Greetings all! I've actually been working on this at an OCD pitch so haven't taken the time over the past few days to post WIP pics.. so here's everything at the same time!





-EDIT-
I was browsing the interweb looking at some peoples' mawlocks and revived this post for some basing inspiration. Enjoy!

Here's what I started with. I wanted to go for a more dynamic model, portraying how a Trygon would get to dinner. Obvioused based around a carnifex model, which I ordered for just this purpose!

The first thing I did was cut the tail off the lower torso half and throw away the legs. I then mounted it to a 5" round piece of plywood (just a little larger than 120mm) with a copper wire and covered it in sculpt.

Next came building up the torso, head, and tail. I added mandibles to the head for the ravener look and the fins to the shoulders (that I suppose would prevent the vents on the back from getting caught underground). I also ended up extending the forwardmost plate on the carnifex head to give the whole front of the model a pointy feel.

^And filled in the vent stacks

The rest of the tail was sculpted in one go. The end of it was terminated in such a way that I could paint it to look like it was coming out of a hole in the ground.

For the next step I tacked the pieces together for a final torso-angle, then added armor plates and a bunch o' arms
The arms include 1 set of Carnifex scything talons, 2 sets of monstrous creature scything talons (one set cut shorter), and 8 pairs of hormy arms at varying lengths

This first pic is just the fit next to an orc for size


It's very tricky setting up arm angles that look aggressive rather than just kind of flailing and odd... Especially when there are 2 dozen sticking out all over the place.



Armor plates and additional arms added


View from the top

Next comes the basing!



----- Will post in a bit to keep bumping the thread forward! -----

So dang cool looking! Make me several eh?

That's really top work, I can't wait to see it painted.

Looks awesome.

That is an awesome conversion

I have to say... skill-wise, this thing is spectacular.
What (brand name) material are you using for the sculpted parts?

I'm comcernted about the size, though. Can you take a pic of it next to something large, like a tank or Carnifex?
It LOOKS quite a bit smaller than the FW model.

Eric

Nicely done. Love the pose.

Looks real nice, what is that you are modelling with???

in the pic I believe its a product called Apoxie-sculpt, in the white colour variant of course.

ATTACK OF THE TYPO!

ok cool, cheers mate

Looks awsome, and thanks for the pics and ideas.. this is exactly the same project I'm about to start! Though I'm going to be giving mine less of a tail, I want to try and model it like it's just busting out of the ground.

How did you do the shorter 3rd row of tallons? is it just a normal fex tallon that you cut short?

Time for more updates! to answers for everyone's questions- I use "Apoxie Sculpt" from Aves studio as my medium. It's working consistancy is tackier and not quite as firm as kneadatite (greenstuff) and when set it isn't as resilient, but it is muuch muuuuuch cheaper. As far as the size of the model, it doesn't stand quite as tall as the forgeworld Trygon due to the pose, but they are the sames size (The FW model has the same bulk as the carnifex).

Wow very nice.....

The look I was going for on the base just reflects how it will generally arrive on the table, bursting through the floor and slamming directly into the line.

The first step (not pictured) involved sketching out what I actually wanted to do! I just traced the circle onto a piece of paper and started brainstorming. What I ended up with is some cracked floor with a reinforced wall being gently moved out of the way.



With that portion set and in place I proceeded to model a little earth displacement so it looked like it was BURSTING from the ground- no sneaky entrances here.

I marvel at your mad sculpting skillz. Looks pretty fantastic!

And lastly, adding a few more sheets of displaced concrete.



With all that dry, I added basic texturing for the dirt (sand on woodglue)

There you have it! After that, it's all up to you how you want it to look.

For my Tyranid paint scheme, I use a low contrast red-brown look. Body parts were sprayed flat white and terrain flat black (with your basic 99 cent spray paint from walmart).

The sheer speed of your progress puts me to shame.

Basic plate colors and talon/teeth colors are built up the same.

Armor plates get a nice application of scab red. Dipping the brush in water then getting some paint gives me the thickness I need, I'm not sure what ratio that would be. It isn't a wash consistancy, just slitghly thinned so recesses end up darker than large surfaces.


Next, a scortched earth base for all the pokey bits. All the plates get a first wash of Bestial brown.


A second wash of bestial brown for the armor, and streaked on brown for all the teeth/claws. I applied the bestial wash to the tail section as well.


To finish off the base color for everything, some Snakebite Leather

Also, a thing to note is the flat surface where the tail is attached to the base. This is being painted as well in such a way as it looks like it's coming out of a hole. I continued painting the body pattern for 3 more segments, and would later shade it with a few applications of black ink.

Highlighting was done with Commando Khaki then Bleached Bone. Black was added between plates and little spots were added to the skin.





There's also an unpictured final white highlight on all the teeth/claws/spikes

AAAAAAND DIP!

The last 3 layers consist of 2 flesh washes and a brown ink. I used standard GW inks, diluted to about 3:1 water:ink with a drop of white glue dissolved in. You want to get good coverage on everything with shading in recesses, without having huge pools or tide marks left on the model. And no.. I don't physically dip my models, just use a large (size1) brush for good ink control.

Flesh washx2


Brown ink on everything except for the spikey parts

For the base painting, I just layered from skortched brown -> bleached bone with the same colors I used on the model. Streaked on thin coats of codex and fortress grey then white for the concrete

Annnnnd the final product

Bump!

Utterly stupendous piece of work!
Bravo Sir

awesome

Looks bloody brilliant to me! Keep up the nice work

delicious, nice work

As a fellow nid player I am truely jealous of your sculpting skills, sweet conversion, and very nice color scheme!

Freaka

That has to be the most awesome bug I've ever seen. My hat off to you sir!

Very very nice, was this your first time at sculpting?

An amazing piece from start to finish.

Very well executed.

I just bought some apoxie sculpt. A WHOLE POUND!! And im only out 13usd.!!!

Actually, the Trygon is my 3rd sculpt, after a squig that will be posted with my warboss thread and THIS! My first ever scuplt:







About 15 pounds of Apoxie sculpt and chicken wire around a coat-hanger frame. I think I posted these somewhere about 2 years ago.

wow... you have inspired me. My first sculpt shall be some massive creature of destruction!!!

Wow... I think you need to paint that thing next

Trygon looks great. I should be starting mine this week

HOLY MOTHER OF NIDS.


WOW.

Never saw a model coming this dynamic through the surface. It is the very moment someone shouts: "Oh crap!" and dies. Lovely.

Nice work. Props to you.

hahaha thats a whole lot of posts for like one night XD

Dang - you are a man who loves his bugs. Zowie!

Holy Crap those two are some scary nids. I can just imagine those guys apperaring and having a lowly IG trooper seeing it and just saying "F#$% Me". But on a serious note those are some amazing sculpts.

Another problem I have is every time I get a good idea and revisit one of my old(er) armies, I always get the urge to repaint things or make some new additions... I'm sure you can expect at least 6 more raveners to be painted up shortly!

That bio-titan is AWESOME.

Christ on a bike that's an impressive bio-titan.

That my friend is totally awsome

keep the gold coming

biztheclown wrote:Nice work. Poops to you.

Fixed your typo.



That is a NICE looking bug. Keep up the good work!

Eric

That is super sweet. Good job.

smashing!

2 nearly-painted pics of my biotitan... eventually have to sit down and finish it. Too many projects going on at once! Chaplain included in the second pic for size.

delkins42 wrote:2 nearly-painted pics of my biotitan... eventually have to sit down and finish it. Too many projects going on at once! Chaplain included in the second pic for size.

For size? looks more like "for lunch"

are you an artist or are you lying about that being your first sculpt? that bio-titan is something i wouldn't even expect from FW. so so amazing.

"Captain Chaplain's cereal... Nid tested, Broodlord approved."

That is just unreal. I have ot agree that that Bio-Titan has to be your first GW related sculpt. You look like this ain't your first rodeo. All things aside, however, you've turned out some crazy work!

Dude sell that thing (or a casting of it) to Forgeworld. Just sign something for like 1% of whatever income they make form it, and you'll be rolling in it within a year.

It really IS my first sculpt ever. The cool thing about starting large is even all the "intricate" detail is larger than the hand of one of the minis. My second project should be posted by the end of the week (and you can see part of it in one of the pictures in my P/M blog thread). The trick is making something small. Biotitan- time consuming, a NOSE... now that's a hard one. Then after a tiny mini a trygon tail seems pretty easy

I think my favourite part is the head/mouth/teeth.

GOOD Lord! About how many hours do you estimate it took for that Bio-Titan? Did you sculpt it in parts, or as a single piece? Where did you get the idea/ inspiration from for the Bio-Titan? Is it hard to keep up the motivation on projects like these?

Sorry for all the questions, I am very curious!

Wow....

We're gunna need a bigger boat.




Great work sir. A friend of mine has made his own trygon and after hearing bout Scuply I said I'd like to help make a Titan with him.

Now I see that it can be done amazingly well with talent.
Hope I can achieve something even half as good as yours. That's inspirational work.

The 1 think I don't really like about the bio-titan is the close up shots of it, as it looks hairy with the detail to me (but this is when it was unpainted), and then it starts to seem nurgle like, with the holeish things. However, I did not notice at all with the painted, so it does work well as armor flow, it was just something I noticed in the unpainted pictures.

Anyway, nice job, really nice sculpts, I really like the dynamic poses, especially with the turning bio-titan.

umm.


Wow, I think my head exploded.

How long do you typically allow the white stuff to dry before carving away? How do you keep other parts of it from falling off during the sculpting process?

WOW! you got awsome tallent in both modeling and painting! well done! cannot wait to see it finished!

thanks,

Matdragon

this model makes me eyes water, its so kick a$$

Apone wrote:Wow....

We're gunna need a bigger boat.

Screw that, Sarge! Need a bigger battle field!

That is just down right scary. What are you going to field it as? Or do you just place it on the table and see who still wants to play?

The working time for apoxie sculpt is about 2.5-3 hours, after which it is still cuttable with an exacto knife for another hour before fully hardening. I don't quite have the tallent to just go crazy and sculpt something out of a single piece and instead work in layers- building an initial shape as accurately as I can, letting it partially set so I can carve sharper features, then waiting for it to cure fully before moving on to another piece (see my warboss for an example).

The biotitan itself was slowly built up over a number of weeks, with the process being made slower as I was making a lot of it up as I went along.


edit for typos

love the trygon fex, just about to start work on my 2nd one now, going to try and use the old DE dragon as a base mixed with a fex though.
also, this might interest you, have you thought about building a malanthrope yet?





just finished his nurgle style paint job.

I swear, the more I look at that last shot of the bio-titan on the shelf, the more it looks like it's gonna crawl down and start eating the dog.

if you ever concider making more bio titans, pm me prices
also, quick question, for things like that whats best to make them from?

Wow, nice!

I like how the plastic and sculpt mesh together.

it looks very sexy. I see there was alot of thought put into the conversion and I give you bonus points for sculpting.

If you are planning on building up a large project, I recommend going to http://www.avesstudio.com/ and picking up some apoxiesculpt. Good product AND cheap. For smaller things, I like using the good 'ol green stuff.

very nice trygon, and the biotitan is simply epic

Nice! I suppose I could add a malanthrope to my army.. but if I'm converting another carnifex, why not make another Trygon?

Just to echo, the Trygon is impressive.

The bio-titan is fracking immense.

Phazer

Bah, malanthrope's gonna have to wait... time to work on some raveners to go with it!

i wonder if that paintjob will work in green...

thanks for the inspiration delkins
and NICE biotitan

can i start worshiping that titan now
you put us to absolute shame

Jesus I'm beginning to think your the leader of the hive mind.

I'm speechless on the bio titan well not entire thought I'd go ahead and ask
"can i have one?"

I'm 90% sure my nid's will worship yours.

looks like a badass centipede
keep up the good work

Oh me oh my, that thing must eat gargants for breakfast. you should put pieces of bodies into its teeth...not to give you more work...but I think that everyone would appreciate that sort of thing.

Revived!

Well, there's really no longer a need to convert Carnifexae these days, but there seems to be a few attempts out there of making a trygon/mawlock look like it's bursting out of the ground (and this thread can be used for just that!).

Anyone know how to get this moved to the tutorial section of the forums?

ask a mod?

pingas

Warboss Narznok wrote:pingas

Necromancy!

Truly some amazing sculpting, that trygon is great, and the base makes it just epic. The same for the Bio-Titan

Done...

Love the base work on the Trygon, I want to do something similar for my Mawloc, truly an inspiration

//Edge

oooooo a carnyGon cool

Wow really good idea! Love the base!!

Great!!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Cool now I can make a trygon cheaply. To Ebay!!

I want one I want one I want one, wait no, make that 3.

The best model I have ever seen!

awshum.

Gotta say my initial thought for the second bio-titan pic was,.... wait, theres an SM somewhere around there? Oh wait, snack time. I think in this case even the "they shall know no fear" rule would get tossed out the window as it would just be ridonculous not to be running at full tilt away.

:0

@ biotitan
In 'nid codex it says that when they approach a planet many people there think they are gods... I now know why
P.s: NECROED!

Sweet blast from the past