‘nids part 272 – Tyranid VSG part 3

Dreadtober starts tomorrow, but I mentioned the other day I had been sculpting the Tyranid Void Shield Generator and so thought I’d just slip this in before I can start sharing my Dread progress. I had been putting the VSG off, for over 3 years now, purely because I wanted to video how to do some of the tendon bits. I finally did the clip and I desperately want this complete, but among so many other projects Dreadtober included there’s quite a competition for my limited hobby time.

Here’s how I sculpt a tendon:

And static shots from the completed spine in the video.

The inner spine is [almost] complete though.

It’s not perfect by any stretch but after the gloss and Tamiya Clear Red X-27 it doesn’t have to be.

My next stumbling block is how it interfaces with the ground. I was going to use some of the wood chips I used on my ‘ground-bursting’ Trygon but I still need to add some lava stones to look like alien growths. It’s a fair bit of work and not without challenges, hence why it has almost caused my renewed efforts to stall…

The emitter node also needs adding to the pen tube so I can then add veins and whatnot before I then try and sculpt the inside of the battlements. 

The black mark is for one extra tendon that needs to be sculpted in place. I’ve got some concept elements for the battlements – which is an odd situation as in 8th edition the building rules are far more streamlined now with less room for interpretation. It’s still possible to position models in the standard Imperial VSG but nowadays this would probably be considered modelling for advantage. 

I mean I did specifically build it to fit a brood of Devgaunts in but that was perfectly legitimate with the prescribed rules in 7th. Anyway, I doubt it’s ever going to a tournament so it’s not really an issue.

Anyway, not sure when/if I’ll do some more on this, Dreadtober is my focus but I will have some extra hobby time between writing this and it’s scheduled publish date, so I might have one update soonish or none for six months to two years…😂

Terrain is everything – Ferron Fire Firs

My last update on these was April 2018. They’ve essentially sat in a box untouched until now. Other projects take priority and terrain often falls by the wayside. Frustratingly not a lot needed doing to complete them – the Red Planet BASE! and some additional highlights on some of the trees for variety.

I did my Red Planet BASE! highlights, I also did all the Genestealer Aberrants, Hive Guard, Rippers, Termagants, Tyranid Warrior and Redemptor Dreadnought while I was at it – you see that’s the advantage of the Big Build programme, it allows you to get them ready for basing.

I then did the extra highlights of the mid-yellow [lemon] and then threw on some white for super hot streaks of combustion. Hopefully they’ll fit in with the other set I’ve done previously, although the very reason for the extra highlights is variety so not sure how ‘fitting in’ is supposed to manifest itself as I’ve expressly painted them different…

Wraithbone chips next and then a quick varnish. I actually have once of those cheap spray-can car varnishes so I decided to give it give a go. It seemed the easiest way even if the soft cover makes varnish almost redundant. The red trees are from the first set I bought, where I didn’t paint the big trees because I thought they were too big – this was before LoS for Knights was needed, so I’m finishing these off too.

The clear lacquer did alright and the ‘bottle brush’ feels slightly more substantial know because of it. 

However, it is glossy, which for the trees I actually like.

But for the bases I don’t.

Protection wise I’m satisfied but I’ll be painting all the bases with my Winsor & Newton Matt Varnish. Not only will this add more protection where this terrain is prone to damage but also supply the finish I’m after.

It’ll be dull ‘drone’ work, that I’m not particularly looking forward to but it’s just the one last step and I can tick it off my To Do List as a great start to the new season – terrain ✔️, quantity ✔️, long time in production ✔️

I also picked up a couple of extra art acrylics, so I’ve got my infra-red spectrum going here. I need another can of clear lacquer to varnish up my first set of trees to the same level of protection but typically Home & Bargain is out of stock.

Terrain is everything – 40k future container scatter terrain – Touch ups

Just a quick one, in amongst completeing the previous future containers I decided to embelish this older green container. It followed a similar pattern to the Maersk Line container and I had a spare stencil template to put a big number on so it was rude not to.

Now although I firmly believe big numbers make anything look cooler there is something about this one that doesn’t quite work, perhaps it’s just too bright. I also added some more Rhinox Hide sponging and Ryza Rust as well as Valejo Red Oxid paste in places to cover up where the paint has already chipped off. I also weathered up the base a lot to be more durable and fit with the three previous containers.

As you can see its overall colour ‘silhouette’ has changed dramatically. The overwhelming green its now competing with 25% white and the orange and brown is significantly more noticeable. So I’m a little sad I’ve lost a solid block of colour but I’ve just got to accept where it’s at now.

Maybe a little more toning down of the number 5, some silver in places and a varnish. There was no urgency in doing it just something I felt it needed.

Terrain is everything – 40k future container scatter terrain – TO DONE!

Although I was occasionally naughty when i was painting the Bio-titan in that I would get distracted and do some of my future containers there is a benefit when it comes to tackling them alone – there’s so much already done.

And so they were pretty easy to finish off. That said I can’t find a consistent approach to my rusty/scuffed weathering. Sponging Rhinox Hide is a start, followed by Gun Metal and usually a wash to tone it all down. 

I try Ryza Rust but it just doesn’t look right and wouldn’t have worked on the Hapag Lloyd containers anyway. The Maersk lines isn’t too bad though.

I just love these containers and as I’ve said before it’s such a shame Mentos discontinued the gum they contained. I’ve started on a foamboard STC but haven;t had time to perfect it yet.

I’m also thinking that you can get wooden, chamfered blocks off ebay and making some reinforcement templates you could achieve something similar. That’s not to say Munitorum Containers aren’t also up to the task but we like cheap terrain solutions too.

Giddy with excitement I have taken my green container and applied a big number to it and for once I’m thinking it was a mistake. 

Adding some weathering has shifted it’s overall ‘greenness’ and it looks very different to what it previously was. Nevermind, we’ll see if I can rescue it. 

These were great fun to do though and another item that started as a Big Build project, once again reaffirming that although making models is not my favourite part of the hobby setting aside some focus does provide projects that can be completed. Without the making I can’t get to the painting!

I’ve a dozen of these now and as I say, although I can’t get a consistent approach to weathering I’m definitely happier with how I do them now than years ago. I also have the ‘water container’ that could be finished off at some pint the construction is flimsy at best so I may not bother with it.

Here’s my Big Gamboge Stamp of Approval, I’ve a few Camera360 shots to share too and then it’s my Razorback which also got TO DONE!

Terrain is everything – 40k future container scatter terrain – Detailing!

With the Armigers out of thesurprisingly it was the future containers that drew my attention. The orange ones requiring four coats of paint to achieve the orange I was after and that’s not including all the priming, shading etc. Strong Tone picked out all the shadows and then my pumpkin craft acrylic edge highlights.

Then I noticed that some Aquila decals would fit perfectly in the top space so they both had gloss coats, decals and then matt varnish [can’t find my Lahmian Medium 😦 ], two side on both.

I’ve shipping company logos to add yet and then some more weathering and damage, probably not as much as the OOCL ones but we’ll see.

The third container – I decided on grey.

Once again BIG numbers look awesome, painted some scuffs too.

Maersk Line shipping company, I did consider switching it for Magnus but decided to leave it as is.

The other big number. A simple stencil, tidied up and then scuffed.

The Maersk logo – a stencil with grey dots for the centre of the A, R and nicks in the S. The blue square was stencilled, then the white star stencilled and tidied up afterwards. Again still more weathering to do, as I say I got carried away with the amount of sand in the basecoats, it’s a bit too rough but there’s not much I can do with it now.

I then went and did the Hapag-Lloyd logos. Obviously with less success – stenciling the name was really difficult. Given the spacing between the letters I only really cut out the H, p, g, L, l y, and d and then hand painted the a, a, – and o.

Then I went back and filled in all the ‘counters’ [the holes in all the letters, like the o and d]. I tidied it all up, added some shading’highlights to the blue logo and although it’s not perfect it’ll do. Some weathering will help but I do need some additional decoration on the sides.

These last two pics were originally going to form the start of the next post update but I’ve since realised these will have to go on hiatus while I focus on the Bio-titan, so thought I’d share them now. And one day I still need to create an STC for a foamcore cube to replace the OOP Mentos cubes that form the base for these, one day…

Terrain is everything – 40k future container scatter terrain – Big Build To Done!

You know the deal by now – I set a number of tasks and targets for myself and go about sabotaging it by taking on yet more projects but the muse compels me. Having completed 2 of these containers earlier this year I had found the last three Mentos Cube boxes I’d collected – I so wish I’d bought more. I thought I could do the ‘reinforcing’ in my lunch break at work. So the plastic got sanded for more of a key when it gets painted, my current ones do chip very easilt but it’s soft plastic. I used PVA to stick them on, it;s worked in the past. I wasn’t hole punching the circles on the corners/middle I bought some small 2mm adhesive jems to make rivets instead.

Now the original plan was for these two to me MSC shipping containers  [yes, I appreciate the tautology]. Having done OOCL I wanted another global container brand and the yellow would stand out, except I changed my mind at the last minute as I already have the two biohazard containers that are yellow and wanted to try something different. So I chose orange instead and luckily there’s a container company for that – Hapag-Lloyd. Now I’d undercoated these with grey primer and black primer, I then painted them with black masonry paint mixed with PVA and some fine sand [too much fine sand actually so they’re far grittier than I’d planned]. All of this is to try and make them more durable. I then primed Red Oxide and the first orange paint was a Dark Orange craft acrylic which had really poor coverage. I had to stipple it twice to get coverage I was happy with but even then the colour was not the ‘papaya’ orange of the Happag-Lloyd container.

 
It would go on, be quite bright and then dry very matt, semi-transparent and much darker than I was after. I picked up another orange craft paint from The Works, it was only a pound and the same make as my lime green I use for toxic stuff. It’s amazing because it’s very like my Vermilion in that it’s relatively thick but still goes on thin and also very glossy. It’s hard to tell in the pictures above but the container on the left is pre-glossy orange and again the right one required two coats to get the colour I was after, it’s almost a glaze! I took this picture in daylight so you can potentially see the difference.

Anyway, it might be a right palaver to do, four coats of paint to get what I’m after, and that’s before washes but I’m finally happy with it. I still have some of the earlier stages to do on the second H-L container and I’ve changed my mind about the third too. Originally the third container was supposed to be Dark Angel Green but I might go for light grey and make it a Maersk Line container, for yet more giggles. Obligatory B&W art shot.

So I do get a Big Build Big Gamboge Stamp of Approval.

Terrain is everything – New display board – ‘bloody marbleous’

I really didn’t expect to progress so quickly with my new display board but I had a puncture last week which meant I had to take a day off to get it replaced. This afforded me some time during the day to work on the board. In the hobby for me, some jobs are ‘day jobs’ and some jobs are ‘night jobs’; for instance painting the Heirophant is not something I can do during the day, it requires far too much patience and focus. But my new display board is definitely a day job, something I can fit in if I can snatch a few minutes. Considering my hobby time is supposed to be at night that makes the situation both challenging and rewarding when I get stuff done in the day. Seizing the opportunity I mixed up some black and Vermilion and sponged on the resulting brown to break up the previous Vermilion layer.

I then shaded all the cracks between panels. I did plan to paint Bonewhite mortar down the centre, I was amused by the concept that the Imperium would be collecting the Wraithbone shards across Ferron Proxima, grinding it up and then using it just as ‘glue’ to stick stone slabs together. The utter arrogance and ignorance for the revered Aeldari substance tickled me no end.

However, I wasn’t sure it would look right, so for the time being I stuck with the shadow. Unfortunately my pics don’t quite do justice to the gamut of colours applied so far.

Even so there was another set of highlights here, possibly Vermilion again, just to knock back the brown a bit. Towards the end of this project I may well have wished I’d stopped here but I went on with my next step regardless.

I then did my Red Planet BASE! effect on the Ferron sand bits, although I admit it looks more Orange Planet BASE! than red, but that had to happen to make it stand out against the Rockcrete. I also applied extra orange highlights to the slabs for yet more texture/depth.

If you hadn’t guessed already here’s where my intent is revealed. I’m going all out and recreating my Dark Angel Jetfighter/Dark Talon red marble. Now I’m not certain this was the original plan but as I progressed I thought why the hell not? However, at this stage I was thinking I’d made quite the mistake as the bonewhite veins had been supplemented with a dragging sponge across in places for fine scuffs and bone scratches. I mean it’s not unpleasant but it was über busy, much lighter overall  and I was seriously regretting doing it. I then tried to mitigate the starkness of the veins by another light sponging with Vermilion but the decider would be the shading step, which was up next.

Resulting in this… now I’m, a lot happier with that finish. It’s still ridiculously OTT, even more so than the previous step, but it does look considerably better – more deliberate, controlled and better executed. The big question is – should a display base overshadow the figures you but on it? I’m not sure there is a correct answer either way. I think I was similarly worried with the amount of bonewhite spots I did on my Realm of Battle and AoP boards but observed once you put your army on it covers up 75% of the boards anyway. So hopefully adding my figures, that will match up with the Red Planet BASE! effect on the Ferron sand bits, will break up the marble even more.

But everyone comments on my Dark Talon’s wings and this is just as good an execution. In actual fact it has a life beyond Double Trouble 3 and will form the base for my Armies on Parade board at Southport this year. the plan for that display does not require anything bigger than this board so it will be perfect.

From the first picture above to the last this was done in one day, including the metal debris. I varnished it last night so it is fundamentally finished but I will obviously have to do a TO DONE! photoshoot. I may just add some yellow flock inbetween some of the slabs – pernicious weeds always find a way. Other than that I’ve ticked it off my list – the AoP board, even if it was not the complete 2’x2′ board I had originally planned for that task, but the concept is still in the bank. Now I just need to do a backdrop [not neccessarily for DT3] and if I can eventually get the Sanctum Imperialis done that would be even cooler! What do you think, should I have stopped before the veins or did I do right to go all whistles and bells on it?

Terrain is everything – New display board

I started this display board the other week. This patterned sheet of hardboard was left at my Aunt’s house when we cleared it after she passed away. It has a glossy finish to look like tiles and I hoped the slightly embossed pattern might still be visible when it was painted. The original plan was for one of these to be a platform in last year’s Armies on Parade board but I didn’t have the time or space. However, this one on its own will make a decent display for Double Trouble 3: Double harder [tickets still available]. With only 875pts to display, a 40cm square board will look far less empty than my 60cm square AoP board. So I added some Valejo Red Oxid paste and some sharp sand so the rockrete slabs weren’t completely featureless.

I primed the board with grey and then Red Oxide Primer, trying to retain some of the grey underneath for variety. I also added a few toy packaging bits to look like metal debris, these are the things that usually have tie-wraps attached to brand new kids toys to keep them in place – keep your eyes peeled for them as they’re really useful for debris.

I then followed the undercoat, stippling on Vermilion.

It’s here where it came apparent the embossed pattern wasn’t going to show but it’s not too much of a problem.

With Double Trouble 3 on the 9th of June this was the perfect interval project. I have a deadline to do it and the quicker I finish it the sooner I get back to the Heirophant.

Terrain is everything – Sanctum Imperialis Big Build TO DONE!

After my last Confession I’d assessed what was on my palette and distilled it down to the ‘Big 3’ which begs the question why I was suddenly building the Sanctum Imperialis from my Imperial Knight Renegade set… In fact, on the sprue this took up far less room but I suddenly had the urge to sacrifice valuable time on the Heirophant to finish this off.

Now I made some choices about construction, to get as much out of it as possible and match up with the smaller pieces of it I already own. However, despite not looking at the instructions or the pictures I’ve made an almost stock version of it, the main difference being it has the walls on both sides, instead of the front wall leading to ruins.

The balcony is also twice as big, running the entire width of the buidling. I used ‘granny grating’ to extend the balcony, which meant gluing was a challenge. I used Super Glue Gel, to bond it to the sprue ‘cantilever’ supports and various bits of cable ties to support it underneath. it should be sufficient for the load of a few figures. And the grating allows light to pass through unerneath – no shelter from the caustic rains of Ferron Proxima but it does look pretty.

Side views, so that you can see how wonky the balcony is – no plumb lines in the 40k universe – it’s heresy!

So I do get a Big Build Big Gamboge Stamp of Approval, it was even on my Big Build list! Regardless I need to see how quick I can actually paint this and it’s siblings…

‘nids part 251 – Tyranid VSG

Almost two years ago now, there was another one of my ‘honestly not’ diversionary tasks while the Dark Angel drop pods failed to motivate me. But what a task to get distracted inspired by – the Tyranid VSG. Although don’t get too excited I haven’t touched it since, I just got sick and tired of seeing the two posts about it permanently in ‘draft’ status.

Anyway, this was just two nights work in 2016 as I endeavoured to fill out some of the fibrous musculature on the containment spine. First of course I had to do spikes which were sculpted to match the Capillary Tower spikes on the Skyshield. I probably should have checked that post before beginning, it might have reminded me how fiddly DAS can be, even when applied to the curtain hook core. The clay kept slipping all over the place and it was extremely difficult to bring to a sharp point it just wouldn’t play ball. I’m sure Milliput or even green stuff would have rendered better results with their adhesive properties.

After the two nights of effort progress stalled. The plan was to at least get the fleshy bits done, possibly the battlements too. However, I planned on doing a ‘how to’ video of the fibre sculpting and for that I need a willing child to hold the phone while I sculpt. The eldest helped with my infamous Chitin panel sculpt that I finally posted regardless of it’s ‘adult’ nature.but I haven’t been able to cajole him to repeat the process. The upside of losing interest in the VSG was renewed vigour on the Ravenwing Dark Talon, then 31 Genestealers, Land Speeder Typhoons, my Imperial Knight and finally back around to the drop pods, ultimately seeing them through to completion. So despite the distraction it actually kickstarted my efforts in the task I was actually trying to avoid… eventually!

Hopefully I’ll one day film a set of fibres being sculpted, but finding time to do it is tricky and I’m otherwise occupied [as I have been for almost 2 years!!!]. Then I can move the spine onto completion and worry about sculpting the battlements or do the interface with the ground…