"Eye for Detail" - Necro/=I=Munda Blog ------------(07.09. Infinity moved to new blog)

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**Baiyuan**

Damn you, imagination! Damn you, perfectionism! Long story short, I'm not done with the saw yet.

I'd have never expected it to take that much more time to finish, but I had to change some things again, because they didn't make much sense, had lots of additional ideas on the way and started adding the real details, photo etched parts that is.

Tomorrow I'm taking a day off, because of my birthday and will get up soon and have some quality hobby time until the family arrives. Which means I will complete my masterpiece tomorrow.

Until then, feast your eyes on a nice little WIP shot, most of the parts even made into the final version.

So relax your mind and let your conscience be free... and picture what I might have done with those parts...

**Baiyuan**

I did it! Yes, we can! Free at last!
Will post the big update later tonight, still got some partying going on...
l8r

**Baiyuan**

@Everybody:

Thank you all for the gratulations, I had a great day!

@PDH:

Thx, for cheese and dice. What detail do you mean?

Just because I like shots of people's workstations:

OK now, here it comes! Update time!

The Project:

It's been in the making for quite some time now. Now I'm done with the circular buzz saw for my rebel miner ogryn, Cortaro. I won't go into detail about the character now, since he is not done yet, just the weapon. So I'm keeping the backround for when the whole model is finished (next week I'd say).

The status of the saw is actually 99% since there are some spots that need some putty, but that's the hands and arms mostly.

The idea for the conversion started with the lovely FW miniature and the ugly looking hands and puny pickaxe he had. I felt the urge to make a major change and give him that industrial flavor I'm aiming for with my rebel miners.

The logical solution was a supersized powertool. Chainsaw? Nah, eeeeeeverybody has that and there are enough "chain somethings" in 40k. Drill? There are not that many around and it would look cool, but I would want the killa kans drill for that, so it has to wait. Well, long story short, I was looting the waaghbiker box looking for something else and came across that one specific bike and it immediately turned into a circular saw in my imagination.

The Conversion:

First steps were trimming and rearranging the bike.

Next was finding new hands to replace the oddly shaped and crude looking old hands.

After that was done I looked around for circular blades, there are a few in the orks range and I tried out the nob's ones, too small. FW boss on waaghbikes blade didn't have the right flavor, too orky and it was slightly too big. Killa kans and Deff dread I couldn't test, because I don't have the boxes, also I reckoned they might be to big, plus it would be a waste to cut them up, just for the blade.

So scratchbuilding it is. I had to make three blades to get the size and shape right and practice some carving techniques. Very time-consuming...

After a couple of hours of work the basic parts were found and I entered one of the most difficult stages of the conversion. Fitting the framework together, handle blades, tank and so on. I bet I bluetacked the components together a hundret times. Bending the handles, carving out the space for the blade (there was zero space inside the warbikes wheel housing)... Finding all the parts took forever too, they come from dozens of sources. I was well into the conversion (15h+) when I discarded the first idea of lamp and found a proper exhaust.

Fitting everthing together took me ages and at this point I thought I was almost done. The blade and the handle weren't in place yet, but that was basicly it, hell was I wrong...

The next pictures show some of the WIP stages. First an early idea for a lamp, which was crap. Why is there a lamp on that thing looking like an exhaust...

Some new details I considered using.

Along the road I had the idea of adding a safety shield to the blade, like some circular saws have them. With shield.

Without the shield.

The carved out wheel housing. Looks rough I know, but I figured that's what it would look like inside a saw for cutting ore.

New lamp with detailed wiring.

Ok, some dozen hours later, everthing was glued into place, suitable details were found and I took pictures of the final components on their own.

In the end it looked like this:

So after something like 30h+ of worktime and including more than 50 parts into the weapon alone, I had accomplished my mission, building a proper, industrial looking, (did I mention magnetized) heavy duty ore saw, worthy of the lovely renegade ogryn. Enjoy!

Ok, comments please! Praise it if you will, but don't hesitate to nitpick, we're here for the creative exchange, aren't we. Myself I'm not exactly sure about some parts:

What do you think of the blade shield? As it is, it makes the whole saw look like a lanternfish, which is cool, but maybe too orky.

The second problem also includes the shield, do you think I should shorten or even trim off the teeth of the jaw and those shards attached to the hull of the saw? Too orky again?

My work on Cortaro himself will continue tomorrow, so that he can soon say his punchline for the first time: "I saw you!!!"

**Baiyuan**

First things first, before I start replying to your posts individually I'd like thank you all for your numerous flattering comments, it's very motivating to see, that you people like what I do. This project was especially much fun for me so far and it seems to do the same for you.

Perkustin wrote:Why take a normal buzzsaw when you can make one out of a motor cycle. Great ogre very mencaing and brutal...

Just what I was thinking, why take a normal one, plus I couldn't think of a proper one.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:It is all looking jolly D mate!
Those of a certain age will remember the ads:
Blackanddakkablackanddakka...and so on and so forth

I liked the ad and I have some black&deckers, I could add the logo to the saw when painting it.

Cadaver wrote:You've outdone yourself yet again! I love the buzzsaw. I do prefer it without the guard. It doesn't look overly Orky, but I think it looks better without.
Now, I must nitpick a little - the model looks a little front heavy with such a huge weapon. Maybe just pose him where he's a little more centered on the base and that will help. Again, it's minor nitpicking, but something I noticed immediately in the first pic. I think that's also part of the reason I prefer it without the guard, just because it's adding additional bulk to the front of the model.
Still extremely cool and I love the end result. Little details like the lamp just put it over the top for me. Excellent work!

Thanks for the overly kind words. I hear your words about the front heaviness, in fact the model is not properly fixed to the base yet, which was actually just a quick idea to make the ogryn look less hunched and more like on the top of a hill. I will see to it, once I build his base and decide on a final position for him. Please be sure to keep an eye on whether I solve the problem in the final version or not.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Just to go back to the guard.
I would remove the teeth tbh. The problem is not so much that it looks orkish, but that the serrated aesthetic is not working with the blocky bulkiness of the Ogryn now I look again.
The studded glove he has would be a better style for the guard. Hope that makes sense.

I think I know what you mean. I haven't made up my mind yet, but I thought from the beginning, that the teeth on the saw itself have to go.

haranos wrote:make a spare buzzsaw blade and put it somewhere on the ogryn, such as hanging in place of the cogwheel, it would look cool imho
aside from that, ITS AWESOME

Perkustin wrote:Hmmm if he put a spare blade on there wouldn't he also need a sprocket or wrench? Maybe some oil or a fuel can , i dont think a crazed ogryn is gonna be capable of changing the blade on that beast. I dont mind the guard as imo it is hard to avoid anything improvised looking orkish so you might as well embrace it.

Good thinking, I actually planned to do that right from the start. At first I thought I could say the cog wheel was a spare blade, but of course it's way to small now. I actually imagined the saw to be able to unlock the blade upon a button press and release it to be bouncing through anything roughly in front of it, so I planned to give it a release handle and some spare blades. Giving him a wrench seamed cool to me to and I'm still considering it. As far as I can see there won't be enough room for spare blades in the end. Not sure yet.

HF Izanagi wrote:... I bow to your insane creativity. I'm impressed that the 50-pc ensemble chainsaw is about 1 step away from being fully functional and the blade being able to spin... simply amazing!

Thank you, very flattering, I like that.

Btw the only thing that made me glue the blade in place was the fact, that there are one or two teeth on it, that didn't turn out very good, so I positioned them on the inside. The blade was able to spin at first, but it felt to much like a toy and I don't like that, it's a model, so I had to restrain from the fun of spinning the blade and making "wrinnn wrinnn wrinnn" sounds.

The Good Green wrote:Ok, That is incredible. Such attention to detail... I'm convinced you would benefit from a straight jacket ;~P Really, incredible. I'm not quite sold on the blade guard. I think it looks cool, but it looks a little big, with the toothy bits at the top of the saw blade as well. Thanks for raising the bar.

I'm wearing a straight jacket, that's why I have to do everthing with my mouth and feet, my minis would turn out waaay better if I was able to use my hands...

Again I'll address the teeth and blade guard soon, but I know exactly what you mean, thx.

tipios wrote:Wow! The blade is perfect, and thanks for showing how it was done Fantastic idea and conversion. Only nitpick I have, is with the handle. Just below left hand, where your plastic tube enters. Can you GS it so the original part looks straighter?

I didn't exactly show it, that was step one of many many more. If you're interested I'm willing to share the whole process. You're nitpicking is welcome, I'm not 100% sure what you mean though. On the very last picture I agree the handle looks strange, I think it slipped out of position there, it's not supposed to bend sideways and it normally doesn't, if that's what you meant. If you mean the fact that the white tube is not in line with the reception of it and there is a slight bend towards the saw, I don't mind that, It looks ok to me.

neil101 wrote:Well , the timing is perfect becauser i can actually here a huge buzzsaw from my writing position , the whining cough, spluttering is quite dreadfull , ( watre works ) but to have this image to go with it, is disturbing , to say the least, the chain pull is such a nice touch and the , custom blade i would have sworn was shop bought. its big and nasty like it should be , perfect for that beast of a ogryn , kudos , on all the hard work fella.

Hehe, I was very happy when I saw some construction workers with a big buzzsaw cutting open a street some weeks ago, when I was in the middle of building the saw. Nothing beats a real reference. About the blade I could have made ten more, because it didn't seem that good to me, glad nobody recognized.

RSJake wrote:Absolutely amazing! Really! I actually had to look at it several times to find any citisizm at all, and it's just asthetics...and only because you asked us to be nit-picky!
The guard looks great, and not overly Orky, but it looks like it's kind of in the way, you'd be able to do much more damage with it removed...however, it looks nastier with it on, so I'm torn...
But great job! I would say that I want to steal the idea, but I would never get it to look anything like what you have come up with! Bravo!

Don't hesitate to try, I'll happily assist you with my experience.

monkeytroll wrote:Excellent work as always. The chain was an inspired idea, loving that. Personally I'd lose the guard, or at least lose the teeth from it, not neccesarily too orky, just doesn't gel with the aesthetics of the rest.
Overall impression - towards the high end of outstanding

Very flattering! The chain is one of my favorite parts too, it was a blast when I had the idea.

No time to update on my works now, gotta go eat with my students. I'll inform you about my progress later this evening.

Well, later is now. Recent Progress: I've been a bad boy! Instead of finishing my ogryn (I worked on him but he's not done yet), I worked on something all new and not affiliated with any of my current projects.

I accidently bought a miniature from Ebay and when it arrived yesterday I couldn't resist to start converting it. I actually had no idea what to do with it, because I had not expected to win the auction with a bid of 1€. So there it was and I thought about possible conversions, I considered something ratskinish, but it didn't exactly fit.

My next thought was Genestealer Magus and that's what it's going to be. I already swapped the head, removed any details that did not work with a magus and added additional arms.

I know, I know, Magi are 4th Generation and will normally not have additional limbs. Keyword is normally Genestealers are highly mutating and nobody can tell me it can't happen. Plus the fluff has changed in so many significant ways over the many years, nobody knows what might happen next time.

Anyway I'll try to steer away from the magus again soon, so I can continue with my other projects, but I can't guarantee. It's such a tempting quick conversion, as far as anything I start can be considered quick.

**Baiyuan**

neil101 wrote:Wow i think i should congratulate you on your wonderfully written replies to so many comments as much as i should on your sidetracked Magus! Can only immagine the detailed lengths you will go to on such a project. Btw can i ask what you teach? if its not too personel a question for the forums?

I can hardly imagine any of my replies are wonderfully written considering my insufficient english language skills, but if you say so, well thank you very much.

I'm excited about the magus as well, must resist the urge to make a full-fledged project from it...

About my field of activity, I don't mind the question at all. I'm a teacher for two different subjects, language and martial arts. So on one hand I teach German and Chinese and on the other hand I teach traditional chinese martial arts, mostly to adults (though I also used to work with kids for some time). And if you were to ask my fiance she would say I teach absolutely everything, whether one asks me to or not.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Baiyuan teaches forum etiquette and good manners Neil
As well as excellent miniature modelling.

You know all the compliments could actually make me become arrogant, if I wasn't an arrogant bastard already, that is.

PDH wrote:Ah what a treat! Come back from a weekend of wild camping and foot destroying hill walking to find possibly the best armed ogryn I've ever seen.
Now perhaps I just wasn't paying attention before but I assumed the buzz saw was replacing his hand....not an actual buzz saw tool - which is simply stunningly! I think it works perfectly and I wish I had the imagination to have seen that final product from the parts.
My only suggestions are:

The pose. I think the ogryn needs to be tipped back. As in what he is standing on should not be flat. It should be sloped up towards the front of the base.

The blade guard. This part should go completely. Not that I don't think it looks cool but using a tool as a weapon and keeping the safety guard would make it pretty ineffective!Though it does look pretty heavy so I suppose he could just bludgeon his opponent with the guard

Best armed eh? Thanks!

About the pose, oh yes he will be tipped back, he actually is already. That's why I put him on the landraider hatch in the first place, but the bluetack gave in over the weeks, so the original angle isn't there anymore. Like I said somewhere before I want him to climb a slope to make him look less hunched. So we totally agree in this point. Another reason for this is that one can see much more of the saw if he is holding it out over an edge.

The blade guard... difficult topic. I hear what you say about it, had that in mind at some point too, but I came to the conclusion that it makes the saw more credible overall. I have difficulties to decide what to do with it, but I'm almost determined to get rid of the teeth on the saw itself. They distract from the blade, prevent the guard from being turned to the front and just don't feel absolutely right for a tool, which maybe has been quickly altered for better combat usage. I'll see what the guard looks like once the teeth are gone and decide then.

Talking about quick alterations I had the idea to bind the guard to the exhaust with some wire, like they wanted to make it not get in the way. Hhm, thanks for pushing me there, could be funny. Some more storytelling for that model.

**Baiyuan**

Hey guys,
just wanted to keep you up to date. It's been a rather busy week and I had to play through Crysis 2 (decent game). I'm done with that now and ready to get back to my projects.
I haven't been idle though, I installed a new chest of drawers in my workshop, which grants me much more space for my innumerable tools, bits and kits.
I also went back to further preparing some scenery kits for our gaming table, which is a pain in the ass.
I had a look into my Tau and Necron boxes, which both contain huge mainly untouched armies and found an old project, that is now intrigueing me to get back to. (A necron warmachine I dubbed tombscorpion something like 6 or 7 years ago.)
And last but not least I have been thinking, yeah just thinking, about how much I need to get painting more.

Anyhoo, I will have some time tomorrow, so let's see how I'll put it to use...

**Baiyuan**

Scarper wrote:Hey Baiyuan!
Okay, Cortaro (Cutter? Nice touch!). First off: Wow. I'll just leave that on it's own, because that was, for around 30 seconds, my original reaction. No analysis, nothing else, just that. I have absolutely no idea how you fit those parts together in your head - looking at pieces from such eclectic sources and seeing something completely different, then putting them together in a way that not only works but works cohesively requires one hell of an analytical mind, and one that I am insanely jealous of.
That being said, I agree with some of the others in thinking that that guard should go. It looks perfectly fitting with the tool, and is definitely worth saving for another model, but I definitely think that if you've modified a saw with the express purpose of harm, keeping a protective cover on it is a little counterproductive! The binding may work though, and I'm sure you'll find a way
It sounds like I'm selling your saw short, but on of my favourite touches is the extra drive shaft (?) on his belt - it really sells the conversion, and ties his weapon to him. I'm sure you've stopped noticing all the comments on detail by now, but I can't resist
Overall - astounding. As always, any criticisms are incredibly minor, and barely worth making. BUT, I've come to understand that you're a fan of the little things, so still thought it was worth mentioning Keep up the amazing work, and sorry for the comment drought recently!

Thank you for the flattering words, Scarper! You know I'm a huge fan of your stuff and I think that shows one thing: Even if what you say about my analytical mind is true and even though you might envy me (I tell you it's as much of curse, as of a blessing...), your work shows that there is more than one way to creating something great and inspiring. So we work in completely different ways from one another, and we both see things in the others work that are out of reach for us. I'm quite jealous of the flavor in your works. I find it hard to define, but there is something in your work that is beyond me, it really tickles the g-spot of my imagination. Your warden for example even as a wip is really pulling me in.
Oh and finally someone recognized (or just mentioned) the names are not coincidence. That's true for all my gangers btw and I'm glad you like it.

Behind th Mask wrote:Just stumbled onto this thread, .... AWESOME work so far. That buzzsaw is to damn cool man. GREAT work on it.

Thanks, and welcome to my blog man, stay tuned!

About my recent progress:

This whole week was not very creative/productive, I didn't get to do a lot of what I like the most, pushing the projects. And what I managed to do wasn't satisfying, I need a fix...

I only had one short session with my ogryn and I still have no idea what more needs to be done to him. I added a double tank to his back (works perfect, but needs to be blended into the rest) and I started fitting the mask of some fantasy ork on his face (wasn't sure about it at first I just thought his masked face was to plain, but it's starting to look good), but I still feel there is something amiss. I'm still considering giving him a big wrench, but I can't find a sensible spot to put it. Same for some other pieces of possible equipment. Really not sure yet.

I also built a base for Cortaro and I have to say, I hate it! Not the base, it's boring but not hateful. I mean making bases in general! Creating a diorama would be something different, because it becomes part of the model. But bashing together parts for a base, I don't like that... Anyway save for the sand/dust/dirt it's done now and that's a good thing.

I also spent a little time sawing and filing off parts of two Valhallans to convert them into Delaques. Worked quite ok on one of them, the other will need some serious "dremel"ing and I decided to get back to more important things for the moment before I got there.

What I did the most this week, was watching Scrubs and removing moldlines from some thousands of parts of scenery. I'm sure you know those bio hazard/chemical plants from tehnolog.ru. Well I got a couple of them and it's a pain in the ass to prepare them for assembly. I think I mentioned before that we bought scenery consisting of far more than 15k parts and I'm almost done preparing all the parts. Unfortunatly I have had only very little help and I'm starting to lose the spirit. There are still three more boxes I didn't even touch yet...

Always look on the bright side of life...

**Baiyuan**

neil101 wrote:thats a lot of prepping mate. Create i diorama i say . a mini one , i did one today to stop burnout. you could always think of your bases as dioramas, allbeit tiny ones.

Now that you remind me, I'm still waiting for those tiny rats to add to my bases to make them look more lively...

Scarper wrote:It sounds like the tank will have filled up a lot of the blank space on Cortaro's back, but I'm not really sure what else to suggest :/ You could try some survival gear? Or maybe a pendant or personal item hanging from his belt - kinda falls into the "dumb brute" cliche a little, but might add a little more character.

Yes and No. (Did I mention that English really lacks a word to say both at the same time? In German we have "Jein" which is "Ja" and "Nein" in one word...) Anyway, even though the tanks take some space (it's a burnaboy backpack put on the side), there still is some space that really needs something, but it's really hard to find something to go there. That spot is above the original tankthing on his back, close to his right shoulder...

jackanory wrote:PDH sent me this way. That buzzsaw is amazing!

Thank you, welcome to my blog! I had a look at your scavvies and got to say, they something else. Very artsy and unique! I'll keep an eye on them.

In other news, I'm trying hard to force myself to paint. I know it will just take one motivational event to get me back to painting with pleasure, so I'm finishing off one of the gangers. Rayo it is and even though I've been quite sloppy out of the need to get him done, I think he doesn't suck that bad. He is done already, I just need to finish his base, because he didn't have a proper one when I started painting. I think I can finish him this night, so expect pictures before tomorrow.

**Baiyuan**

What is it with the fricking gallery? Uploaded those new pictures 6 times now and they are damaged everytime...

After trying another dozen times it finally worked... so here we go!

Update Time!

What I'm showin you this time is the first finished ganger of the Espantajos, his name is Rayo.

There is not much to say about the build, he used to be the renegade plasmagunner from the hq squad. I trimmed away the skull on his shoulder and replaced his plasmagun with a lasgun.

The paintjob is quite basic to be honest, because Rayo belongs to the first batch of gangers we started painting and is little more than a color scheme test.

I'm not exactly happy with how he turned out, but I really need to keep an eye on my standards if I want to get both my gangs done before retiring.

The scheme is like I said before: Orange jumpsuits, subtle colors for the rest of the equipment, greys, dark greens and browns.

The purple lenses on him are surely not everybody's cup of tea, but I like 'em. In the end there will be lots of different colored lenses for the miners.

One thing that might stand out is the color of the rifle and that I tried to make it look rather clean compared to the rest of his equip. The reasoning behind this is that slave miners don't normally are given rifles, so he took it from a guard after clubbing it down.

About the pictures, they are not ideal, some are blurred, some are dark, but most of them should give you a good impression of what Rayo looks like. (Although the orange of his suit for examples looks a little redder in the pics and so on.)

I think there isn't much more to say except be gentle with him, it's the first miniature I finished in more than 6 years.

**Baiyuan**

Krieg Solder 117 wrote:I really like the subtle colors used against the orange jumpsuit. IIRC you mentioned they were sulfur miners. So my only suggestion would be to add some yellow weathering to their clothes. I know forge world sells a yellow weathering powder.

Yeah that's right, they were supposed to be sulfur miners and I planned to have a lot of yellow weathering, but I changed my mind.
Even though I'm sure it would have looked good, I decided specializing on sulfur was too restrictive. There are so many kind of dangerous yet valuable ores to mine on a hive world. So not sticking to sulfur means more freedom to my imagination.
I'm thinking about using something like warpstones or psi reactive ore and the likes.

**Baiyuan**

Edited this as a spoiler, since it was totally out of context, just had to say it...

Spoiler:

**Baiyuan**

Newsflash:

Another cursed week, meaning I didn't get to convert a lot. Instead I spent a lot of time on further prepping the scenery kits and unsprued the remaining 1100 parts and removed the majority of moldlines. My thumb is raw meat now and I'm taking a day off before I continue.

Today I actually managed to take an hours time to convert, that was too little time to actually work on my projects, so I dug up two models I have been thinking about for a couple of days.

One is a champion of Slaanesh I converted a couple of years ago and that has been waiting to get painted ever since. I like the model a lot and still intend to paint it, but he needs a proper base first of all. Since I don't play 40k anymore this will be a showcase piece and one sleepless night I've been thinking of a possible base for him. My plan is to put him on a very special wooden socket that I bought two years ago just because it looked so crazy. It's some kind of exotic root wood and the surface is full of bumps and ripples and it looks like the flow of warp to me. So I will have a multitude of hands protruding from the ripples of energy that serve the chosen of slaanesh as stairs. No priority project, but I will keep it somewhere on the shelf for moments of boredom.

The second was the one that actually included converting. I thought about building something with =I= flavor for a couple of days, it had to be either an Inquisitor or an Acolyte. In both cases I wanted to go for something more medieval, that will go well with my Vostroyan Stormtrooper conversions and that's how I got to think of Archaon the Pedestrian... Archaon on foot I mean...

He's been waiting to be used since that GD years ago, but I never found any use for him and even now that I have something in mind I've got to say, what a weird, weird miniature. Not only is he huge, but his whole pose is so incredulous and stupid. What's going on with his feet? He stands on that rock he comes with like he was glued to it, the angle is ridiculous and it looks just plain stupid. I think he was supposed to wear high heels "Archaon on heels", but they changed it last minute, sculpted a rock around his heels and took his rightful title "Archaon, Dragqueen of the end of times" from him.

Ok, let's just say I don't like his pose, which also holds true for his arms. The sword arm isn't thaaat bad, but definitely not ideal. And the shield arm looks like he is suffering from some severe kind of paralysis. All in all the arms won't be a problem, because they'll have to go anyway, otherwise he would always look like a mere 40k Archaon.

I started by removing the rock from his feet (No I couldn't find heels inside), tried some possible head swaps and thought about what weapons to give him and whether I'll keep his cape as it is, or not. So that's another side project...as if I needed any more!

Right now, apart from giving you an update, I'm painting the next, soon to be finished, miner and having some Ardbeg. Back to the painting table, Cheers!

**Baiyuan**

My inquisitorial ambitions include an Inquisitor, a few henchmen and a couple of stormtroopers. The whole group will serve as some of the badass NPCs for the final stage of our necromunda campaign. So atm we are playing rather normal necromunda games (with a very customized rule set), to get the hang of it, but for the final stage I plan to have much more narrative elements and mission goals. I hope this will result in a very memorable finale worthy of our gangs.

The inquisitor is Iudex Probitas, a puritan member of Ordo Hereticus, who has come to Necromunda in order to investigate rumors of heretical tendencies amongst the noble houses of the planet. I'll write down his whole story sometime, but not now. Let's just say, that even though he is just observing and gathering evidence at the moment, he will have to take action soon and will therefore be a central element in the events to come.

I want the style of the inquisitorial troops to be very, very gothic. They will be a huge contrast to the grimy miners, the techy delaques, the military mercs and the exotic spire gladiators.

Götz von Berlichingen:

So far I'm thinking of using the soon to be converted Archaon as an inquisitorial henchman, who was born on "Berlichingen", an imperial planet with strong medieval features.

The people of Berlichingen worship martial prowess and tolerate almost any means to enhance them. Generations of bio-engineering and tube breeding the strongest men have resulted in an almost infertile (and some would whisper degenarate) caste of warriors of enormous physical dimensions, the Hiunen. On a first glance one might mistake the Hiunen for Astartes warriors, but that is mainly due to their immense size and heavy armor that looks similar to older models of power armor. In fact the Hiunen lack the versatile weapon training, advanced combat tactics and superior gene enhancements of true Astartes, yet they are fearsome warriors and their strength and endurance far beyond what a human can ever hope achieve.

Probitas once came to Berlichingen to shatter a coven of witches, that the rulers of the planet couldn't handle, due to the complete absence of psychic abilities amongst the noble and warrior casts. After a successful campaign against the rogue psykers that involved heavy losses, the lord of Berlichingen granted Inquisitor Probitas his greatest warrior as a sign of his gratitude, "Götz der Amboss". Being bound to Probitas for his lifetime by the traditional ritual of submission, Götz proved to be an indispensable addition to the retinue. When it comes to intimidating adversaries by sheer physique, taking hits to protect the Inquisitor or when a battle can be won by supremacy in close combat, nobody does it like Götz!

Now that I wrote it down, I'm quite satisfied with it and convinced it has some flavor, please tell me what you think. Too generic? Any suggestions to flesh him out even more? Anything you think the miniature must have to suit the backround?

**Baiyuan**

Scarper wrote:The painting looks amazing - I've never seen orange done in a way that doesn't look cheesy before, but I really think you've pulled it off! The tone is dead on, and combined with the rusty, corroded feel of his gear, it really works. I like the idea of the different lenses too - gives everything a scavenged feel, which you may be aware that I'm a fan of Fantastic!

Thanks for the props, mate! The orange was done with a wash of vermin fur over a grey primer with black shades, followed by a couple of highlights with increasing parts of blazing orange added to the vermin fur. For the final step I added darker shadows with heavily diluted black.
Looking forward to your opinion on the "fluff".

Todays update:

Managed to spent some time with my projects today.

I used that time to make major progress on Cortaro (sculpted a respirator mask after deciding the other mask wouldn't look right, sculpted missing areas of the new backpack, added a lantern, added a holster with some boomstick, slightly modified the base).

And to work on Götz a little (changed angle of his feet, continued to smoothen his chestpiece, decided on a head, decided on a more credible and dynamic pose, tried different weapon configurations).

I'm totally not sure about the last point yet, my favorite setups so far are either two one-handed hammers (from the inquisitor force weapon booster) or a huge chain halberd (maybe parts of malicants eviscerator or scratchbuild). I'm also eyeballing these:

What do you think? Maces? Hammers? Halberd? Something else? I'm sure there are tons of good options, I just can't think of any. Help!

**Baiyuan**

PDH wrote:Do you have a link to a picture of the inquisitor force weapon booster?
I'm really enjoying the different directions this blog goes in.

Picture? Sure thing! It's obviously the one that looks like a hammer.

Spoiler:

Different directions? That's easy for me, the real problem is not to freeze completely, when you are trying to go in all directions at the same time. But I have a feeling that both, this blog and the campaign, give me a general guideline to what comes next. So I hope I won't get lost. Like I wrote in my very first post there are lots of things to come and if Necromunda isn't enough, I've got the full 54mm =I= range in form of scores of almost finished, mindblowing projects lying around.

My 54mm stuff will definitely make an appearance here or in an individual thread sooner or later. There is that PIP IG soldier with a custom build needle rifle for example, that I intend to finish painting, once I'm fed up with the Nec stuff.

**Baiyuan**

Howdy folks, I made some progress on my ogryn today and I think I'll give you some WIP pics tomorrow. It also shouldn't be long before I finish him, but then again I always think that before spending another two weeks on a project.

About Götz I just decided that it will definitely be double hammers for him and I will scratchbuild them, because there are no hammers around that suit my needs.

**Baiyuan**

neil101 wrote:So its Hammer time !

like those maces you showed are they from a khorne chaos warrior wfb boxeset?

The maces are from the Chaos Knights sprues.

No WIP shots today, I hope for final shots very soon. Cortaro is almost done, details are in place, I decided on almost all equipment choices, the only thing he needs is a lot of GS work. I'm very very happy with how he turns out to be, it does the buzzsaw justice. I would have hated it when it looked like a cool weapon on a standard dude. Well no chance of that now, let's say he' different... Muhaha, masterpiece incoming, just you wait!

So much for today, will try to keep my rambling down until I can show you something updateworthy.

**Baiyuan**

Still no update guys.

Götz is on hold, as I'm working full throttle on Cortaro.

Didn't get to sculpt today, but I elaborated some details. His respirator is finished now and his Equipment is finalized.

Only things missing are some tubes and wires and the straps for his backpack.

Still there are two big questionmarks:

1. Additional armor Yes or No? Don't want him to look to much like a juggernaut. I tried a row of armor plates from the middle of his spine up to his forehead. That looked ace, but it took away from his salvaged and improvised look and made him look like a professional, which is not the right flavor, I think. I'm still considering giving him shoulderpads though.

2. 100% more postapocalyptic monkeys?! This question is new, it arose just today, I'm thinking of giving him a monkey spotter, like a trufflesnout. I can't elaborate on the background yet, but the miners could use them to find the location of certain valuable ores and crystals. I started converting the pirate monkey from the imperial musketeer box into a proper necromunda monkey. I'll finish him anyway and maybe I'll put him on Cortaro's shoulder, not sure yet. If not I'll find the right place for him on one of the other ogryns or the diorama.

2a. Actually this gives rise to another question. Maybe the monkey is too fancy for an ogryn and would require a more sensitive handler. Thore, the foster father of the gang, suggested giving him a bird in a cage. I wanted to use the gas-detecting-bird-idea on the diorama anyway, but now that he suggested it for the ogryn, I've got to admit it's a rather good idea. One might not want to give the ogryn a precious (fragile) monkey, but he's good enough to carry the bird cage on his back.

So, what do you think? Any ideas?

**Baiyuan**

I've got to admit it, you deserve a first glance at Cortaro. So here comes a sneak peek of the almost finished ogryn miner. (One more GS session and he will be done, so maybe tomorrow.)

Oops, how did that get so small...

**Baiyuan**

Start drum rolling guys! Cortaro is finished and as soon as I find the time to edit the photos (tonight) there will be 16 delicious shots of conversion madness.
Just hang on for a moment...

**Baiyuan**

Here it comes!

Quick recap for everybody who's new to the thread: I was recently building a kickass NPC for my Necro/=I=munda-gang of rebel hive miners, the Espantajos or Scarecrows.

For the final phase of our campaign I'm planning to introduce powerful allies for all gangs participating. In case of the miners that will be round about three ogryn slaves from the mines.

The first one of those is finished now, Cortaro. For details about the 50+ part buzzsaw he is wielding, go back a few pages, I've presented it in detail there.

Just as a reminder, a shot of the base model first:

And now my version:
Cortaro - "The Cutter" - ogryn slave - ore saw operator:

Don't want to write walls of text today (like all the other times). The conversion was a rather time consuming project, more than 50h. So there are scores of things I'd personally find worth mentioning, but I'll save us all time and let the pictures tell the story. I made closeups of the most important details anyway, so you can fully appreciate them. The grill of the respirator for example was a pain in the ass. It's basicly a piece of plastic card with a photoedged grill on top and a photoedged rivet band wrapped around the edge (that bloody thing went off a thousand times and had to be cleaned of glue and then reglued again, every time)

As always, if you have any questions or suggestions, ask/suggest away! Also if you enjoy a round of "where's the bit from" just as much as I do, feel free to start the competition.

**Baiyuan**

First of all I'd like to thank my parents... Nah crap, I am not Halle Berry. Still I'm happy you all like Cortaro and thank you all very much for the kind words!
One more time I'd like to mention, that I really don't mind you being nitpicky. So don't hesitate to leave me comments, that are not purely complimentary, but contain suggestions or ideas.

News:

Cortaro is primed and ready, but I haven't done anything else, except applying some washes to his base. Not sure what to paint first, too many minis on the painting table...

I started the next Ogryn slave! This was not planned, but when I showed Cortaro to a friend of mine and told him I'm thinking about building one or two more, which could get a jackhammer or a power drill, he said "...or a mining laser." Bloody genius! A mining laser it is!

I only spent 20min on the laser ogryn so far, but I already found the right base model, the core of the laser, a replacement hand and so on. So the core of the model is basicly there, but I will restrain from jumping into the project right now, I'll save it for later. Next up should be something of immediate importancy for the not yet finished gangs.

I mainly worked on the Iquisition troops today (another project with low priority... focus man, focus!) and they are developing very well, but numerous. I could easily come up with a 15-20 men retinue, so the hardest part will be to decide what ideas I won't pursue.

Expect Inquisiton WIPs and PIPs of Cortaro some time soon.

**Baiyuan**

Ok, maybe I am. Although I think a bearded almost 2m tall, 130kg weighing version of Halle Berry wouldn't make you read my thread... at least I hope it wouldn't!!!

**Baiyuan**

HF Izanagi wrote:
Baiyuan wrote:First of all I'd like to thank my parents... Nah crap, I am not Halle Berry. Still I'm happy you all like Cortaro and thank you all very much for the kind words!
One more time I'd like to mention, that I really don't mind you being nitpicky. So don't hesitate to leave me comments, that are not purely complimentary, but contain suggestions or ideas.

You know... I'd love to, but I find it extremely hard to critique a high-standard of work, perhaps when you start painting them? I feel like that'd be an easier (more level?) playing field... until you whip out a NMM, SENMM, super-blended something for a standard rank-and-file...

So for now, how about a question instead? How'd you make that butcher guy's base? It looks like bits and bobs(which I understand), but I'm interested in what it's mounted on- looks like salt/glue or MSG and glue...

-HF Iz

Hehe, ok Iza, we'll wait till I paint him. I'm not a big fan of nmm, so no fear regarding that. Smooth blendings are what I try to master at the moment, we'll see.
Yeah random bitz from my terrain and vehicle bits boxes. I arranged them with bluetac first to get the angle I wanted. When I was satisfied with the core elements, I replaced the bluetac with GS and added more details to it.
Next step was to fill larger gaps and give the base a sensible shape, because I didn't want to much of the standard 40mm base to show. I used vallejo plastic putty for this.
Once dry I applied undiluted Ponal (Best brand around, don't take the cheap stuff.) to the areas where I wanted sand. The sand was a mixture of pebble, slate and sand I made some years ago, unfortunately there were too many small pebbles in it, which is why I later applied a second layer of pure fine sand (sand for bird cages, it's like 1€ for 2,5kg, cheap and very fine, yet irregular, best solution imo).
Well that's it! I hate building bases, but this project was worth it and I'm happy with the result.
Just one more thing, there will be one addition to the base later on, problem is the little fellas didn't arrive in time (packages from US take forever to get here). But I think the overall look of the mini will benefit if there is life in the scene.

**Baiyuan**

Nope, keep going...

**Baiyuan**

prototype_X wrote:wow just read the whole thread. great work

cant wait to see some paint

prototype_x

Thx, some more painting would be good, yeah. I'll try to paint a little tonight...

Ok I can tell you, it's just ordinary rats I'm planning to use. I ordered some of the tiny rats from the rat ogre box. I'll place them on some of the bases to make them more lifelike. The hive is full of vermin and I'm sure it will look great to break with the industrial desolace.

Newsflash:

Now that I'm done with my first playthrough of Dragon Age 2 (Awesome game, at first I was afraid it lost to much of the rpg elements, but that's not true, they just trimmed away all the fat and improved on all the annoying aspects of the first installment.), well now that I'm through I can spend more time on modelling again. Which I already did... update incoming... well now...

Yesterday I worked on the second Ogryn a little, the one with the mining laser, you know. Despite the fact, that I'm quite positive it will be a much less demanding project than the first one (which is good), I'll not try to finish him any time soon. I'll keep him for one of those rainy days, when all other projects suck and I need some motivation.

After spending half of the day outside, enjoying the day off and the lovely weather, I came back home to enjoy my time away from all the ugly nature and oxygen and stuff and went to work on my projects a little. (One has to recover from such massive exposure to environment, my resin-dust filled lungs are not used to all the nature crap. Well not totally true, but you know what I mean.) Even though I know I should actually be painting more, or if I'm modelling I should at least work on the core projects of my campaign, I've been busy with the Inquisition over the last few days. As a reminder I'm working on a rather big retinue for an Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor, who is to appear in the later games of our campaign.

Since I'll use a lot of Vostroyan guardsmen as inquisitorial troopers (in addition to more individual henchmen of course), most of the work I had to do was sawing, filing and dremeling, which I have been doing now and then in the last few weeks. I'm not done yet, but about 5 guardsmen are ready to be glued together and receive some greenstuff. While some others give me trouble, because of their stupid poses.

Which brings us to what I did today and therefore this evenings update. I worked on one of the officers, this one here (NOT my paintjob, random picture of the mini from CMON, props to the actual painter!):

Spoiler:

While I love the Vostroyans (I'm not including furry hats into this love), some of the models are a bit strange, or even low quality. This las pistol toting, finger pointing sicko here is one of the strange ones, I don't like his pose. Sure it's the typical "Stalingrad, go here, go there I'm a mean political officer, don't mess with me"-thing we all like, but the guy is plain boooooring.

After sawing off his head, trying a million new ones as replacement and playing with the position of his head, I thought about changing his weapons (a laspistol/pointy index finger-combo is not my definition of a cool inq trooper). I considered having him look in the direction of his finger and giving him a second gun for his left hand, but that pose was boring as well and I wouldn't picture an IT (inq trooper) to wield different pistols in both hands. Next idea was to replace his original pistol with a close combat weapon, but he has a sword already and I definitely wanted to keep the cool hilt of his pistol, but the pistol itself had to go.

So he had to look to the left, keep the hilt of his pistol and somehow make sense at the same time. This was when I realized that his pose actually made more sense when he looked to the right and when I assumed he gave his fellow guardsmen a "halt" signal. The next step was logical from his body language, weight on one leg, upper body tilted back, right arm retracted... It's obvious he's taking a peek out of his cover or around the corner of a wall. Voila, now he makes some sense.

That leaves the martial understatement of the laspistol. He needed something more unique, something more powerful, something looking a bit more crude. I tried all kinds of pistols (believe me when I say that's a lot, I'm obsessed with my bitz box...), ended up trying bolters and almost settled with the custom bolter from one of the DH inquisitors, but in the end it had to be a sawn off. Double barreled sawn off with incendiary ammo, that's what I'd like to have, when I go hunting rebels in the underhive.

I kept most of his original pistol and filed down the barrel to fit in the new ones. Looks ace to me at least... Now he's almost done, he still needs some GS work and I'm considering giving him additional rounds for his shotgun, but apart from that he's good to go.

Enjoy!

**Baiyuan**

http://www.collecting-citadel-miniatures.com/wiki/index.php/Image:Necromunda_Orlock_Weapon_Sprue_1.jpg

**Baiyuan**

neil101 wrote:looks cool , nice find with the machinery wall too.

Thx, I dare you to tell me where it's from. I can tell you that much, it's from 40k.

Molotov wrote:I think that the head seems to be sitting somewhat awkwardly in the neck.

Really? Keep in mind, that he is hugging the wall, I actually tried what position my head would have, when I peek around a corner, before I positioned his head. Try it yourself and tell me what you think please, maybe my neck itself is awkward.

**Baiyuan**

neil101 wrote:I havent a clue, has it been recast ? looks like a forgeworld part though
is the guys head from the space wolf scouts?

Forgeworld indeed. Yes, it has been recast. Even though I'm not cheap with my projects, I wouldn't want to spend 100 bucks for background basing.

Spoiler:

The head is not a SW. I have those too, but they are huge, not good for most guardsmen imho. The head is from the imperial greatswords I think. I bought more than one hundret different heads from the fantasy range for this project, so I'm not absolutely sure though.

Help needed!
I would highly appreciate any suggestions regarding a good color scheme for my inquisitorial guardsmen. Let's sum up the facts, so you can start doing my thinking:

They are not Vostroyans, they are former guardsmen of the 5th platoon of the Berlichingen Lionhearts, which was almost completely killed during the battle against the witch coven, that Iudex Probitas led. The last survivors couldn't remain in the ranks of the standard troops, due to their delicate knowledge about the whole crisis. So instead of exterminating them like it would be normal, the Inquisitor decided to "promote" them into his even more dangerous services and they became inquisitorial troopers.

Their homeworld has strong feudal and medieval features, so they need to show their roots.

To paint them mainly red is out of question, they must look different from your every day Vostroyan.

The paintjob will of course include some weathering, but I'm not planning to make them too dirty. They are part of the inquisition, not some underhive bums.

Suggest away! I'm looking forward to your ideas.

Oh and never forget:

**Baiyuan**

Asylum_Inmate wrote:If an inquisitor had saved them to be part of his personal retinue he would have had a part in their new 'uniforms' possibly complimenting his own personal colour scheme/heraldry. Also with Inquisitorial Henchmen I personally think that darker colours really suit them as they want to be able to go about their business without drawing too much attention to themselves, as they are from a feudal/medieval homeworld why not go with blacks and browns to represent the leathers they would almost certainly wear, maybe a hint of chainmail too (for a bit of bling) and use a highlight colour to match the Inquistors colour scheme. Simple and yet brooding and doesnt overpower your inquistior model by being to 'showy'

(edited for spelling)

Excellent reasoning. Very close to my thoughts so far. Thank you.
Only thing I'm ambigous about is making them not "showy". I'm fond of the brown tones, but I'm not sure a nice clean bretonialike color scheme wouldn't look even better.

I'm really torn here. Ordo Hereticus: Dark and sinister or Knights background: bright and heroic. Help!

Keep going guys, I'm starting painting tonight. More suggestions would be great.