Guarding the Stern

Sternguard! They guard the stern... of the... boat... that is the Imperium! 

These folks will be the heavy weapons department of my first company of Minotaurs. I already have one sternguad squad with lighter weaponry, and will be making a third squad, who will carry two lascannons. 

I managed to improve my photography a bit here, moving the lightbox around the room to get better natural light, and my goodness, it makes a difference!

Something new I tried was using some different skin tones on the bare-headed model and so she has a very pale complexion. I've always thought that I would expect (white) space marines to have quite pale skin, as a result of the physical changes they go through to become space marines, their age, and the fact that they spend a lot of time inside space ships and inside suits of armour. Maybe this marine has removed her helmet to try and get a bit of vitamin D in her system! I do like painting varied skin tones though - it's a bit boring to paint the same thing all the time, especially when their armour is always the same!

I really like this squad. It's got a lot of character, and the green glowing parts look good. I'm pleased with the poses (something I have struggled with), and the sergeant in particular looks dynamic. 

Overall, a pleasing result! The Minotaurs are coming along nicely now. I am working on a vehicle this week, so hopefully I can post that soon.

 

Menacing Black Legion

Adding to my ever-growing Black Legion army is this little squad of Chosen. They are a mixture of models that include conversions from a Blackstone Fortress model, a Dark Vengeance model and some of the new Chaos Space Marine tactical squad. My favourite is the one on the left, with her pale skin and punk haircut. The one that is second from the right has a small head, and I think that gives him a "truescale" look. Or maybe he just looks like a small-headed person... I'll leave that for you to decide! 

I'm working hard on painting at the moment, so hopefully I can keep posting models over the next few weeks. I have a couple of big models in that queue, but I'm very slow with big models, so it'll be a real push to keep the momentum going when I get to those. We'll see.

 

A fistful of fists

Today I have another in my series of "single squad of space marines from a new chapter." So far, I have made squads, usually out of vintage models, from quite a few chapters, and this latest is the Imperial Fists. I already had Captain Lysander, so he really needed a retinue, and that gave me the opportunity to paint more yellow marines. I particularly like the sergeant with his freehand banner. The Imperial Fists icon isn't too difficult to paint, so if you're considering what chapter to paint, that might be a factor for you.

 

Here they are with Lysander. 

I thought this might be a good point to recap some of the squads I have done, so here they are:

 Ultramarines

 

 Black Templars

 

Iron Snakes

Salamanders

I have plenty more space marines, but these are the ones where I just have a single squad and a captain to accompany them.

A folded, flaming banner

Today's upload is some Black Legion cultists to add to my already very large force. These models come from a variety of places. All are kitbashed in some way, except the third from the left.I honestly can't remember where all the parts came from, so I can't really list them, but maybe you can have some fun trying to figure it all out!

My favourite model here is probably the one on the far left, who sort of looks surprised! You don't get that look often with Warhammer models. 

I hope you like them; more models next week!

 

Dread and Wolves

Today is a day for wolves. Space Wolves! I never intended to expand my Space Wolf collection as such, but sometimes you just get a hankering for a particular model, and the Space Wolf Venerable Dreadnought kit is one of those! The kit builds three different base models: Murderfang, Bjorn the Fell-Handed and a regular Venerable Dreadnought. It took me a while to decide which to go for, since they all look great, but in the end, the combination of huge axe and shield was the most exciting one for me. 

This is the resulting finished model. I've called him Eldgrim Whitemane (you have to picture the white mane on the marine underneath the armour!)

 

The second entry here is Lone Wolf Rorkr. He's made out of spare Space Wolf parts from my bitz box. The good thing about Space Wolves is that they have a few different independent characters that can be made to reflect whatever you can cobble together out of bitz, so it's a good way to use up spare parts. Rorkr is accompanied by Floki, a small wolf that is an old non-GW metal miniature that I've had for a long time. It's nice to see him painted up and given a home in the Space Wolves army!

Minotaurs Update

It's been a while since I posted. This wasn't because I hadn't painted anything, but because I couldn't be bothered to photograph what I'd done: I think perhaps I needed a break from blogging. However, I've been on holiday, and feel refreshed, so this morning I took some pictures. I'll post them all together, since they're all Minotaurs.

This is terminator assault squad Kairas. The shields are from a seller on Shapeways, as is Kairas's head. I have decided to stick with green for power and force weapons, and so the lightning claws are green here.

This is Librarian Andretis. He's the Magister Severin Loth model, with an arm swap. I also added some green stuff robes to his rear, to cover up some bad casting. I really like the pose, and the colours on the force axe came out well.

 

 

Another librarian! This is Vangelis. A model from the recent Space Hulk re-release, painted to my highest standard. I have started doing some dust and dirt on the feet and legs of these models, to see what it looks like. It doesn't look as good on the bronze models, but it comes out well on the librarians, since it contrasts with the blue.

 

Urkra'Gom, Bloodthirster of the Second Host

Wow, this is a huge relief. Urkra'Gom is a model that I started late in 2017, so nearly four years ago. It has been a difficult model to get right. Building it was tricky, involving lots of sculpting, sourcing of parts, and repositioning of limbs. I actually had to heat up the (plastic!) right arm and twist it round to get the axe into the right position. 

The model is based on Dorghar, Archaon's mount, with the addition of parts from the Bloodthirster kit. I removed the two extra necks and sculpted over the hole, and found a new piece to serve as the Bloodthirster's rump, instead of the tail.

Deciding on how to get it fixed to a base and what sort of scenery to include was the most difficult thing to get right. The model was laying down on its back for a couple of years while I mulled over ideas. Since the model's tail had been removed, it was without a strong base mounting point. Originally, I put a brass rod pin in the bottom of one foot, with the intention of pinning it to an mdf circular base. However, the length of pin that was exposed wasn't really long enough, and the base wasn't thick enough, so it wasn't holding the model up properly.

I left the model alone for a while (which was probably about a year!) until I could return to it and fix it. Eventually I had the cunning idea of building a base that had a flat surface to which I could glue the lower foot. The foot had a flat surface, and using poly cement to secure it to something plastic would surely work. After drying, the model was secure! Now I could happily paint it. Painting wasn't easy, but I perservered and eventually got a paint scheme that surpasses all of my previous Bloodthirsters. 

Urkra'Gom is an imposing model with a huge wingspan (it was difficult to get it in shot!) and will join my cohort of Bloodthirsters, representing the second rank of the Bloodthirster hierarchy. There are only 64 of these Bloodthirsters in Khorne's Legions, so second rank Bloodthirsters are quite rare. There is no record of what weapons they traditionally carry, so I decided to arm Urkra'Gom with two axes of Khorne, painted in glowing blue. 

He's finally done!