the color choices, the shading, and other detail work… it just looks awful in this picture, is all.

A nice picture of the painting of the power sword. I'm not 100% satisfied with this, but it's my first attempt to do lighting effects on a power weapon. Not bad, all things considered.

I love the way power swords are painted nowadays – where once, everything was just metallic, now it’s all blazing energy or electrical lighting. So, I decided to go for that effect on the Inquisitor’s sword. I give myself a B-, but I think I know how to improve.

Another terribly lit image, but you can still make out the important bits.

In the reverse angle, you can see the Inquisitor’s power pack and some of the highlighting on his clothing. I’m happy with that. His inferno pistol also looks a little better in this picture.

A closer look at the Inquisitor. For some reason, the lighting worked out alright this time.

Alright, it’s finally a good picture! Here, you can see finer details, like his glowing eye and matching cybernetic eye. I’m happy with the red trim on his coat and the graying locks of hair. I’m not completely satisfied with the face shading, because it doesn’t really pop like it should. I’m not going back in there with the brush, though, so it is what it is.

There you have it – I’m painting! Overall, this figure is too dark in shades, which hides a lot of his detail in normal lighting. I need to use bolder colors to contrast with the black coat and hat. Still, I’m excited – I don’t have much practice at painting, but my earliest work shows a lot of promise.

…I mean, if I do say so myself.

Now that I’ve painted the interior roughly to my satisfaction, it’s time to cobble this sucker together! I used the bulkhead as a guide to square the bottom and left side first:

Of course, as I stare at the model more and more, I become less and less satisfied with the painting work. It's on the interior, though - I'll do a better job on the exterior, right?

This shot makes the interior look better, so I’m including it, too:

Yay! I love that bulkhead.

I then said a fond farewell to the interior and popped the right side and bottom on the model:

This is a nice shot of some of the underside details, too, like the wells for the landing gear.

Unfortunately, as I was just getting some momentum, I discovered that Forge World had packed two of the left canard and no right canard! I know a lot of you have probably not experienced “double canard shock,” but it’s pretty brutal. Luckily, Forge World (and Games Workshop) have pretty great customer service when it comes to missing bits, so a new canard is on its way!

Here’s a shot of where I had to stop:

Mostly assembled! Double left canard!

And another shot:

Oh my! It's missing a canard!

These shots don’t provide you with a good look of all the places where patching and filling are necessary. That’s the nature of the beast – if you plan on building a resin model, have a plan for filler and patches. Green Stuff, Liquid Green Stuff, Green Putty, and Apoxie Sculpt are all good for different reasons.

I used Apoxie Sculpt so far on the Storm Eagle, but I think, in some places, I would have been better off with Green Stuff and Green Putty. Liquid Green Stuff is perfect for tiny gaps and bubbles. However, there was a big chunk missing from the front of the left side. I don’t know if I accidentally broke it or if it came that way, but for that part – which was a straight, flat part – Apoxie Sculpt worked perfectly. I’ll try and get some pictures of that for the next (and last) assembly post. After that… painting!

Now, my painting method is “Base, wash, layer, layer, layer.” This is the method that’s in the new Citadel painting guide, “How to Paint Citadel Miniatures.” After reading through the book and watching the DVD, I decided to try it their way – previously, my method was more “Layer, layer, layer, layer, etc.” The improvement in my painting was instantly recognizable. I didn’t really expect this (expensive) book to be a big help, but I really hadn’t felt like any advice or other tutorials had helped me. I mostly bought the book because my wife was interested. Meanwhile, I am totally getting my money’s worth.

Back to business – I had to paint the interior before I glued the Storm Eagle together. I started with some really messy and poor methods, and that shows somewhat in the first few pictures.

This is a wide shot of the interior on the port side.

In general, the paintjob is mostly messy, but I wasn’t really doing it right. It was suitable for the internet, and the contrasting colors will be fine when someone looks up inside. But I was pleased with the control panels up front:

I don't know what these screens are for, but they're turned off, I think.

Thanks to the wonderful point on my Vallejo Kolinsky Sable brush (and a semi-steady hand), this was actually very easy.

Here’s a (poorly lit) shot of the starboard interior, close in on the opposite control panels:

Control panels look good, but the rest is so-so.

I wasn’t too happy with the finished products, but I was still kind of feeling my way through it. Then I had to paint the bulkhead. This time, I basecoated it with gray, then put a black wash in the crevices, then layered gray over it. On the lights, I based with a dark red and highlighted with a pink color to make it appear lit. I put an icy blue on the two lights overhead, then edged some things in a light gray. I even went for the gold and did the door frame on the front side with warning stripes!

This is the rear-facing side of the bulkhead.

This is the front-facing side of the bulkhead.

Of course, when I then test-fitted the bulkhead into the model, I realized almost none of this is visible in the finished model… so… enjoy the pictures, I guess!

More to come… including some sidetracking on the new Storm Talon Gunship!