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--- EDIT --- I'm turning this formerly "Female Eldar Corsair Queen (Autarch)" thread into my main Eldar P&M blog, this will make things easier---

Here's first my custom "Female Eldar Corsair Queen (Autarch)". This is still WIP, and my first almost 100% green stuff mini. Without further ado, I present to you "the Black Faery" (inspiration from the Therion song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnZxYmk7QIY )
First, the original concepts, drawn over various scraps of paper in the last two years:


And now some WIPs of the character. I should stress that these are more than 1 week old, since then I have finished most of the character except the hand (which'll hold a fusion gun I left in my bitzbox in France when I moved to Scotland) and a few strands of hair, and I have started work on the base. First the body:

and her backpack:


She is supposed to be an eldar corsair princess/captain/however her title may be translated in low gothic. Although her spiritstone and most of her gear mark her as a Craftworlder, she has a few similarities with Dark Eldar (the small tormentor-like device on her helmet is supposed to work as mandiblasters in game). The suit's design (custom helmet and wings, richer and or exotic garb...) are supposed to mark her rank as a rich and succesfull corsair fleet leader as well as to create her "legend" in the hearts of her enemies. Rulewise she'd play as an Autarch with mandiblasters, a banshee mask, a power sword, fairy (swooping hawk) wings and a (soon to be added) fusion gun. I have also modeled standard Autarch items such as a pistol (eldar laspistol in its holster), a few grenades and a forceshield.

Comments and critics anyone? I apologize for the pictures, I will get the camera back in about 1 week and then I will make sure to post updated, higher quality pics (if I manage to take some).

That has a lot of potential!

Thats real awesome work man really awesome

Holy . That is looking REALLY good! Do you sculpt professionally?

I'm impressed with the faithfulness of the sculpt to the finished product.

-Remi

Great start! Looks excellent, so far.

HF Izanagi wrote:Holy . That is looking REALLY good! Do you sculpt professionally?
-Remi

Thanks a lot guys. No, this is my first green stuff mini, I work as a researcher in biology. I have made a few conversions here and there: Avenger exarch with lateral crest (à la Sicarius), modified Night Spinner I'll try to post soon...
I'm sure that if I showed a better pic I am sure some mistakes here and there would become apparent. I am not planning for something perfect but just something that will look good enough once painted (I will try to hide any small mistake if possible as I paint it).

Oh, forgot to mention: the plastic of the wings comes from... the wrapping of the old metal prism cannon! So this is actually something GW sells ^^

This makes me cry 'cause it's sooooo good.

Subb'd for the rest of time.

Iranna.

Brilliant! Great concept drawings, great sculpt!

And now for a compilation of shots of my WIP command Fire Prism/Night Spinner (magnetized turrets):


I already have a Cloudstrike Squadron with a Falcon Type II command tank (will post in a few weeks), now the idea was to also make a squadron of 3 fire prisms (Sunstorm squadron) that are magnetized and thus can also be played as night spinners (Deathweaver squadron). This squadron will include:
- two tanks using the new kits (1)
- this command tank.

The old style fire prism turret has been converted using the newer kit so as to have a clear crystal. I still have to decide if I will just use the new transparent crystals to get something like this: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/11/diapo098e61e60bc1096f6f.jpg/ or if I will cast my own crystal in clear epoxy to get something closer to the old look, this will depend on how easily I manage to create a mould.
The body of the tank itself will incorporate the apocalypse command bits (not shown), the newer FP/NS kit’s star engines, a FW NS rear door + antennas, a homemade spirit stone and homemade holofield generators (I modeled one in green stuff, created a green stuff mould and made three copies). I also wanted the tank to have rear side fins like the ones the Epic NS has: http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat490034a&prodId=prod1110074 , so I modeled them using FW rear hull extensions from the Firestorm kit, green stuff, bits from a spare eldar gravtank underside I had got from ebay, and three layers of thin cardboard covered in superglue (cf this method: http://fromthewarp.blogspot.com/2009/01/pre-heresy-terminator-shoulder-pads.html ). I then realized how unbalanced the tank looked with these alone, so to balance its silhouette I decided to add two small extensions for the upper rear hull (again, cardboard + superglue + a bit of green stuff).
Lastly, I drew inspiration from http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/278129/eldar-nightspinner-conversion to convert the NS turret’s gunner into a warp spider aspect warrior. My own solution was to use green stuff to convert a spare guardian jetbike pilot body with normal gunner arms into a warp spider dude (just a mask, no armour as it is too bulky for a cockpit).
All I have to do now is solve the crystal dilemma and then I can start painting, I’ll try to


(1) I only need to buy one FP/NS kit: a friend of mine’s kindly given me his old Biel Tan Falcon which will become my third FP/NS. How? Simple, I also want a Warp Hunter, and these come with the FP/NS turrets => my friend’s tank will provide a body for this extra turret.

Really cool concept artwork on the corsair queen.

Time for some updates. First, the current state of the Black Faery mini:



The backpack is not yet glued to make painting the wings easier. Sorry for the chaos black paint that makes it difficult to see any detail on the backpack. I will get the fusion gun in two weeks and then I can finish modeling the left hand. I also need to finish work on the base and add some more braids. I drew inspiration from the harlequin sculpts and added some gemstones embedded in the braids.

Next, progress on the tank(s):

I have assembled and basecoated the "converted, command old style fire prism/FW night spinner" + some alternate turrets for my FW serpent and my FW command falcon type II. I still have to create the mold for the fire prism's transparent crystal, but I have made a test with the material and it looks very promising (I embedded a dead rose chafer and some flowers).

Update: here's the finished Autarch, hope you like her:

Enjoy!

Wow that's really amazing, looks like a mini you could buy from FW. Excellent work and painting.

Really, really nice sculpting there, and a very original idea. Are you going to do more corsairs in this theme?

Also, good to see that someone else is holding it down with the old FW Wave Serpents. I'm a big fan (have 4) and really think they're better than the new plastic ones. They're getting rarer and rarer on eBay these days, unfortunately.

Really creative stuff coming, cant wait to see more

Absolutely beautiful...
Aherm...
Dem iz da purti-est skinneez I haz eva put rocks at!

Wow, that Autarch is just beautiful and amazing work. And the tank is coming along nicely too.

Cheers guys ^^ I do have a few concepts I'd like to sculpt (one "super-warlock" and an original aspect of Khaine), but first I have 20+ normal figs and tanks to paint. I do have other conversions in the works which I'll try to post ASAP, together with some shots of the army in its current state. I'll also post two Tau sculpts I recently did for my youngest brother.

Savnock wrote:Also, good to see that someone else is holding it down with the old FW Wave Serpents. I'm a big fan (have 4) and really think they're better than the new plastic ones. They're getting rarer and rarer on eBay these days, unfortunately.

Actually, I sculpted and moulded the field generators myself on this one, but I do own an old FW wave serpent I got from ebay, I like both designs so I wanted one of each ^^

That is just amazing! You are a wizard!

.. (when the standard Orkmotion doesent cut it)
^
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U

Brilliant work! the sculpt looks fantastic as does the fire prism/night spinner conversion.

Superb! Simply so... Where do one learn to sculpt so?

I wasn't sure about the green as I couldn't get a feel for the figure, but the final painted version is superb. Really nice sculpting, great concept.

Any more on the way?

Awesome Mini! From concept to completion, just great!

storag wrote:Superb! Simply so... Where do one learn to sculpt so?

Well, I just visited your blog, and it's full of nice conversions ^^ Love the grots! I don't think you need to learn anything

Again, late update. Here's pictures of the finished command tank (prism turret, night spinner turret 95% completed).




For the mold I used Rapid Mold, a thermo plastic I bought on ebay from Anvil Industry. The difficulty with making a transparent crystal was that the alveoli that hold the crystal would be visible through the crystal, so I had to find a way to paint their inside too. I thus filed the corresponding space in the mold with green stuff, waited for it to cure, then painted all the visible green stuff in the color I had planned to use for the outside of the alveoli (Dwarf Bronze).

The crystal part was then cast with ClearCast (clear epoxy).

Finally, once cleaned and mounted on the old metal weapon, the crystal was washed in a mix of modeling water and Ice Blue. Since the resin in yellowish, the result was a light blue-green that fits well with the red theme of the army and the green canopies.
More pictures in my gallery. I'll try to take pics of the whole army in a few weeks (months?)

That Autarch is awesome mate - your green stuff foo is good.

A quick update, nothing spectacular: a few pictures of my banshees and scorpions, including two quick manips; and finally a concept for a Void Dreamer I'd like to sculpt soon:







That's all for now folks!

I'm liking the idea of the Void Dreamer. He/she should be really nice... especially the kitty

Finally, some progress on the Void Dreamer project (pictures below).
The mini is 95 % completed.
I apologize for the low quality of the pictures, for the completed, painted mini I'll try to use a decent camera + better lighting for once. I know this is not the cleanest sculpt, I'll try to smooth down irregularities a bit before/during painting.
Everything was made from scratch except for the gyrinx, which I based on the Rogue Trader era mini (thx ebay!) but modified heavily because I wanted a heavier cat. The white bits are actually not plasticard but ... yogurt box plastic. And although I am not too unhappy with it, it is actually quite on the soft side, hence the heavy repairs I needed to make on the sword. So I think that in the future I'll invest some quids and buy real plasticard.
I still need to modify the coat a bit (too rough at the moment, though the white bits are actually ) and to make a clear epoxy mold of the opening webway portal hovering over his hand (cf concept above; the green stuff effect is done, I just need a mold of it). Then I can start painting.


More images in my gallery.