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Lol, tres amusant. Poor old sam always lugging the provisions...

 weetyskemian44 wrote:
Lol, tres amusant. Poor old sam always lugging the provisions...

...and Frodo would rather believe a twisted, angry, creature, who's soul aim is to get the ring back and crawl into a cave.

Also;
The Hobbits are now up on eBay. Go buy them, you know you want them.

I've finally pulled my finger out and painted the rest of the bathroom items.


Plenty of casts available of these and the boxes.
The hobbits and Kranon are also still available.

Thanks.

Nice hobbits you have there Dr H

Filthy looking bathroom you have there..... ...think I stayed somewhere similar once....

GiraffeX wrote:Nice hobbits you have there Dr H

Thanks Gir'.

monkeytroll wrote:Filthy looking bathroom you have there..... ...think I stayed somewhere similar once....

Thanks.
My first year student flat approached that look in places, never entered the bathroom without some form of footwear on.

I can definately vouch for the bathroom products and the boxes they are most excellent, exception value for money and brilliant to work with.

Some creations I have made using his excellent products, spoilered so as to not clog up this brilliant blog.



Can not praise these products enough.

Thanks Cam.

The Hobbits have now gone. But Kranon is still hanging around (they don't call him relentless for nothing).

I thought that maybe some of the details on him weren't being shown off in his photos and may have been misinterpreted as sloppy work, so I've taken some more in the hope of highlighting some of the hard work that went into him.


I've got a few more things to finish off for my own army and then I will be returning here for something big. Keep your eyes peeled.

Looking at that image I keep thinking of "That's the leader."
"how can you tell?"

"Well, the fancy pistol and honking big sword could still be anyone, but those ridiculously long horns shows he has a complex many leaders fall to, he has to be above all so the horns help him feel that tall."

"Oh, well, shoot him then?"

Yeah, he definitely has the look of someone saying "Look at me, look how important I am!" And yet, still he looks for a home and some love. Sad Kranon

Had some very nice feedback from the new owner of the Hobbits, so that was nice. Good to hear that someone that can inspect my models up close and having paid good money for them, is really pleased/impressed with my work.

And here we come, to a new project. Those of you aware of the contents of the Dark Vengeance box set, and have looked though this thread, will notice one final model remains untouched...

Yes. The time has come to have a go at the Hellbrute... Dun Dun Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuur...

This model, unlike the rest of the box set, raises some issues in my money-making plans. This is a single pose model, with a fixed set of weapons and seems to split the gaming community down the middle in terms of it's looks.

The biggest problem with all this... is that there is now a multi-piece, poseable, Arguably better looking, version of the model, with all the weapon options available.

This means that I could paint this one up and do the best job I've ever done, with all the tricks in the book... and half the people will not want it because it's ugly, of the remaining half, many of them will want different weapon options and of the few people left, how many will want to fork out for a standard model that can be picked up on the cheap and painted themselves.

So, I need to maximise the customer base by modifying this model to create a unique, exciting, good looking (?) model... with all the weapon options...

No small feat.

I've already started a thread to collect ideas about what people like and dislike about the standard model, and have started thinking about what I can change without making this too huge a project that it becomes economically ridiculous.

So far, I can see that the main dislikes about the model are:
The large quantity of fleshy parts / lack of mechanical or armoured parts,
The feet in particular,
The open face on an armoured unit,
The armpit tentacles,
The many horns,
Too much bling,
A lack of options (as I mention above),
How short the MM is...

And the likes:
The overall look of the model (also cited as a dislike),
That it's a scary / intimidating model,
The level of detail from any angle (many of which are cited as dislikes above),
The powerfist (which I haven't seen a single complaint about)...

It may seem that there are more dislikes, maybe there are, maybe it's my own prejudice... but this is an opinion thing and I'm not saying anyone is wrong.

I would, however, like a few more opinions on what people like and dislike about the model (be as specific as you can), and I'll be back later with my thoughts and plans of what I am thinking...

Thanks.

These are my thoughts on what I might change / add.
At the centre of the front of the body, the exposed head, horns, eyes and armpit tentacles are out.
Most of this is contained on a separate piece of the kit, so is easily left off.
Some of the horns may be relocated about the model, will have to see how it progresses.
There is a dangling eye on that piece that I may also find a use for.
On the main model piece, I will remove the hole and surrounding raised area (and the top of the abdominal muscles. This will all be replaced with a scratch-built armoured sarcophagus. I will also extend the armour a little further down to protect the ab's a bit more.
I may use some of the details of the front piece and removed face to add detail to the sarcophagus.

The legs, while I would like to change them, make them more mechanical, re-pose them, etc... It looks like too much work to make it worthwhile, as I'll be rebuilding the entire waist/hips section.
I may do some re-sculpting of the thighs though to make them less fleshy.
The feet will be replaced with more mechanical ones. Only one needs chopping off as the other comes separate.
The replacement feet, while mechanical, might be made to look dangerous (clawed etc...) and not just functional.

The back of the body is a bit too fleshy and symmetrical, so I plan to make the right hand side more mechanical / armoured (as if it's part-way through it's transformation to the stock Helbrute). This may involve the change of the exhaust pipe on that side.

As the bit of concrete that the left foot is on will be going with the foot the position of the whole model will change slightly (it won't be leaning as much over to the right) I will need to take account of this when re-building the right arm (that is normally aligned parallel with the ground).
The right arm will be altered slightly to be longer and look more like an arm with an elbow region an' all (not just Shoulder-Gun, forget the arm).
The left arm will remain largely unchanged.
Both arms, however, will be adapted to allow weapon swapping. This should be fairly easy for the right arm (due to the changes there), but the left arm may involve the hand being removable and the weapon options fitting in there.
All the additional weapon options will be scratch-built:
Right arm will get;
A power-fist (in a similar aesthetic to the left arm's, but not identical),
Twin-linked Las-cannon,
Twin-linked Heavy Bolter,
Reaper Autocannon,
The re-built Multi-melta,
and a Plasma Cannon (that I may use the removed ring of teeth from the body to achieve the look of the kit).

Left arm will get;
A thunder hammer (I don't like how the actual kit has the attachment of the hammer to the arm, so will be different),
The Power-Scourge (Metal tentacle things? Will be tricky to make some sturdy ones that will stand up to gaming),
Missile launcher (That fits into the end of the arm where the fist goes? As does everything else, but this will be the interesting one),
And the power fist should just be a matter of adding the hand.

I also have to make the Combi-bolter and heavy-flamer additions for the power fists.

And there will probably be little changes here and there as I come to them...

Thoughts?

Forgot about this little blog for a while there, everything is looking great and I'm looking forward to this Hellbrute.

Thanks Casey.

And just in time, here's wip 1 for the Chaos dreadnought.

As the saying goes "You have to break some eggs to make an omelette"...

...You have to chop up a Helbrute to make a Chaos Dreadnought.
Why the distinction? Well, this is the basis for what I am aiming for; Less cartoon monster... more insane, armoured beast of war.

I wanted to start with the feet and then work upwards, as this would give me a solid base to set the rest of the pose to.
However, to do the feet I needed to have both halves of the body stuck together, and to fix the number of large holes I had just cut into the body it would be easier if I could access the inside... So I've started on filling the holes.


So I've added a plate to the front to be the sarcophagus and I've extended the armour plates either side of that.
Looks a bit boring at the moment, but I'll add surface details to tie it all in to the rest of the armour.
The putty is mostly flattened around the sarcophagus, but is sculpted to blend in to the fleshy parts at the bottom. Again, more detail will be added later.

The rest of the model has already been chopped up, and I'll show these bits when I come to them.
Thanks.

Nice direction, keep it coming.

Nice work on the hobbits dr H
Curious about the hellbrute
Keep us posted
Grtz
Mark

Thanks Casey. Will do.

Thanks Mark. Those Hobbits were quite tricky to paint, but I'm pleased with the result.

Today's progress moves around the back of the Chaos Dreadnought, before returning to the front...

As I mentioned, I wanted to mechanise the rear of the Helbrute a little.
The right hand side of it's back is fairly plain (the left side having a pipe hanging across it) and I therefore set about it with my tools.

I removed the exhaust pipe from that side and I carved/sanded the two sides of that area to make them flat.
I added a piece of tube (that took 2 attempts to drill holes in) to represent the original exhaust pipes.
I then stuck a piece of plasticard around the corner to form the outer skin of armour.
Filled in the gaps with putty and added some details (more still to come)

Around the front, I've started to add the trim and tie the new parts to the original parts.


Much more to do...

Colour me intrigued.

Looks interesting
Keep the updates comming
grtz
Mark

I am watching, just never really paid any attention to the Hellbore before. I don't mind it as a model, Puny head bothers me and the whole fleshy silly monster bit, interesting to see where you are going with this though.

Thanks chaps. I'll accept interest and intrigue as good responses.

Well, I'm working on fixing both those issues, Cam. So that's a good start.

As a thank you, here's an example to show that it won't all be straight and plain edges as it is now...

Why the original only had 5 arrows, I don't know. Thought I'd take it up to the full choas 8 points...

Same reason Night Goblin archers once came with 2 left hands. Or was it 2 right hands.

Jewel-like objects of magic and wonder and all that.

It will be interesting if you make a 'silk purse' out of this one. And quite remarkable. Best of luck at it.

The Space Wolf flying shoe-box is still available, BTW.

Nice work - definitely looking more dread like now, doing a good job of bringing it away from the fleshy feel, should be really interesting

Just to be contrary though, one of the things I liked about that model was that there were plenty of fleshy parts to play with

Red Harvest wrote:Same reason Night Goblin archers once came with 2 left hands. Or was it 2 right hands.

Jewel-like objects of magic and wonder and all that.

It will be interesting if you make a 'silk purse' out of this one. And quite remarkable. Best of luck at it.

Are you saying that they are made imperfectly...


I will do what I can, and hopefully it'll be worth something to someone.

The Space Wolf flying shoe-box is still available, BTW.

If someone want's that model improved upon, they can either sit on it, or send it to me and I'll give it a go. But it'll probably be cheaper and easier to just scratch-build something better.

monkeytroll wrote:Nice work - definitely looking more dread like now, doing a good job of bringing it away from the fleshy feel, should be really interesting

Just to be contrary though, one of the things I liked about that model was that there were plenty of fleshy parts to play with

Thanks MT.
There will still be plenty of flesh (and will be painted fleshy), and you will (maybe) notice that I am tying the new parts in to the fleshy areas.

I'm starting to think along the lines of Tetsuo after he's rebuilt his own arm, but before he turns into a giant blob. So I'll be running plenty of wires and cables about...

I've just cut the vents into the new back and I think I'm ready to stick the two halves together and get to work on the feet and legs...

I did indeed stick both halves together and I've been working on the legs and feet.
I've also been playing with some small details here and there; such as the mechanised hip and extra detail on some of the tubing that I've added.
I stopped short of mechanising the calves as it would be a lot of work for little gain. The hip and feet will have to do.

While there appears to be a choice of feet, I'm going to continue with the ones of the right as the ones of the left, while closer to what normal dread's have (and that was the aim), I'm not happy with how they have turned out and look a mess. The others are far easier to get clean lines.

This is only the bare shape at the moment and they will get some alterations and additions to tie them into the chaos feel.
I may shorten them (to get a higher front) and might (as I've just thought of it so making a note of it here) add a notch to the middle to give them a double toe look, like ninja shoes...

Still playing about with them at the mo', basically... There is a plan even if it is not obvious at the moment... Still, progress...

Just dropping by to check in, too much went on lately, will (try to) properly comment once catched up!

Just a heads up: expectations are high!

Love it! How did you manage to cut out the back vents so cleanly?

chaos dread is comming along nicely
rgards
mark

Littletower wrote:Just dropping by to check in, too much went on lately, will (try to) properly comment once catched up!

Just a heads up: expectations are high!

I shall look forward to it.
Are there any other kind of expectations?...

Casey's Law wrote:Love it! How did you manage to cut out the back vents so cleanly?

Thanks Casey.

Just a saw, really...
I marked out where I wanted the vents and how long in pencil.
Cut the majority of the material out with a saw which was conveniently the right thickness (or near enough).
Then tidied up the ends (as the saw was cutting at an angle) with a scalpel and a little sanding.

Thanks again, Mark.

Here's a mock up of the feet (well, a foot) to show the general shape and size.


I will now make milliput copies of this (using Oyumaru, the wonder stuff!) and then play about with details.

First of all, what can somebody not love about the chopping up of a model like this to turn it into something else, and all explained in such detail?

The reworking of the back exhaust is crisply great. How would the be called: retro-retro-fitting?

Foot/feet coming along nicely. Maybe reinforcing the double toe look before the cast, though? Or are you planning on doing that on the casts and not on the master?