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I finally broke down and bought a Forgeworld Barbed Hierodule.



All the pieces washed with soapy water and more or less cleaned up.



I decided not to fully assemble the model until I had a chance to prime and basecoat the carapace pieces. Based on my experience with the Carnifexes and the dry fitting, I think getting at the carapaces when fully assembled will be tough. To protect the parts that will be glued, I added s thin coat of white glue, which I can prime over when dried, but will pop off with a little pressure from a knife.



I waffled a little on whether I wanted to complete assembly before or after I applied the Raw Umber wash and finally decided on assembly first. That way, if I had to fill any gaps, then I could prime over it. As it turns out, the pieces fit together very nicely as with a little bit of green stuff and superglue. I'll give the joins the afternoon to cure and then I'll wash the entire figure later today.

In hindsight, I'm really glad I didn't attach the arms until the carapace was basecoated. Getting at some of the leg and arm plates would have been a pain.

this is such a cool mini...
it lloks like it will still be a pain to reach some of the inset parts...
the white glue idea is new to me, but i like it...

look forward to seein' this project progress...

cheers
jah

That's one of the reasons I basecoated the carapace before full assembly and also why I'm leaving it off the base.

Here's the washed figure on a drying plate. This is by far the largest figure I've ever washed like this and I think it turned out OK. Once it drys, I'll have to go back with a smaller brush and get at all the little pits that didn't fill with wash.

Here's a close up of the drying figure. I have it on a plate so that I can wick away extra wash before it dries.

That looks really good. I'm always amazed at what a good wash can do for a fig.

This is the standard process for all of my Tyranids. I use an almond color for my primer and then wash everything with a Raw Umber. The almond primer complements it nicely, so it deepens the color instead of making it look dirty. Once it dries and I fill in the pits, I'll give it a drybrushing of Bleached Bone and White.

Slowly making progress. First, a little bit of highlighting with Citadel Bleached Bone and Reaper Polished Bone and then several layers of washes, I'm just starting the Leviathan Purple washes for the fleshy bits and have applied 3-4 coats of Badab Black onto the horns, hooves, and talons.

May i ask what's the name and maker of your initial wash is? The color is fantastic.

I primed with Rustoleum High Heat (Almond) and then washed with a mix of Liquitex Raw Umber, water, and a little glaze medium. The only thing I basecoated was the red on the carapace before washing.

You sure work fast mate. And its looking great so far!
Looks like youll need an even bigger one the next time

Awesome stuff...need more...more i tell you!!

I bet that was some what of pain washing something that big. Nice job tho

Actually, it wasn't too bad. I did all of the extremities first and then held onto the tail to do the rest. The wash flows pretty nicely and a #4 brush covers quite a bit of space. You just have to remember to wick up any excess wash that pools while drying. After everything is dried, then you can go back and fill in all the pits that got missed.

Day 11: I painted the face details using some thinned Baal Red wash to tint the insides of the mouth and gums, and then painted the teeth in various shades of bone. The sphincters at the end of the bio-cannons were painted with VMC Brown Rose first and then given a light wash of Baal Red. The orifice and edges got a further wash of Leviathan Purple and finally, I used a little bit of Brown Rose mixed with Reaper Polished Bone for the highlights. The carapace pieces, still a work in progress, were highlighted with Citadel Blood Red and then some Citadel Blazing Orange.

Wow, nice. I like those guns. I think they'll make for some great rim-shooting.

Heh, I had to keep asking my wife "honey, does this look like an ****?"

Hopefully I can finish off the plates tonight and get some more work done on the purple washing.

Almost done. I'm saving the highlights on the vents for the very last. Here's the obligatory profile shot. I highlighted the carapace and finished the Leviathan Purple wash as well as the Thrakka Green on the hoses. I'll probably do a little bit of touch up on him tomorrow, then seal to protect the paint, and then finish off some more clean up.



Top shot which gives a better perspective of the carapace highlighting

Whoa, sweet. That's such an amazing model, and you're doing it credit.

Awesome!!!

Looking great!

Hrmm.. could be bigger..

haha!

nah thats awesome, nice paint job too

You are motivating me to paint mine.....

What's stopping you?

Very nicely done.

Are you leaving it off the base completely, or doing a nice scenic base afterwords?

The figure comes with a base, which I will probably use. It's off the base to facilitate painting. One of the recommendations I got when I was soliciting advice was to leave it off, to make the under parts easier to get to. Very good suggestion.

Hierodule is finished and based. Overall, took 2 weeks from the day I picked it up.

Frontal aspect


Rear aspect


Facial details


Full write up and supplemental notes on my site: Painting a Forgeworld Barbed Hierodule

Sweet!

Beautiful work. The tan coloured parts look especially well worked. Congratulations. Do you have more tyranids? If so, we would all like to see the whole army some time!

Very nice! Though your pics up there are dead. I went to your site linky though, and that's a great paintjob!

The pics up there work for me. I do have a couple more Tyranids. Here's the whole army:



Full write ups on all of my models can be found at: http://www.kan.org/michael/mkp/tyranids.php