02 Tuesday Feb 2016
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines, Uncategorized
Tags
40k, conversions, space marines, Steel Guard, VIII Company, WH40K
Finished these yesterday, not sure what I think of them. All three were a rescue mission. The Attack Bike had previously been stripped and the plastic is kind of bubbly and rough. I think the silver and grey trim isn’t as good as I had hoped. Still, they are what they are!
14 Thursday Jan 2016
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
Tags
40k, conversions, Honour Guard, lead, oldhammer, space marines, Steel Guard
Another set of recently painted Space Marines I’ve had sitting on my shelf for a while. Apart from the eyes I’m pleased with these guys. The chap with the sword and shield was a mess, missing his hands, and being thickly coated with paint and glue. The chap with the bionic leg was one of the minis I really wanted when I was a kid, so it’s lovely to have gotten to paint him now. All in all I think these make a convincing and pleasing Honour Guard.
11 Monday Jan 2016
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
So I finished this gang a couple of months ago and didn’t take photos at the time because I wasn’t too happy with them. But after a couple of months sitting on the shelf I have decided to take pictures, explain the problems, and move on.
Actually it should be clear what I’ve done wrong here… I’ve mixed periods too much. From Space Hulk to Rogue Trader to Space Hulk 3rd Edition is too much. The difference in scale and quality between the 1st Edition and 3rd Edition makes the 1st Edition Terminator look too small and too square. It really emphasises the limitations of plastic models back then, and I’m not a skilled enough painter to cover it up. I think in future that I will not mix such a wide range of models in one squad.
I Love this sculpt.
09 Saturday Jan 2016
Posted in Finished Work, Imperial Guard, Space Marines
Tags
40k, 4th Company, I Squad, imperial guard, oldhammer, Rogue Trader, space marines, Steel Guard, tactical squad
So it’s been a bit quiet from me in December. December is a busy month for us all, but I got some painting done. I finished two things since I last posted, and to tell the truth I’m not really happy with either of them. In neither case do I think I’ve improved on my earlier work. Still, that’s not the end of the world and after a week or two of them sitting on my shelf I’ve decided to add them to the blog anyway.
First up is another Steel Guard tactical squad. This is 4th Company I Tactical Squad. Led by Veteran Sergeant Sakhalin, a lovely Rogue Trader era mini, mostly this squad are old plastics.
Sakhalin. Would you believe I didn’t notice those stray strands of grass when taking the photos!
After reading a comments conversation on someone else’s blog, I painted the edges of the bases brown this time and I have to admit that I think this is the best way of basing I’ve seen so far.
The scale problems of mixing parts are shown here. I’m not especially bothered as I don’t think it’s a deal breaker but I know some people disagree.
I hated the 2nd Edition Box Set Space Marines when I was a kid. Compared to the RT metal minis and the wonderful mix-n-match RTB01 they seemed lifeless and dull. But as unit fillers they are a pleasure to paint.
The complete squad.
Next up is a unit of Imperial Guard. I’m more used to painting traitors and cultists, and found this lot hard work. The unit consists of a standard bearer and his bodyguards, and 2 heavy weapons squads. Mostly these are Rogue Trader models. I am a huge fan of the RT plastic Guardsmen – though when I was a kid I thought the very boring. The injured guard is a great sculpt, a real pleasure to paint. The guard with the plasma gun had damage to his face which I have tried to paint as a scar, with only limited success. I hate painting eyes – the good eyes in this unit, on the missile launcher guard, were done by the original owners.
10 Saturday Oct 2015
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago I finished painting the whole 2nd Company of the Steel Guard. Actually, when I laid them all out to photo them I discovered I’d actually painted 11 squads! Not sure how you can miscount squads of Space Marines but I achieved it.
I posted the pics of the Rogue Trader period miniatures already, I think they make a wonderful little warband. But here’s the whole lot. Warning! Modern Space Marines included 😀
The whole lot!
This is the newest squad. I have started making scenic bases for them.
This RT chap makes a great assault sergeant.
Based around a damaged mid-period Calgar miniature I converted this captain to be a close-combat monster.
The gulf in quality between the earlier and later marines is huge. One of the best things about this hobby is being able to watch yourself improve.
This sergeant is from Dark Vengeance. Next to him is a Rogue Trader plastic.
This techmarine is one of my earliest conversions. I found painting red really tricky.
In the end I fixed upon using the astronomical icon for ‘comet’ as their insignia.
I tried out different iconography as I went along.
17 Friday Apr 2015
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
I know a lot of the Oldhammer fans don’t approve of the whole Insignium Astartes thing, seeing it as a way of dictating how you paint and play. For me though I enjoy trying to get the squad markings right! It has an added bonus that you don’t need any further markings to work out which miniatures are a squad, so that if they get mixed up there’s no guessing what toys go together! When I first started painting I used coloured splotches on the bottom of the bases to indicate which marines went where, but as I became more confident and started painting squad markings I found that there was no longer any need. Of course, I couldn’t tell you why it’s important not to confuse Marine With Bolter A with Marine With Bolter B, but there you go.
This latest squad means that I now have painted (and named) 9 out of 2nd Company’s 10 squads. One more tactical squad and we’ve got a full company. Expect that sometime this year :p
I’m pretty pleased with this squad. Slowly I’m getting better. I reckon I’ve done maybe 500 of my 10,000 hours – the 10,000 hours you need to spend on something to become a master!
18 Sunday Jan 2015
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
In search of a new project having gotten tired of painting grey Space Marines, I opened a copy of White Dwarf for inspiration. White Dwarf number 98, I think. Featuring the first iteration of the Legion Of The Damned. In modern WH40K LOTD are flame-wreathed ghosts, using melta and flamer weapons. In their first version they were much simpler – normal marines, albeit pale sickly ones, who had painted their armour black with scary flame and bone logos. They had an awesome death frenzy special rule that meant that as long as there was another enemy within 4″ they would keep on killing. So I decided to paint up a squad according to the list given. This meant ten marines, armed only with bolters except for one special weapons marine. All black armour decorated with flames and bones. Any skin should be sickly and warp-tainted.
How did I do? Painting black and getting subtle highlights was tricky – I drybrushed it in really dark greys. Painting flames was tricky too – they look alright from a distance but are pretty laughable up close. But painting bones and skulls were really hard. Still, i figured that the bones and skills weren’t meant to be photo-realistic! I enjoyed this challenge and will be doing similar again in the future.
Currently on my painting table are a rebuild project – i was sent a tatty damaged Chaos Thug by a kind poster on the oldhammer forum and am rebuilding it and painting it. I have also decided to stay in the past, and am painting up Pedro Cantor and his squad as laid out in Rogue Trader: The Battle At The Farm.
I’ve tried to use a good mix of miniatures from different eras.
Lovely old Doom Eagle marine.
08 Wednesday Oct 2014
Posted in Finished Work, Space Marines
Tags
3rd company, I Squad, Space Crusade, space marines, space wolves, Steel Guard, tactical squad, WH40K
Just finished basing these monkeys! I’m quite pleased with these. Compared to my early work they’re Golden Demon standard, but compared to much of the Oldhammer community i’m still little better than a child 😀
I’ve finally settled on a Chapter Badge – nearly 100 marines into my chapter! At first I used a sovietesque star, but freehand stars are surprisingly difficult, and I hate transfers. My fingers are too fat to get transfers right, or maybe it’s a depth perception thing (I only have one working eye), but transfers weren’t for me. Then I used the letters SG, in a kind of art-deco style. That was easy to do, but it didn’t feel right. Yesterday, however, inspiration struck. I discovered astronomical notation. Each planet, moon, dwarf planet etc etc in the solar system has a shorthand sigil. For a comet, the sign is a circle in the lower left hand side, with three lines to indicate the comet tail. Easy to draw, and appropriate for a fleet-based Space Marine chapter. So comets it is. The first 10 look ok! I must have been a bit tipsy when I did the tactical squad arrows though, so those are going to get a touch-up before this squad are consigned to the stasis of the Finished Box.
Not a lot of oldhammer glory in this squad. I’ve taken close-ups of the sergeant, an early-90s metal Space Wolf; and of the special weapon marine, a Space Crusade plastic with a flamer.
3rd Company, I Squad
Sergeant Pusillus
Squad Pusillus Special Weapon Marine
08 Wednesday Oct 2014
Posted in Out Of The Pit
Tags
40k, assault squad, captain, citadel miniatures, death company, oldhammer, Rogue Trader, RTB01, Space Crusade, space marines, Steel Guard, WH40K, WIP
Having finished painting a load of stuff yesterday (pics to follow), I’ve reached into The Pit (aka The Big Box Of Models) to see what happens next. An overpainted Ork Freeboota Kaptain? Into the dettol with you! A plastic marine with a sword? Good for me! This means that the next painting job will be a Space Marine Assault Squad. I root through the box until I’ve got ten marines that have assault weapons or no weapons at all. Below is a picture of all ten in their beginning states. A couple will immediately join the Ork in the dettol though!
As you can tell, I buy my miniatures from ebay! I love poking through a box of old miniatures, seeing what gems are there or looking at other people’s wild conversions. Because I want a whole chapter of Space Marines one day there’s not really any other way of doing it.
In this batch there are 6 modern plastic multipart marines, 1 RTB01 marine, a metal death company marine, a Space Crusade captain (with a home-made paper cloak that i think i will keep), and an RT Dark Angels Marine Captain. You’ll next see these guys when I’m done painting them!
I like the mix and match nature of having different eras of marine in the same squad. I like the idea that sporadic rearming, damage to armour, deaths and promotions etc mean that squad armouring is in regular flux and therefore it is the squad markings and paintjobs that indicate a squad, not the armour mark or styles. Also, because the Steel Guard don’t have a homeworld and recruit as they go, there will be marines from dozens of different cultures within them, hence a variety of styles of personalisation. Let’s hope they’re not too individualistic though, I can’t imagine the Inquisition would have anything good to say about that….
06 Monday Oct 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags
3rd company, 40k, captain, citadel miniatures, master of the arsenal, oldhammer, Rogue Trader, space marines, space wolves, Steel Guard, wd197, white dwarf
Just finished basing this guy. Oldhammerers will recognise the model as a Space Wolves Captain from about 1990. It’s a beautiful model, and one that I felt deserved a special paint job (by my wonky standards, obv). So I decided that I’d use the non-metallic gold painting instructions by Neil Hodgson in White Dwarf 197. Whilst I don’t think its turned out too badly at all, it’s not gold, is it? Still, it’s a paint technique I’ve never tried before, the next one will be better.
WD197 has loads of painting techniques in it, and a Modelling Workshop article on making different types of hedges. So at some point in the near future I’ll show pictures of three or four different types of home-made hedge. If that doesn’t give you a warm glow of trepidation then you’re dead inside 😀
So anyway, without any further ado, may I present Captain Niqal Vosuqabad, the Steel Wolf!
The Steel Wolf
Doris Plunger's Lead Mess 