First off, the image police would like you to fix the pictures so that they scroll vertically. The 4 wide thing is making it impossible for me to view on this bad monitor.

As to the snow, the basing looks good but I'm not a fan of it on the legs. I've never had snow collect on me while snowboarding through deep snow so I can't imagine it would stop on a guy who's actually running. It works on vehicles that are stationary or collecting on the roof, but not on the tops of feet and such.
The painting all looks great and I really like the tartans. I don't really like the orange/red gun though. I think it doesn't mesh well with the colour scheme used on the rest of the model.

Hmm, are you using Internet Explorer? It must be a browser issue since I formatted them to wrap. Anyways I changed them so at most they would go 2 wide.

From yours and other inputs I'm gonna try just reducing the amount of snow/ice to the crevices around his boots and the very bottom of the tartan. Weathering Powders make fixing this a snap since I haven't fixed them to the model yet.

I needed a break from the blood claws to test out a new material I was wanting to use. Normally I use a matte varnish or dullcote to seal my mini between layers, but I was wanting to see if I could find something cheaper. After some searching I found:

Testors Model Master Acryl: Flat/Clear Acrylic.

Since this was a new material, I didn't want to try it out on some models I've spent a couple months working on.

Time to break out the gnoblars!
I don't know how many of you are familiar with Warhammer Fantasy, but I also play ogres. The cheapest unit ogres can bring, (And probably the cheapest in WHFB) are gnoblars. At 1/5th the cost of a firewarrior, they are utter trash, but the change to the 8th edition rules make them incredibly useful as a tarpit unit. Bring enough and they'll always be stubborn in a fight, and keep them in range of your general and battle standard bearer and they have a re-rollable leadership 9 . The trick is quickly painting them up when you have over 100 of them. This means cutting every corner you can. So I must confess my painting sin.

I resorted to dipping them.

For this batch I painted up 55 in one shot. First step was to adhere them to a couple pieces of cardboard & spray them with Army Painter Greenskin Primer. Then I did a simple preshade job with a mixture of goblin green, sunburst yellow, & bleached bone.

Priming done.

Then I quickly painted their clothes and wood/leather with foundation paints followed by all metal surfaces with boltgun metal (Gnoblar weapons can't look too new). For their main colors I wanted them to look like they just raided an empire thrift store so I went with Red, Yellow, Light Blue, & Purple clothes (Intentionally clashing). All this was done with some old frayed GW drybrushes I had laying around.

In order to avoid buying the expensive army painter dip, I went with a cheaper equivalent. Wood Stain. At my local hardware store they had Cabot Water-borne stain & polyurethane on clearance so I picked up a can for less than $10. I wanted a water soluble wood stain that also included the polyurethane coating to protect the models since the gnoblars will probably be crammed in a gallon ziplock bag. This would decrease the smell of the stain and make it easier to deal with. Plus I plan on using the excess stain to color a concrete birdbath I have outside.


Since the stain was pretty thick I thinned it with some water (Water soluble )into another container. Using a pair of needle-nose pliers I dipped each model, shook off the excess and set them out to dry.

Dipping done

The stain always comes in a glossy or satin finish so I now need to spray on their matte acrylic coat with my airbrush. This will finish and seal them with two coats of protection.
So I was able to prime, preshade, paint, and shade 55 models in one week. Did I mention this also happened to be during finals week? Overall I spent about 17 minutes per model up to this point.

As soon as I get my airbrush hooked up and the minis sprayed I'll post pictures of the final/unbased product. If it works well, I'll be using it for all the matte coats on my minis.

Fun dipping technique, looking forward to the matte sprayed results!

Thanks for putting up the run down on your mass painting exercise.

- Tael.

Well, I sprayed about half the bottle of matte acrylic on the gnoblars only to have them turn out slightly less shiny. They have more of a satin finish now rather than glossy. Oh well I guess it's back to spray can varnishes or airbrush dullcote.

I'll post some photos as soon as I wrap up the blood claws in the next couple days.

Well the Blood Claws are almost completely finished. I went with a slightly snowy look. Now all I have left is to touch them up a little and base them.






Since I'm almost done I started my next project, the beginnings of my Warmahordes army, Circle of Orboros. I chose Mohsar for my first Warlock because I love the flexibility he has, as well as the HUGE amount of fury he can have a turn. Since I've been doing a lot of blue & green armies lately, I wanted to try out a hot dry feel, which is appropriate considering Mohsar's territory is in the desert. This is the first model I've ever tried a NMM technique on. So far I think I'm starting to get the hang of it, I'm thinking I'll need to redo the shoulderpads & add in a horizon line on the scythe though. So far I've done my initial layout, preshaded the whole model, and painted both ends of the scythe, and shoulderpads.

I've almost finished Mohsar, although I'm thinking I need to redo some of the work on his front.






Just a appropriately impressive base is needed

Wow it's been a while since I've updated this, life has gotten in the way for a LOOOONG time. A lot has changed since I was last here. For a while I quit playing 40k due to another local store closing and another relocating along with ridiculous gas prices. . . and Grey Knights. That and working two jobs while going to Grad school tends to leave little time for fun time. But life finally calmed down a bit (Now it's just one job and Grad school), I found a local club that regularly plays 40k and I found another store that opened near me so I can finally get games in again.

Since this Project Log is a bit old and was orphaned for a bit, please have patience while the broken image links are cleaned up.

But I'm working on my armies again, this time my Space Wolves are sitting on the shelf while my Tau get finished. But to catch up:

LED Rhino:

As you might be able to guess from the Land Raider my Space Wolves like to ride around in vehicles that actually have functioning exterior and interior lights. This last project involves lighting up a rhino transport.
Problem 1: Where do the batteries go?
Problem 2: How do I wire these since the vehicle is already assembled?
Problem 3: How can I make this modular if I ever need to remove it from the model?
Problem 4: How do I trigger the lights now that the vehicle is basically complete?

Solution 1:

With a piece of plasticard inside the drivers compartment 4 AAA batteries will happen to fit (With a little carving where needed). However I needed to construct my own battery holders since they will not physically fit in the space. While it's a bit jury rigged, it works (most of the time). I need to do a little bit more work to set up reliable battery contacts at the top that don't lose contact every time the vehicle moves.



Solution 2:

Since the sides are already glued on I decided to limit the amount of wiring outside the drivers compartment. This means 2 lights inside the drivers compartment, one for the red glow out the front of the rhino and another to shine into the passenger compartment. Outside, there are two lights for the Rhino's headlights that are wired through holes cut into the driver's compartment. I don't know yet if these will need to be sealed up because of light leakage but if I do, the job won't be easy.





Solution 3:

At the core of the electrical system sits a solder able circuit board. Unlike the Land Raider where I simply soldered wires together and covered them with heat shrink, the board makes it MUCH easier to connect wires securely and cleanly. Worst case scenario I can remove the Circuit Board and move it to a new vehicle with a lot of the soldering work already done.




Solution 4:

This is probably the trickiest part. Since I normally trigger the lights off of switches (I have no room in the drivers compartment) and contact switches on doors (Can't access the rear door hinge without breaking the model) I'm sticking with one jury rigged switch to trigger all the lights. Here I drilled a hole replacing the antennae on the rhino's hatch. When a straightened and shaped paperclip is pushed through the hole it completes the circuit turning on the lights.
DISCLAIMER: Creating a switch like this without proper understanding of the system's voltages and current supplied can be very dangerous! There is a risk of being shocked by the wire connector and/or arcing between the contacts and creating a fire inside your mini (BAD BAD BAD). ALWAYS ensure the power supplied by the system is safe for handling (Preferably with an electrician) with this type of "switch".





Sadly this rhino will be sitting on the wall at 75% completion for a while until my Tau are assembled/painted. Since my Space Wolves are going into Semi-Retirement (Until they can actually do more than growl menacingly at flyers), my Tau are now taking precedent.

Up Next . . . XV-8/XV-88 Suit Conversions!

Even though my Tau were retired from active service (5th edition) after January 2010 I still adding to my collection for the future of 6th edition and the next codex release.

Reposing
Since the regular Crisis Suit Models are over a decade old and so in need of a rework (and I hate the poses unmodified suits are capable of) I set about reposing my old models and assembling my new ones. This means cutting every joint, reposing and pinning every moving piece. While the older models were less flexible in their poses (I couldn't separate the ball joints from the hips even with CA glue debonder) I could still make them a little less static. My goal was to make them look like Pre-XV-8X suits incorporating some of their design elements. First were the "Knee" Joints. If you look carefully at the existing XV-8 Suit "knee" joints you will notice that:
A. They are anatomically incorrect for a creature with a backwards bending legs ie "Hocks" (Compare them to Firewarrior Legs, the suits are missing a joint)
B. Forge World fixed this with their XV-8X suits and turned the legs around. This allows them greater range of motion and dynamism in their poses.

So on all the XV-8 suits I switched the Legs around. On the broadsides I left them facing the same way as before since the original style would be physically capable of carrying more weight.



Weapon Mounts
The second modification I made was the under-slung weapon mount on the arms. This both decreases the number of magnets I need to use for mounting weapons and does away with the outdated wrist/mount weapons. This was a bit tricker to pull off since I wanted a solid piece of plastic to glue my magnets into and didn't want to completely sculpt the forearm. After digging through my bits drawer for a while I came up with two solutions, the halves to a SM vehicle pintle stormbolter and Ork Sluggas.

With a little trimming, gap filling, sculpting and plasticard I came up with an acceptable forearm mount for the weapons.



Finally, all the mounting grooves on the arms and shoulders have been filled in to smooth & bulk out the model's form.

The downside was that it took about a month to complete all the conversions on 10 suits. But every joint is now pinned giving me incredibly strong models.

Final images to follow.

Shas'el Vior'La Shik'het Mal'caor (Victorious Path Spider)




Shas'ui Vior'La Or'tal


Shas'ui Vior'La Revket




Shas'ui Vior'La Besk'al


Shas'vre Vior'La Il'vah (True Sight)


Shas'ui Vior'La Shi'bet



Shas'ui Vior'La Toskor




Just basing and magnetizing are left to finish them off before painting.

These are looking really good, lostinnm. I went on a "fixing spree" myself on some of my older XV8's that were coming apart at the seams or had been knocked around enough to break at the ankles. I don't know that I've got your skills at fixing the super-old stuff, but you've given me some ideas to try on my next XV88 suit.

Your spot-filling looks dead-on, and I really love the poses. Looking forward to seeing some more of your work.

The older XV8's are pretty easy to readjust even if they have been previously assembled, especially if they are already falling apart.

Shoulders: I cut the ball joints from the torso flush with the body, then rounded out the ball joint. It happens that some of the round injector ports on GW sprues are the same diameter as the extensions between the ball joint and torso. Just glue them to the body, file them down to the right length and you can pin the arm to the body through your new extension.
Forearms: Cut the forearms from the elbow joint and clean up the joint. Now they can be pinned into a new position.
Knees/Hocks: Cut the lower leg portion at the joint and clean up the joint. If you turn the legs around you can pin them through the shin area and file the pin down flush with the shin.
Ankles: These are the most common repair. I cut the ankle from the leg just above the ball joint. Then I reshaped the ball joint into a ball and glued the foot back to the leg. With that done I ran a pin up through the recessed area in the bottom of the foot up into the leg.



For filling cracks and areas between parts I usually use milliput rather than Green Stuff. Milliput it MUCH more brittle than green stuff but being water soluble I can thin it out with water to the right consistency to make it easy to work with. Plus you can shape it into sharper edges than green stuff. But being so brittle you are limited to areas where the putty is pretty well protected already. Usually for stuff like this I'll use a 50/50 greenstuff milliput mix for the good properties of both green stuff and milliput but I've been out of greenstuff so I just stuck with what I had on hand. My other hobbies have been taking any disposable income I happen to have right now.

I have been meaning to post in this thread for a long while. Some very inspiring stuff in here, I especialy like the lighting work with the Rhino.

Looking forward to seeing the different Crsisi suis finished, and to see your magnetising work with the weapons in use.

With the Suits waiting for magnets to complete their assembly I've moved on to finishing my Hammerhead chassis vehicles. I do own five piranhas but they can wait until the rest of the army is finished, they won't be seeing any table time so their painting can wait. For the longest time the vehicles have simply been tacked together and it's time to finish them. When I pulled them out of storage I was pleasantly surprised to find that prior to their retirement I finished all of their LED work and they are almost ready for painting !

All that is left before painting is to hinge the vehicle's side doors and finish the assembly. After previous trial and error with the weak and hard to access door hinges as well as experience hinging rhino doors I have adjusted my approach from the last vehicle. Now I simply cut off the exterior hinges from the vehicle body and drill holes in their place.

Then I add a pin running through the door and wrap hobby wire around the pin to create a hinge.


This wire I twist up, thread through the holes in the body, and glue to the inside of the vehicle.

After this a plasticard door threshold panel will placed over the wire to conceal it.

This creates a much stronger hinge with less drilling involved.

And the other vehicle, a scratch built Sensor Tower

Bonus points to the person who can identify all the parts used.

The 110th Vior'lan Urban Interdiction Cadre often needs the heavy firepower XV-88 suits provide but the close confines of urban fighting often restrict their ability to deploy the standard XV-88 variant. The standard variant's long guns are often hard to conceal and maneuver in tight spaces so they have been modified and refitted to adapt to the 110th's needs. The XV-882 railgun variant is an experimental model that sacrifices long ranged hitting power for portability and ease of concealment. Added to their railguns they often mount Twin Linked Plasma Rifles giving them the capability of laying down a whithering storm of firepower. Often those chasing retreating firewarriors or tetras find themselves in the middle of a trap, cut down on all sides by hidden railgun and plasma fire. Those attempting to flee are then cut off by the 110ths crisis suits and hammerheads until they surrender to the greater good or die trying to escape.








And the railguns alongside plasmaguns for scale:

While I'm waiting for magnets to arrive I've started painting up the models that are already assembled. Looking at my old firewarriors I can notice how far my painting has advanced. The paint scheme was created before foundation paints, before I had an airbrush, and was the second unit I had ever painted.

The problems I have with it:

• Complete lack of color harmony in the scheme
• Heavy use of light colors next to dark colors makes it difficult to paint
• 9 colors per model is way waaay too many
• The scheme is so complicated it takes too long to complete a unit
• In an urban environment the Vior'lan troops would adjust their sept markings to blend in with the terrain better.

So the 110th is being refit and for duty.
I don't want to totally change the scheme and have to completely repaint every model in the army but rather repaint the firewarriors and tweak the rest of the completed models to fit the scheme.

New Scheme Goals:

• 4 Colors per model Maximum
• More than 50% of the model uses foundation paints
• Keeps lighter armor feel of old scheme
• Pays homage to old scheme

Standard Firewarrior:

The colors used are:
Shadow Grey
Charadon Granite
Khemri Brown
Space Wolves Grey
Undecided on the Yellow color
I should have pics up of the new scheme in a few days.

I haven't had a whole lot of time to post pictures but I have been working. Sadly a lot of that work has been fixing/salvaging models that have been ruined (I'll get back to that later)
I figured I'd post these before I sold the models. I badly need the money and haven't played Warmahordes in over a year now.

Mohsar the Desert Walker Finished



Gnarlhorn Satyr 90% Finished



Shifting Stones Finished





Blackclad Wayfarer 50% Finished

Whenever I have been time (ie not at school or class) I've been on a fixing/painting spree to get my Tau fully painted so I can get some games in with them. So far I've been able to finish up two more firewarrior squads with the new scheme. To recap:
Old Paint Scheme:


New Paint Scheme:


110th Vior'lan 4th Firewarrior Squad




The scheme has been greatly simplified from before and the the basing scheme has been updated about 25 years. Now they are actually an urban cadre rather than a blue army on a field of sandy turf.

Shas'Ui:


Shas'La:


Base:

Since there is no real model for differentiating veteran firewarriors from regular firewarriors I wanted to model one squad that actually looked like they could be elite veterans. I wanted them to appear to be as kitted out as possible, armed for any encounter. These veterans all are packing grenades, many feel hindered by their face enclosing helmets and many are packing both Pulse carbines and rifles for whatever situation they may face.

1st Vior'lan Veteran Firewarrior squad:




Shas'Ui preparing a photon charge before clearing a room with his carbine:

Shas'Ui using his Blacksun Filter to coordinate his squad's fire


Up Next:
Tetra WIP

With my old painted units I now have 48 firewarriors, so I'm moving on to other units. Now for some FW goodness, Tetras!
The long isolated Pathfinder deployments in the field make the firewarriors armored bodyglove impractical so they wear a lighter field uniform under their armor. While this provides less protection than the standard firewarrior's equipment, it allows a greater degree of mobility in the field for hiding in the brush or rapid extractions via tetra or piranha.

With the new paint scheme, all light scouting units use the same colors but the charandon granite and khemeri brown are switched. Also I have adjusted the camo pattern on the vehicle in order to paint faster. These WIP pictures have the majority of the model's color blocked in but I still need to go back and clean up the edges, sharpen the camo, add details, highlight, and ink the model.

WIP Tetras "Urban Mid-Altitude Insertion Pattern II"
Tetra I - Pathfinder Shas'Ui Tor'det

This model took a little extra conversion where I used a Tank Commander's torso and arms(I happened to lose the spotter's torso ) but I think it turned out well and gives me a distinct squadron commander.

Tetra II - Pathfinder Shas'la Praesal


Tetra III - Pathfinder Shas'la Hir'ur


Tetra IV - Pathfinder Shas'la Sha'hui



Hopefully I can finish these up this week or next.