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Kraut Scientist, have you seen that Forge World have just brought out a Chaos Knight?

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/New_Stuff/CHAOS_KNIGHT.html

Yours is better though, I reckon!

@ corpuschain: Oh yes, I am quite aware of the Forgeworld Chaos Knight! To be honest, though, I am almost a little underwhelmed by the model. Sure, it clearly reads as a Chaos Knight. But doesn’t the design seem like they phoned it in a bit, at least compared with Forgeworld’s regular output? It seems very generically chaotic to me, especially with the warped armour and teeth around the head. And some touches are pretty close to my own version, as it happens: Just take a look at the chaos star on the back of the cannon, the spikes on the chainsword and the reactor section…

It seems like a nice enough basic template for a Chaos Knight, but I think it needs some additional touches to truly shine -- and if I need to convert it anyway, why not go for a full plastic conversion? Or for a Kytan Daemon Engine -- that thing is far more interesting, if you ask me! So, when all is said and done, it’s a nice enough kit, surely, but I am actually rather relieved that it’s not that much more awesome than my own conversion — at least that’s how I feel about it. This means I can happily finish my own model without feeling like I missed out on an even cooler version


So here's another small update: I've been working on the Knight's belly and groin armour which is probably one of my favourite parts of the conversion:





The teeth will need some additional highlighting, but I am already pretty pleased with how this area recalls the World Eaters legion badge!

I am currently working on the Knight's pauldrons, btw.

As always, let me know what you think!

Loving the belly armour!

Thanks, mate!


I realise that this incremental style of updating might not be totally spectacular, but I've never tackled a model of this size and complexity before, so bear with me, alright? So here's what I've managed to do this weekend:







The pauldrons actually took a fair bit of work to come together. And while they are not quite finished yet, they are definitely getting there.

Left pauldron with icon of Khorne and various totems and trophies:



Right pauldron with legion badge, legion number and company number:



And finally, the mostly finished facemask:



As always, let me know what you think!

Awesome work. Are you going to do one with the Forgeworld kit now ?

Well, first of all, I am going to finish this one, thank you very much

Like I said above, the FW conversion kit doesn't really speak to me -- I might do a Kytan Daemon Engine at some point in the indeterminate future, but don't hold your breath

Love the last picture with the eyes peeping out from behind the mask. It gives the engine such a creepy and almost intelligent look. Great work mate

I would pay literally tens of dollars for one of these! But in all seriousness, far better than the FW version. And doing it yourself adds a level of pride to it. I love all your work. Now I just need to hit that lottery and offer you an obsene amount of money for them......

Cheers for the positive feedback, guys! Here's another small update from my personal Knight Manufactorum:













The top carapace is still very WIP in those pictures, with only the base colours blocked in. But you can still get an idea about how the finished model will look. I do realise that the monochromatic colour scheme I've chosen might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's certainly the look I wanted for the model -- if I had been in charge back then, the early 90s "Red Period" at GW would never have ended

As always, let me know what you think!

I definitely agree with you on the 'red period'! The Knight is looking excellent. It fits with your army very well, or at least it will when it's done. Are you doing anything more with the eyes? I think if the eyes popped like the glowing bits on the chestplate, it would really look like there's something malevolent pulsating inside.

I love how the chaos knight is coming out. Keep up the good work

Cheers, guys!

@ corpuschain: The eyes are actually still pretty noticeable, if seen from the right angle. And in any case, I am really rather happy with them not being too obvious: The bright blue eyes look excellent on a bare Knight head, but with the facemask added on top, there is a very real danger of the googly eyes behind it overwhelming the face and making it look comical -- so I don't even want to make them more noticeable than they are right now.


Nothing too spectacular today, just some pictures to prove that I've finally managed to paint the detail on top of the carapace:





Please excuse the crappy lighting, but it was pretty late when I finished this part

It's so cool to see the knight almost finished! Good job mate! and those blue glowing eyes are absolutely beautiful!!

Cheers, mate!

In case anyone was wondering, btw: That model in the corner is the "Chibi-Knight", a roughly epic-scale version of my Chaos Knight which I am pretty certain has been featured on this thread before, although I have updated it with an additional bit or two since then:



It's been a terrible week so far, so not much progress and some only slightly better pictures of the model:







I did have a bit of fun finishing the interior of the top hatch, though:



As always, let me know what you think!

Great stuff. The metal on top of the metal the chaos star and spikes needs some contrast to set it apart from the trim. Maybe Steel or Bone?

Hey everyone,

even though life has been less than optimal lately, I felt the urgent need to do something creative -- probably to get some distraction from the overall situation, so I made this:







As you will have guessed, that's the base for my Chaos Knight right there: After spending quite some time thinking about what I wanted to put on the base, I realised that there are few things more emblematic of the crumbling Imperium of Man than a toppled and destroyed Astartes statue -- plus the piece from the Honoured Imperium kit was a pretty nice fit scale-wise!

Here's the - still unfinished (!) - Knight, provisionally placed on top of it:













Even though there's still quite a bit of detail work left to do (I'd place the entire model at about two thirds done, roughly speaking), the pictures should still give you a reasonably good idea about what the finished piece will look like.



As always, let me know what you think!

Nice base, very fitting.

For being just a WIP, that knight is still head and shoulders above what a lot of people (myself included) consider their best work.

Hang in there and keep doing the awesome! BftBG!


Now if you’ll excuse me, I think the Chaplain wants a word...

Beautiful. I like how the base is evocative without taking away from the model standing on it. I really like the pose of the knight, too. It's a great "come at me bro" pose.

Cheers, guys! I really appreciate the kind words!

Nice work , the base really finishes it off.

 KrautScientist wrote:

Even though there's still quite a bit of detail work left to do (I'd place the entire model at about two thirds done, roughly speaking), the pictures should still give you a reasonably good idea about what the finished piece will look like.

This is an UNFINISHED PIECE?

 KrautScientist wrote:

As always, let me know what you think!

You give us your problems, we give you our minis. To do some 'Unfinished business'.


P.S. I love the base.

Again, thanks a lot, guys!

And to be fair, while I still consider the Knight unfinished at this point, don't expect anything too radical, alright? Most of the work left will consist of fairly minor detail and cleanup work -- stuff that might not even be all that noticeable from a distance but will hopefully make the model even cooler when seen up close.

Just like today's small update: I finished the banner dangling between the Knight’s legs, using some decals to create a suitable design. The front received a World Eaters legion badge in red:





As simple as this design looks, it was a veritable nightmare to get right! I started with a decal from the FW World Eaters decal sheet, but it needed lots of decal softener and several coats of varnish to finally conform to the banner’s surface. And even then, what had been a rich, ox-blood red on the decal sheet turned into a prety off-putting shade of pink against the dark background, so I ended up painting over the decal several times, coloring in the legion badge, so to speak, with my brush.

Fortunately enough, the rear was far less of a hassle — in fact, designing some of the battle honours won by the Knight during its long years of service was actually quite a bit of fun! Take a look:



The bottom of the banner will be slightly drybrushed (along with the Knight's toes), in order to make it look like dust from the battlefield has settled on those areas. It'll be a difficult balance to get right, but that's just one more tiny detail that I'll need to keep track of

So, here’s the Knight as it stands right now:









As always, let me know what you think!

Nice to see this finished. Nice work.

Hey Kraut, not sure if I've posted here before, but I just want to say that I love the blog! I've been lurking around for a fair while, and some of the conversions here are absolutely AMAZING! You never fail to make me reconsider my army choice, and I love what you've done with the knight more than anything you've done so far. One question though, is the tilting shield on the right shoulder intentionally left off, or is it simply not finished yet?

Cheers, guys!

 Rygnan wrote:
One question though, is the tilting shield on the right shoulder intentionally left off, or is it simply not finished yet?

A very valid question! I think this should answer it rather succinctly:





As always, let me know what you think!

Looking good. Really like the torso plate and the glowing eyes. Dam it, now the first thing I do when I get up and running again, is buy an Imperial Knight. That's really going to go down well with the wife.

Love it! What you did on the shield design-wise was exactly what I was imagining you would do as well

Sorry to hear about your situation mate...

Hope the latest work on your Knight proved to be sufficient distraction !

well, for me, it was at least

Cheers for the feedback, guys! Here's what'll probably be the last update for this week -- you're probably sick of the sight of this model anyway







So, what did I do?

I finally took the time to paint the last details on the top carapace, for instance. Mainly the Space Marine helmet and Necron head. I thought it would be a nice little shout out to paint the Astartes helmet as belonging to my INQ28 DIY chapter, the Golden Legion. Oh, and I also added some decals where appropriate:



The legs also received some more attention: I apply a very subtle drybrush on the feet, using a mix of the grey I used for the base and some Typhus Corrosion (cheers for the suggestion, MadSkoll!). It's not very noticeable, but it does make the feet look slightly more dull and dirty, creating a nice sense of interaction with the base:



I also added some decals to the kneecaps, as you can see. The one on the left knee is a decal I like very much from the ancient Khorne berzerker decal sheet. As for the right knee, I did change my original plan around a bit when it comes to the symbol showing the Knight's affilition with the Legio Audax: I combined a cog symbol (to symbolise a Titan legion) and the wolf paw print (because it seemed so appropriate, given the fact that the World Eaters use bloody handprints as a sign of honour). Anyway, it's such a small think, but it really hints at a bigger backstory for the machine.

As always, let me know what you think!

Not a single comment? Huh, so you really are fed up with this model, right?

Be that as it may, I do have another update regarding the Knight this weekend. What can I say, I simply cannot keep my hands off the model right now, and I know better than to second-guess my rare bouts of inspiration

So today I tackled those bloody handprints on the Knight's shin armour. Just to remind you, the idea was that the warriors of the 4th assault company press their bloody hands to the Knight's armour as some kind of oath of moment and good luck charm.

Anyway, I even made a new "stamp" for the occasion, using some latex to make a cast from the press molded hand I had created earlier:



I quickly learned a couple of things, though: One, in spite of the flexibility of the stamp, actually creating some believable handprints on the shin armour's curved surface turned out to be quite a bit of an ordeal. Two, there was actually even less room than I had anticipated. Three, while I had planned to add many, many handprints, I realised that the limited space resulted in a very real danger of all the handprints just mushing together into a solid wall of glossy red. So In the end, it was all about suggesting the intended effect without going overboard -- and I actually ended up painting most of the handprints by brush. Oh well...

Here's the armour after the application of the handprints:





I might revisit this area at a later date, in order to add some final touchups, but I am pretty pleased with the effect as it stands.

So here's another round of pictures for you -- the final round for this weekend, scout's honour!













And, because we haven't seen the old chap in a while, a closer look at the Baron inside his cockpit:







All that remains is a lot of minor cleanup work, but I'll be leaving that for the coming week. Until then, let me know what you think!