Stormboyz are 3 things: Shock troops, orderly, and disciplined.
I scratched my head a bit about what I wanted to do with these models and came up with a few rough ideas:

- They should be flying, or at least some of them. The 'just touching down' look is fine, but I wish they hadn't cast the base terrain into all of their feet. That aside, their body poses are still pretty dynamic, and they can easily be made to look like they're 'suspended' in the air.

- Gas mask helmets. Once hortwerth made his Death-Korps-ish helmets available for sale (here from The Warstore for those in the US, and here for those in Europe). Gives the stormboyz a somewhat intimidating, uniform appearance.

- Similar weapons. Here, I think I've decided to give the whole mob of 20 chain-bladed weapons, meaning chainswords, chain-axes, that sort of thing. A buzzsaw or two may make an appearance if I end up cannibalizing one of the new nob choppas into something smaller. I thought that might help with the 'shock' part of shock troops, since a mob of orks blasting towards you with revving weaponry is probably enough to force a morale check on it's own.

So I started off with this guy:









The stormboy was hacked free from his molded-on plastic base detail. The choppa arm is the one swinging the chain from the warbike set, with the chain hacked off. A 2nd edition ork choppa was added in it's place. The slugga arm's from AoBR, and just reposed a bit with some greenstuff and pinning. The head's straight from Micro Art Studio.

I have some 14-gauge galvanized utility wire that I used to suspend him in the air above the base. I decided on this stuff instead of the normal flying base because although I have about 40 of Games Workshop's clear flying bases, there is not a single one that doesn't have ridiculous air bubbles in the stems. I've also read stories about how easily same stems can snap, and being a klutz, I figure galvanized wire will be better to work with.

A washer was added underneath the base to help with balance issues, even though the miniature could still stand without it:



I'm going to get some 2-part plumbing epoxy later and just cover the whole base over so the stem will hold a bit firmer into the base.

I figure the stem can be hidden at least to a tiny degree by the addition of either flames or smoke. Sculpting flames would be fine, but I'm sort've giving smoke more thought right now because a bit of steel wool would probably be easy to add, and it's certainly much easier to paint than fire.

Anyway, I made two more stormboyz after this guy as a start on my mob of 20, so here they are:













Yeah, I see the mold lines, don't worry.

I'm going to try and limit the number of identical weapons I have in the full group of 20 to maybe 5 max, so I don't end up with too much redundancy in the chainswords. I really like the 2nd ed chainsword on my first stormboy, but a lot of input I'm getting about these suggests they might be too weedy in comparison to the current-edition chunky chainblades ork boyz have. I'm not sure if I want to change the weapon or not, honestly.

Anyway, that's a start.

Very nice

Waaaagh!
Really nicely done.
How many will you make?

They look awesome! Can't wait to see what you do with the stems, but even as they are they're a marked improvement on the current GW solutions.

I say keep the chainsword, old schoolers will enjoy it and I'm sure it would do just as much damage! Maybe just give it a special paint job, such as hazard stripes or something

i like the heads you used.

Oooh!! Nice! These guys are very cool so far! Can't wait to see em painted!

I like the 2nd Ed Chainsword bit. Makes it look a bit more vicious. (As curved weapons are wont to do.)

The galvanized wire is a good idea too.

Looking as brilliant as always.

Ein you continue to turn out great work.

I'm not too keen on the MAS heads though, they look a tad too long and snout-like for me.

But the combination of cutting them free from the base detail and the elegant rear wire mount is genius. I've held off on replacing my stormboys because something about the kit wasn't meshing with me. Aside from being too busy with triangles of scrap metal on every conceivable surface, I couldn't put a finger on what I didn't like about the models. Seeing your mods, the culprit is evident: the cludgy base detail and subsequent vertical posing.

Man, I've seen the light. I might have to free up some cash for a new unit!

What are your plans for a nob, your bang-on Zaggie model?

Wow. Another thread from you in which your conversion laden models are much better than the stock GW model.

Great work and yet another thread of yours I will be viewing intently.

Teek: I'll be making my ol' Zagstruk fit this mob. New head with a gas mask, chainblade... I'll get to it.

Banged out two more stormboyz for the mob.









I will be tweaking the existing ones a bit, probably bulking up the old 2nd ed chainsword when I get around to it. I'm probably going for wool-based smoke at this point, since sculpting smoke is a pain I don't want to go through. Flames also seem appropriate, but the idea of them belching out smoke is more fun. More to come.

sweet very good ideas i dink. I think your army is one of the most ustom i seen

Finally we get a Stormboy conversion. Been itching to grab my wallet and buy five box sets ever sicne i laid eyes on them in WD.

Nice conversion work though, cannot wait to see them painted with your L337 painting skilz Jamessionsneimheim.

Banged out two more stormboyz for the mob.

Nice how'd that work out?

Anyway great looking stormboyz I'm def gonna steal/borrow this idea

They rock,can't wait till I can see em' painted!

I really like the wire firstly. It would also make a good base to green stuff exaust out of the rocket pack. I really like the heads from Micro Arts Studios and I think I'll snag some for my burna boyz. Nicely done man.

These are great. Besides the heads and arms, are they stock stormboyz?

The wire looks good, i second the steel wool idea, ive used it before and it looks great.
look forward to seeing the rest!

Ein you might try cotton take a Q tip super glue the cotton to the exhaust port after it hardens pull it slowly while twisting drench in super glue zip it then cut off the Q tip instant smoke trail.

I've looked at all of your conversions, they're really sick. I love the heads on the stormboyz, did you make them or can you get them somewhere? Totally Bad ***

s1gns: Please read the first post, there's two links in there where you can purchase the heads I'm using. They're a product of Micro Arts Studio.

Corndoggy: Yeah, the heads and arms are the only real changes. I've been hacking the arms up and resculpting the shoulder joints a bit to make them sit farther out from the torso, so they look like they have their arms extended away from their bodies a bit more.

Put one more together yesterday and snapped photos this morning. I felt like building a chain axe for this guy, and did a little tweaking on his rokkit pack. He's also more lateral than some of my previous ones.







I'm fine building a couple more axes, but I need some alternative chain-weapon ideas. I'm giving some thought to making one 'stormboy' be a pair of grots who managed to get their hands on a rokkit pack - maybe one hanging from a harness, and the other riding on the top. 2 grots is almost equal to a boy, right?

What about a Chain-hammer?

What about a chainsaw? Although it's clearly the mother of all chain-weapons, you never see them in 40k. I mean a proper two-handed belching engine chainsaw!

This makes me want to build a unit of Stormboyz. I've always thought they were one of the more characterful units, and converting them like this, shows more of it. Great job!

As usual, very nice work, but you know that already of course.

I'm giving some thought to making one 'stormboy' be a pair of grots who managed to get their hands on a rokkit pack - maybe one hanging from a harness, and the other riding on the top. 2 grots is almost equal to a boy, right?

At least in points they do . Just do, it'll look great, I'm sure.

I really like the boy with the geared-up chainblade with the bike handle. Reminds me of Devil May Cry and with the other hand just above it, he looks really menacing.
The one with the chainblade under his arm looks pretty cool too. I was thinking about doing that for a biker.

edit:

What about a Chain-hammer?

I have no idea what that's supposed to look like, but it sounds awesome!

Ain't nuffin' 'arder 'den a stormbo-...







Oi! 'Ow'd grotz get a rokkit!?

I figure the model's sufficient enough to count as a stormboy. Got all the wargear - chainsword, slugga(s), and a stikkbomb.

Does any one have a brick wall with a stop sign for the orks. +wall = then
They looks better than the stock ones.
i ilike them.

I really dig the stormgrots! Your stuff helps me set the bar high for my orks Ein. Not sure how im going to be able to even attempt to top these though!

As expected, your Stormgrotz are pure gold, Ein.

I think you should probably work the gas mask on the lower one into his face a little better. It looks like it's just stuck onto his face, with that bandanna over his mouth still showing below it.


LOVE it, though!

Eric

tbh , they look freeking awesome

For you next awesome conversion, I suggest two grotz - one standing on the other's shoulders to imitate an ork. Maybe even throw a long trenchcoat on them with just the lower grotz face poking through at the waist.

showoff.




/jealosy

So I've made ten, and I'm fresh outta Stormboyz!

Number 8 and 9, which are pretty boring to be honest:





I had a fun idea for number 10 - a loony stormboy who loves his boomsticks. I figured the zillion stikkbombz he'd be chucking would make up for the fact that I neglected to put them on most of the rest.



I'm fresh outta Stormboyz parts now, as I only bought enough for 10 to start with. I have to pick up another 10 at some point, and when I do I think I'll be doing some more fun things with them. I have an extra stormboy body, thanks to my Stormgrotz taking his place, so I may make a rokkit and have him hanging from it by a hand or something.



Anyway, I'm going to watch ebay for cheap stormboyz. In the mean while, I'll figure out how I want to base 'em and add some smoke and other finishing details. (I just noticed a slugga I forgot to drill out, and some mold lines)

I love them.

They look really great as a unit, very impressive. The flight stands really make the models dynamic. I definitely plan to do a unit like this myself.

On the topic of chain weapons, I was thinking knuckledusters. A basic Brass knuckle frame with a row of saw teeth cycling around it, smallish exhaust running up the boys wrist. A pair of those on a boy and you're in business. Super-Bonus points if you make them tall, with multiple rows of teeth. That's a punch to the face that will give anybody a bad day.

I'm interested in seeing these painted!

I dunno about the faces you made. Why did you give them snouts? They look like Storm Pigs now...

Green swine aside, I love the poses and the rest of the work you've done. Are they all well-balanced? Not mentally, of course (they are Orks), but physically.



Ghidorah

Wooooww! I really admire ur stormboyz. i love that one holding the chainsaw with two hands and those grots. good job mate ^_^

Nailz94

Shut up id like to see you do better.
they're awesome.

Yay! It's the Death-From-Above Moomins!

Anyway, I'm going to watch ebay for cheap stormboyz. In the mean while, I'll figure out how I want to base 'em and add some smoke and other finishing details. (I just noticed a slugga I forgot to drill out, and some mold lines)

Or you could...I dunno...paint them!

I really like them especially as a homage to the old 2nd ed Stormboys. I especially like the way you've thought through them as a unit an idea I should steal.

They're Awesome!!!

They look great, great use of the models, very inspiring.

Aw man, that outfit is so cool.

Slightly OT but, in your other threads what do program do you use for your concept sketches ein?

Dude! That jack-in-the-box grot is hilarious and completely believable. I love your stuff ...

Wow... these storm boyz DO look disciplined, which I didn't think was possible. And all while having two grots tagging along instead of a 'boy, and all the other hilarities (sp?).

Great job, and I'd like to second the chain-saw-brass-knuckles idea mentioned above as an idea for your next squad, when you get them!!!

i demand that you finish them with smoke and such!!!
now i need to make some myself
//J

Hey Ein, I've been following your work for some time, but only now have I joined Dakka. Your orks are truly amazing. I really like how you make all your models so unique. Well done mate, keep up the good work.

Those conversions are very impressive.

Definitely makes me want to convert the hell out of every ork piece I own.

So I've decided these guys are one of the first projects I want to catch up and finish off over the summer. I glued some sand and ballast down onto their bases for terrain, and before I prime them and paint 'em, I'm trying to figure out my options for smoke.



The left is steel wool, and the right is a cotton swab. Truthfully, I'm not too pleased with the appearance of either. The steel wool holds its shape reasonably well, but it's hard to pull apart and has a very dense look to it. The cotton's a bit better at looking wispy, but I think I'd have to use some sort of spray adhesive to get it to stay put well enough to paint. Neither smoke idea looks good enough that I want to really consider leaving it. The third option is to sculpt some sort of flames coming out of the nozzles, but I'm not too thrilled about the idea as I am poor at sculpting and painting fire would give me a headache. Alternatively, I could leave them smoke-less, but that feels like a bit of a cop-out.

I have seen things like armorcast's smoke bitz that are intended to give the same effect, but whatever I add needs to be able to fit around the wire that's holding the stormboyz up in the air. Plus, a metal smoke bit sticking out the back would seriously unbalance these guys, and I've gone to great pains to get them to sit stable.

On the bright side, I've figured out a nice recipe for a dark grey/blue military scheme that I'm going to be painting on all of their cloth and uniform parts, using primarily the citadel washes. Hopefully, once I sort the smoke out, I'll be able to get the first ten of these guys painted and done with.

when are we going to see some paint on these bad boyz

I was in a craft store the other day and saw a bag of premade smoke for WW2 tanks and such. Never used it but it comes in a couple different colors so I guess you mix the colors to get fire/smoke/coolness all in one. Might be what your looking for.
Also Im glad to see those gasmask heads on a mini. Ive thought of using those for Ard boyz heads. How do they work as far as putting them on minis? any problems?

Those look great. The gasmask heads really do pull the squad together.

Slann: Once I'm done sorting out the smoke, they're getting paint.

KingCracker: The heads work just fine, although I think they look better on something slightly larger than a normal Orc boy, such as on a black orc body or these Stormboyz. They seem a teensy bit big on normal boy bodies, and a bit small on Nobz. They fit stormboyz like a glove, as far as I'm concerned. There's a bit of cleanup required with greenstuff to touch up casting defects, but nothing too crazy.

So I figured out an absolutely brilliant solution to my smoke dilemma, courtesy of the tutorial on this nice blog. Essentially, one takes bushy flocking material and glues it to the flight stem, and after repeated glue applications it resembles a fantastic smoke trail.

The flock was applied with cyanoacrylate superglue at first, giving me what resembled large bushes trailing behind my Stormboyz.



After two coats of watered-down Elmer's glue, they start looking less like flying shrubbery and more like smoke:



The trails are firm, but a coat or two more of the glue might be necessary before I'm entirely comfortable drybrushing it. I may actually try and find some thinner cyanoacrylate glue so I don't spend all of tomorrow sitting around waiting for this stuff to dry up. I think it's a vast improvement over my earlier wool or cotton options, though, as it has a much nicer texture to it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Well, after a bit more glue application, the 'smoke' is now rock-solid. I know because I've managed to drop at least two of the stormboyz this morning, and thankfully both the smoke and their fully-pinned assembly held up just fine, even the flight stems.

Here's how they looked when I was done.



And off they went to the garage for a coat of primer. I'm using gray for this one because I want to do a dark gray-blue on their uniforms, and I think it'll look better with the smoke when I'm done.



Please excuse my poor or inconsistent photography here. I've built myself a new workbench in the basement and I'm still sorting out proper lighting.

The tutorial I was using for the smoke suggests that after priming, one should light the smoke-flock ablaze with actual fire to burn off some of the fuzzies and char the smoke. I'm probably not going to do this because I do not like the idea of lighting my models on fire, and the cyanoacrylate glue I used did a pretty reasonable job at sticking the loose fuzzy bits down and together in smokey clumps.

Anyway, next up is paint. I'm probably going to start on the uniforms - I figure I'll do the bases last, in the event any of the wash drips off the suspended figure.

Really cool stuff thanks for this it's been a gret help for my Tankbustas and Kommando's making me think of them as units and stuff to tie them together. You've been aspirational to me.

I haven't made tremendous progress, but I want to throw this up here to prove that I am, in fact, painting.



I've been base-coating the models so far, and finishing the nooks and crannies I have to, such as the skin on the neck areas beneath the helmets. I basecoat in the bright colors, and use the citadel washes to handle the darker areas. I'm going to be washing the skin with a hit of thraka green, then work on the metals and other tiny details, and then hit the whole model(s) with black washes and touch up what I need to with highlights. Here's one of the orks close-up, just so you get an idea of where I'm at for all of these.



After a black wash, the blue on the clothing will look a lot darker, and hopefully more like leather. This is the first time in a long time I'm doing any sort of batch painting, which is why it's taking so damn long... Not to mention all the other stuff I have going on around home!

More to come.

It's looking good so far ein. I know you've said you're concentrating on these right now, but did you ever complete the biker nob?

InyokaMadoda wrote:It's looking good so far ein. I know you've said you're concentrating on these right now, but did you ever complete the biker nob?

Not 100% - that's on the list of things being finished, along with my bikes.

You'll want a Nob to go with them, possibly using two rokkits tied together so he gets into combat twice as fast, right?

As far as the footslogger you have, I don't know if it's possible but you can try having him stand there without a rokkit in a "ready to launch" pose, looking up at his rokkit disappearing into the distance. "Uh-oh." He should have broken straps and burn marks on his backside and maybe an extra-crispy grot standing behind him who was adjusting something on the rokkit when it "lit up".

P.S. I'm stealing all your ideas.

is it wrong that I want to sing "stormboyz in da sky" to the music of "Brown Girls in the Ring"?

Yeah, these are really fantastic and add great personality to the models! Well done! Can't wait to see them painted!

Hey thanks for the info on those heads. Im sure Ill still go with those for my ard boyz, prolly just shave them down a tad to look right. Or make them bigger.

OT the smoke turned out REALLY nice on those. A buddy of mine used that exact same technique for flocking a super nice game table he made years ago. If you put down enough water glue that flock really will become rocks lol. It lasted for years with prolly 20 games or so a week on it.

Looks amazing can't wait to see them painted.

Well, I finally (mostly) finished base-coating the bastards and doing the menial work, but I decided I was much happier with my 'finish one at a time' method, at least from this point out, as I had more regular updates to show that way. I picked an ork at random and started the task of trying to properly paint the thing, rather than just base coat!

He's not done yet, but I figured photos wouldn't hurt anyway.









This is my tentative scheme for the stormboyz, although I'm toying around with the idea of some hazard stripes (black and yellow) on the chainsaw-choppas, and perhaps some yellow on the cabling on his lower body. I'm thinking some checkers would probably help fill all the area on the rokkit as well... and I need to pick the pipes and details out yet.

My usually tactic is to wash the shadows on and leave it at that, though I may try and highlight things like the uniform a bit better to make it pop more. I'm reasonably happy with the skintone, though.

The smoke I'm not happy with yet. I thought if I drybrushed it black, I'd have the lighter colors still showing on the 'interior' of the smoke, and it'd look good, but it turned into one mostly-black mass. Not really sure how to tackle that.

Anyway, still going.

Since I tend to paint at a crawl, I haven't had much time to get a ton more done on the stormboyz. I have, however, toyed around a bit more with the stormboy I singled out previously. I think I like the hazard stripes as a colorful accent on parts of him, although I wish I could paint the damn things neater. I don't have a very steady hand.







The hazard stripes, particularly on the side of the choppa facing front, at the tip, are sort've poorly done, but I am not going to stress out about it too much. I figure any sort of mishap on the choppa can be easily covered with blood spatters on the blade itself later.

I'm not going to worry about painting the base or smoke until I'm done with all of them. I think I'll end up using saran wrap to cover the whole model, save for the smoke, and re-priming the smoke white so I can work on yellows and reds and then drybrush down to black. For now, I'm setting this guy aside and moving on to a different ork to play with. I will undoubtedly come back to this guy later and try to clean up a few mistakes. There's a few spots on his garments I want to highlight, but I'll end up mixing some weird brighter shade of blue to do it with, so I am waiting till I can do it to all of the stormboyz at once.

I'm more than open to suggestions or ideas. I'm thinking I might make some custom glyph to represent the mob, print it out on decal paper, and chuck it on the shoulder pad of each boy in the mob. The rokkit of this boy could probably also do with some checkers, but I really haven't felt like fighting to get a smooth coat of white down on it.

Anytime I look at a ork army I can judge it on weather or not it makes me smile. This made me smile.

I like him alot,keep up the good work.Happy painting.

It starts to look much better with the paint
Good job

jamsessionein wrote:Since I tend to paint at a crawl, I haven't had much time to get a ton more done on the stormboyz. I have, however, toyed around a bit more with the stormboy I singled out previously. I think I like the hazard stripes as a colorful accent on parts of him, although I wish I could paint the damn things neater. I don't have a very steady hand.

You don't really need one.
Paint the whole thing yellow.
*Mask off lines.
Paint the unmasked areas black.
When the paint's dry, remove the masking.
Highlight as necessary.

*I don't recall the exact name/brand, but there are companies out there that make masking tape specifically for modeling. You can apply it to paint but it won't pull the paint off.
I think I saw it on www.micromark.com.


Eric

Looks great , I think the checkers would set the squad over the top so give it a shot .

Wow!

The second stormboy is "done". I say done in quotes because there's still some pretty obvious stuff to do like touch-ups, maybe some checkers, the smoke, and the base, but I'm just trying to get each individual ork to around the same stage.









And here's the two done so far together.



On a good day, with no interruptions, I'm getting about one stormboy done to this point. Figure I'll be done with the squad in two weeks.

I just did the cabling on this guy orange, as it seemed simpler for now. I may revisit that later, or make the first stormboy'z cabling orange as well. Still going to put blood spatter on the blades, but that'll be one of those things that's done at the end to all of them at once.

Thats going to be a really nice stormboy squad when its all done and painted. The only problem I have with that, is its going to suck picking which one dies in combat lol.

One more stormboy mostly down.







These photos reveal a couple places that I need to touch up, but I'll get to that later on. Group shot again:



Quick question. Do these images appear too bright or dark to some of you? I've got multiple monitors on my PC, and I usually try and normalize the images that come out of my camera to have a proper light balance based on the biggest screen that I use primarily for work. Odd thing is that these images look different on each monitor, so I'm not sure if my photography's actually coming out looking decently for the majority of you guys.

Srsly! These are the coolest stormboyz… ever! Really nice job!!!

The models look awesome on my monitor (recently calibrated 23" ACD)! Perhaps they could have a little more contrast and just a slight brightness increase (which is really hard to tell since I don't have the models as reference).

These just inspired me seriously [even though I don't do orks]. I think I'll go paint.

Colors look good to me!
(LOL Obviously, the models do, too)

Eric

Oh I like these VERY NICE!!!

What colors do you use to paint the metal on the rokkit? Its beautiful .

It's just some slightly thinned boltgun metal over black followed by 1-2 washes of Devlan Mud.

Devlan mud really is a miracle worker. It seems to do EVERYTHING better then anyone can do, ever, period

Devlan Mud = Chuck Norris of paints.

The stormboys look gorgeous btw.. specially love the heads.

Picking up where we left off, I've managed to finish painting two more of the Stormboyz which, all told, is not that much of an impressive feat, considering it's been about two weeks since my last update. Still, I've been busy!











The mob's coming along. I'm saving the Stormgrots for last as a sort of treat, I think. Doing the smoke/flames and the bases shouldn't take long once I have all of the models finished up.

I finally sorted out my lighting setup a bit for when I take photographs, so the following will hopefully be slightly clearer. I think it may actually be a bit on the dark side, but I'll turn the exposure up a teeny bit for the next round of photos and see if that has any effect. Anyway, two more stormboyz are taken care of, mostly.

This guy's probably my favorite so far, though I just noticed I failed to do the fingernails on his leading hand...





And here's the other.





Just a reminder, so there's no confusion: The smoke's not painted at all. I'm leaving that off till last, until I get a good idea of how I want to tackle it. I'm considering adding blood spatters on all their weapons, but I'm not sure if that'd reduce the visual impact of the hazard stripes they're all packing.

A current mob shot:



And on we go. Only 2 boyz and the grot pair left till this project's tidied up.

Hmmmm, I would at this point not put blood on the weapons, mainly cause they look so nice rite now.

And dang that smoke isnt painted? I kinda like the way it is rite now D:

These are utterly brilliant well done indeed. All the pictures look really good on my computer and as its about 8yrs old now......

Two more days, two more stormboyz. This makes nine of ten done.











And the obligatory mob shot:



Just the stormgrotz left!

very nice indeed

Amazing So much win!

Ein is actually painting one of his units??? What is this? Bizarro world?!

Seriously dude, awesome job, as was to be expected.

How do you paint your hazard stripes so damn nice? Do you have a steady hand or do you have some little trick on making them perfect?

Try giving the smoke a badab black wash

they look so cool!

i used your idea with the stormgrotz
but im using 3 maybe 4grotz

Chrisrms: I'm just doing it by hand. If I had a fancy trick to do it, they'd be a lot neater. As-is, they're not perfect, but the rusty devlan mud wash helps hide it a bit.

I'm back from a brief trip to the American Northwest (and Canada too) and I'm going to go ahead and finish this squad up.

I painted the stormgrotz up...







Meaning now, it's time to paint the smoke and bases and add proper detailing (adding checkers / decals) to the ones I've already finished, as well as touching up any mistakes or problem areas. I think I'm going to try painting the existing smoke plumes completely black, putting a bit of red and yellow around the nozzles, and then drybrushing grey overtop. We'll see how that ends up looking!

Those grotz are so cute!

Dude, that looks very very cool

It is like a 3-dimensional comic book. I would be slightly intimidated playing against those guys!

so sweet... i wish they were mine

Yup, easily the nicest stormboy squad Ive seen

And now, these guys are done, or just about. I finished basing them, and did the smoke up to the best of my ability. I tried to leave a bit of yellow/red visible on the interior of the smoke by the nozzle. I think the overall effect is pretty decent.



A final mob shot:





I didn't add checkers or too much else on their equipment largely because I think it'd end up being way too noisy. As-is there's already a pretty decent spread of colors and details, and I think adding chekered strips on things like shoulder pads and equipment would detract from the hazard stripes. I am probably done with these guys for now.

What I would like is a decent name for the whole squad. I want to make a 'Counts-as' version of Zagstruk and Da Vulcha Boyz, meaning I need different names for both. I figure my 'Zagstruk' equivalent should have a gas mask like these boyz do, down the road. I'm thinking 'Da Blitz Gitz' right now, because I like the idea of them being orky drop troopers who come in from extremely high altitudes at an absurd speed. If I can settle on a name that has good glyph connotations, I may revisit the squad and add said glyph markings to all of their shoulder pads.

I will do Zagstruk a bit down the road for these guys. I'm probably going to scrap my old one, or at least hugely revise it, because I figure if I'm making a counts-as Zagstruk he shouldn't have vulture-power-klaw-feet but some other equivalent gimmick.

A great finished mob. Once again, you've really put the work in and come up with something that makes all our jaws hit the floor.

With regards to your previous go at Zagstruk, please don't scrap it! Do finish it and have him as your Zagstruk mini, as he was simply beautiful. If you want to do a 'counts-as' Zagstruk, then by all means do, but why not have them both?!

These are fantastic.
Well done.

Dunno why I didn't see this till now but you should be proud. Those just look amazing. nice job

holt gak... that paintjob is awesome, the skin colour makes them look almost comic-style, very nice 10/10

Truely awesome. The wire gives it a nice effect of flying.

When you do your own Zagstrukk you could give him a super hero pose. Arms straight down his side, head held high, flying across the sky with a big F***ing rokkit pack. And a cool pilot helmet.