There I am unpacking my delivery of mould making rubber and two part resin, ready to begin work on my custom roughriders and my friend bursts in with his new copy of the Nid codex yelling something about a trevo..torvi...tervigon? Apparenantly as a Nid player this is one of the fun new toys they get to play with, and as it has no model for the unit and he has zero modelling skills he was willing to get down on his knees to beg me to build one for him ( I may have taken a small amount of artistic licence when recounting this). Happily for me the Tervigon provides a lot of modelling possibilites and a chance to use my new mould making products! After a bit of design talk with my friend we decided on a "classic" Tervigon (if one exists yet) with scything talons from the fex kits for legs a fex head and carapace and the rest resin and modelling putty. The real concession I dragged out of him was a chance to do something pretty cool by cutting up a guant and remodelling into a faetal position and casting several copies of it in resin, I will then paint them and encase them in clear resin globes. I will then hang them all from the underside of the tervigon carapace and drape them in strings of liquid epoxy which will hopefully droop and drip down like a gruesome form of amniotic fluid, thats the plan anyway....

So I began by modelling a clay form for the main body of the Tervi' (which I forgot to take a pic of) I then poured a two part rubber called "Pinkysil" over it to make a mould ( which I can take a pic of if you want but doesn't look very interesting).

I then poured a two part resin called "Easycast" into the mould to form the carapace and body of the Tervi'



and here it is next to a marine for size comparison,



and with a fex head but no carapace,



I immediately regretted putting grooves into the carapace, I thought it might add some detail to what was going to be large blank areas but I then realised that with the usual chimney/vent I need to add then the whole thing would look too busy so I have decided to greenstuff them away.

Since I am going to need so much room on the underside of the Tervi' to hang the "egg sacs" I decided to mount to scy talons onto the bottom edge of the carapace rather then build a body under the carapce set the sockets into. The next few pics show the Tervi' with the first two sets of legs attached.







Sorry about the pic quality they taken at night under a lamp and the white resin the carapace was made of picked up the light in a nasty way.
This next set of pics is with all three sets of scy talons attached and beside a fex for size comparison.





I think I have gotten enough height to hang the "eggsacs" and not scrape the ground but I am not sure I have enough bulk to the main body to match the rules and the picture of the Tervi' in the codex.

So this is where I have got to so far, any C&C is welcome!

cheers,
BLACKHAND

Its like a black widow spider ... need some egg sack hanging below.

*shudders

Looking good so far but it really needs a tail, and probably some kind of central ribcage (with the eggs inbetween that and the upper carapace). How do you plan on making the 'Birthing apparatus'?

Looking good so far but it really needs a tail, and probably some kind of central ribcage (with the eggs inbetween that and the upper carapace). How do you plan on making the 'Birthing apparatus'?

A central ribcage with half a gaunt coming out would be sweet too.

Very nice start!

I'm look forward to seeing where you end up...

Ah the rib cage and tail suggestions.

Make a tail that is able to curve towards the rib cage.
So they can turn into some sort of egg carriage.

Im a genius!

Thanks for the feedback guys

My plan is to shape a four toed "claw" into the top of the eggsac, as my incredibly poorly drawn example shows



My theory is that the sac grows with a fairly leathery skin and when the Tervi' is ready to spawn the claws spasm together and tear the sac open spilling amniotic fluid and newborn gaunt all over the place.

I think having 7 or 8 of these sacs will totally fill the thorax of the Tervi' and not leave much room for a ribcage but who knows ?

cheers
BLACKHAND

And then when they hatch, they eat the shell like snakes do, right?

On Topic: It looks good so far.

A few pics of the work I've gotten done this weekend, mostly rough greenstuff and putty work , extending the edge of the carapace and adding a vestigal tail.













and here is pic of the faetal gaunt for the eggsacs



C&C welcome!

cheers
BLACKHAND

You, my friend, are quite simply disturbed.

cosmic pixie wrote:You, my friend, are quite simply disturbed.

Yea, but in a very, very, very good way

Could we get another picture of the foetal gaunt? It lloks good so far, but it's hard to make out what is happening towards the rear half If that tail is still straight wouldn't it be better to curl it up around the body?

Awesome, I love it.

Very interesting. I'm looking forward to see this continued.

I never was a big fan of Tyranids walking on their scything talons though. But it makes sense considering your plans for the creature.

Very cool. Personally, I would smoothen up the edges of the carapace, because they are supposed to be bone. Whatever works for you though, could be battle damage

Thanks for the feedback!

@cosmic pixie - Yes, yes I am

@Morgrim - Sure, I will put up some more pics after my game today. The tail of the gaunt will probably stay straight so that I can use it to suspend the gaunt in the clear resin "eggsac"

@anung un rama - I am liking the idea of a very spider-like nid but as I add more and more resin putty and the weight of the carapace goes up I am getting worried about the strength of the scytalon tips. I may end up having to add bulk to the tips to keep them snapping off.

@ DarkangelsRK - The edges will get cleaned up to only leave the typical Nid cracks you find in a normal carapace but I am still trying to decide where the "chimneys" will go. Plus in the last 2 days I have added about a 1/2 cm to the edges of the carace so the cleanup stage is still a while off.

Thanks again for the comments, compared to my other blog this one has been really busy, Tervigons must be a hot topic at the moment.

Cheers
BLACKHAND

I wasn't even talking about the weight. I just think it looks stupid most of the time. Why would 'Nids even bother with something like that if they could just grow a pair of good legs onto the creature?

I was looking through the codex, and both Tervigons and Tyrannofexes have proper hind-legs. However, the walking-on-scything-talons thing is pretty awesome.

Yeah I talked it over with my friend when he first asked me to start the project and even offered to build a couple of hind legs out of crushing claws but he specifically wanted all scytalons. I'm pretty sold on them now as it looks more and more spider-like and gives me the space beneath it to hang the "eggsacs". Considering some of the tervigons I have seen so far ( aduro's monitor lizard inspired tervi' for instance) I think we are still pretty close to the pic in the codex.

Cheers
BLACKHAND

Simply cool...

Yet creepy at the same time.

BLACKHAND wrote:

Wow, That is awesome!
I would love to know how you did that lil guy!

Your work here puts my Scratchbuilds to shame sir.

I don't suppose it needs saying that that's a Hormaguant...? Not that I really care, it's awesome anyway.

So im guessing that what you wanna achieve is a kind of like the Gonarch from Half Life 1?


Do not post pics with profanity in them.
Disciplinary action taken.
Waaagh_Gonads

I like it. For the tail, can I suggest that the small tail you've got so far become a back 'spine' for an egg laying tube? And a swollen egg-laden belly would be great.

Re the 'delicate' talon feet, I've had success in 'blunting' them for a stockier look more suitable for walking on. Of course, if you have an egg-laying tube that touches the ground, that will take a lot of stress off the talons.

Ah yes, the Gonarch. Half-life is the only game where you can kill a giant half crab, half scrotum alien creature with a ghostbuster gun.

On topic, the tervi is looking metal so far mate. The spider legs are just rad.

alexwars1 wrote:Ah yes, the Gonarch. Half-life is the only game where you can kill a giant half crab, half scrotum alien creature with a ghostbuster gun.

40k perhaps Necrons firing at Pyrovores fit that description pretty well too!

If you're worried about the legs being too thin from both a practical and aesthetic view, why not add some of the smaller gaunt scything talons on the side just at the base, a sort of tripod arrangement. I think you could get it looking like they're movable, sort of like toes. If that makes any sense.

You know that the Gaunt is supposed to be a Termangaunt. Yet I see scything talons.

Thanks again guys for the comments,

@tedcase - That little guy was not not fun to slice up and build, in order to get the legs to fold up the way I wanted I had to replace whole sections with greenstuff. To get it ready for a rubber mould I then had to fill in all the voids so that it was all one peice with relatively shallow overhangs (hopefully to get as few bubbles in the mould as possible)
Having never played half life I wasn't exactly going for the look of the creature you are talking about but it's kinda like what i'm building, except my Tervi' is going to have several of the sacs hanging under it not just one big one.

@clang - Thanks for the thoughts, I'm not thinking of a base at the moment as I like the though of a score od gaunts running underfoot like baby chicks so I will have to look at strengthing and/or bluntening the scytalons

@Alexwars - cheers!

@Morgrim - Thanks for the suggestions, I'm gonna run them and a few other ideas past my mate and see what we can hash out as a solution.

@Andilus & Anun un rama - You just had to point out my biggest dissatisfaction with the gaunt didn't you! Yes its a hormagaunt not a termigaunt. That was the only model I could get off my mate to slice up for the faetal model and it has bugged me that it's not the right one, that said it has a great sillouette which will be instantly recognizable as a guant when encased in the clear resin "sac"

I guess the big question is, is this the kind of detail which will ruin what could otherwise be a cool model or is it not such a big deal?
I could try and blag a termie gun off someone else at our gaming club and graft it onto the model if i need to.

Cheers again for all the comments, I can't believe the blog has reached nearly 400 views in 2 days!

BLACKHAND

I would get some fake grapes to use for the sacs. You can get them in a variety of sizes and colors...

Ok so I couldn't wait for replies to my question and I went ahead and got my friend to find me a termiguant weopon to graft onto the "faetal" gaunt (or faetagaunt as it will hence forth be called) so in an afternoon of frenzied slicing and greenstuffing the "faetagaunt" went from this....





To this.





Basically the greenstuff will be painted a toxic green colour and represent the "yolk" of the eggsac that is feeding the Faetagaunt. The rest of the gaunt will be painted in my mate's army colours and then the whole thing will be encased in a teardrop shaped ball of resin so that you can see the faetagaunt inside and then six or seven of these will be hung in a cluster from the stomach of the Tervi"

Any thoughts?

Cheers
BLACKHAND

Wow... That's some amazing skills there an a very nice execution of the original concept. looking forward to the finished model!

Excellent stuff. Not like the Gonad at all.

Much better.

Now fix the legs I didn't like!

I will have to look at strengthing and/or bluntening the scytalons

I'd think that they would drive into the ground when it walked.

Maybe clip three of them off (like they're embedded in the earth) and raise the fourth up a little so it looks like it's taking a stride.

My mate and I like the idea of the the Tervi seeing incoming fire and driving its talons into the ground to secure it then hunkering down with only it's carapace and the "knees" visible!

One thing I like about 40k is how a bit of fluff can gloss over any design flaw

Cheers
BLACKHAND

*joygasm*

Very cool, I look forward to seeing the next set of pics in the development.

Excellent stuff, I'm thinking of making my own Tervigon out of a Carnifex sometime, so this is giving me some cool ideas.

Thanks for the idea! I love how you extended the head! What's the hive fleet colour?

Hey folks, no pics at the moment I got sidetracked putting together a twin linked autocannon left arm for my club's space marine army. There isn't much to take pics of any way as I have been mostly doing detail work around the neck and tail of the Tervi and buiding the original eggsac that I'll cast a mould of tommorrow (family permitting!)

@catpeeler - I'm not sure if It's a good thing that I have the ability to bring you to "joygasm" through a blog but thanks anyway

@j-roc77 - thanks!

@andilus - Thanks, I sometimes wish I had a fex kit to work from instead of just spare parts but I feel it will come out a lot more unique this way. The main problem I am facing in this build is the chimneys on it's back which having a fex kit would solve.

@munch - Cool man your welcome! I've got a bit more greenstuff work to do on the neck but it does look good so far if I do say so myself. The fleet colours are a khaki/bone colour on the carapace and gore red muscles and body.

Cheers
BLACKHAND

Have you thought about looking up Aliens* toys? i think

someone made a queen model sitting on her egg sac

thingy... that might work for critter dispensers?

awesome work by the way!

Blasphemy of Nature wrote:Have you thought about looking up Aliens* toys? i think

someone made a queen model sitting on her egg sac

thingy... that might work for critter dispensers?

awesome work by the way!

Might be too big o_o

This could turn out to be something special. I hope your friend has the painting skillz necessary to do justice to this once it's finished, especially if it turns out to be as cool as i think it's going to

Quick update.
I got some casting in last night and took a few pics which I will post tonight.

@blasphemy - I'm doing something a bit different for the eggsacs keep an eye on the blog!

@Lunahound - Yep.

@J.Black - Due to the fact that parts of the model are going be clear plastic I'm going to have to be painting as I assemble the model so you can't see any resin or greenstuff throught the clear bits. That may not make a lot of sense at the moment but it will.

Cheers again guys for all the comments,

BLACKHAND

Ok heres the pics I promised along with a bit of a description of the casting process.

First you need to build a box to pour the mould in and this is where the Lego comes in very handy. I glue it down with superglue onto plasticard to seal it and stop all the rubber pouring out the bottom Sorry forgot to rotate this pic before posting it.



Then I superglue the Master copy of the model I want to copy in the center of the lego box. Remember that the part that you glue to the plasticard will be the hole you pour into so make it wide enough capture the resin comound as you pour it. I also glue a few short pieces of sprue to the model on any parts I think will trap bubbles of air in the hope that these areas will fill properly. This is a part of the process that can only be perfected by a lot of practice and experience and I am by no means perfect!



I then mix the rubber mould compound which is a 2 part silicone which is mixed 1:1 easy enough that even I can do it! It takes about 20 mins to set fully and I can't recommend it enough, I have used silicones that take 12 hours to cure and its really frustrating to wait to get casting.



Next its a case of simply pouring the mixed silicone into the mould box covering the model by at least 1 cm to provide a decent base to the mould. Another tip is to have another model or piece of model such as a marine shoulder pad which you might like a copy of in a shallow casting box nearby so that if you have any extra silicone mix left over you can pour it into the second box so you don't waste it.



Once the rubber has set you can then break away the lego box and cut out your master. You can be fairly rough when you do this as the the rubber will key back together better with some underhangs in the cut, if you have a perfectly smooth cut dow3n both sides the rubber will split apart when you pour in the resin. Always use a new knife blade and don't cut all the way through, leave the base in one piece so that it keeps the sides of the mould in the right place when it comes to casting



Once you have a usable mould that keys together well its time to cast! and it as easy as mixing the resin , gain the productI uses is 1:1 so is pretty simple and then pour it into the mould. Again this is where the secondary rubber mould handy as mixing is an imperfect art I often have resin left over after pouring my intended cast and I hate letting it go to waste. This next pic shows my first cast which I made far too much resin for and subsequently ended up with 4 extra shoulderpads and a partr for my roughrider mech bike, you may notice that the smaller pieces are clear still as the resin generates heat when it sets and the mor of it in a mould the faster it cures and goes white, you can also put it under a lamp to cure it faster but with a cure time of 20mins I don't really bother.



After the resin cures you just need to peel back both sides of the rubber and pull out your newly cast model. At this point you can easily tell where the bubbles are forming and can add channels in the rubber by carefully cutting with a knife to allow the resin to distribute better and let bubbles rise and not ruin your precious cast. You will notice on the faetagaunt I am casting that the tips of the carapace is not casting and Ive decided to fix them with greenstuff rather than try to carve out ne channels in this case as the mould is fiddly to get into and this wa I can add some differences ini the models to avoid a factory finish to them.





And after a nights work four of my faetagaunts ready to be cleaned up and painted!



Well its back to the painting table for me as I need 7 of these little guys and my deadline for this project is looming!

C&C welcome as always

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Impressive. Most impressive.

Seconded. An interesting idea on the clear egg sacks.

Edit: and I have never seen moulds being created in a single piece and hacked out like that - they are always two piece.

Delicious!

I hate to burst your bubble but since you used GW parts, when you cast it, you broke their I.P. and right now you are considered stealing from GW.

BLACKHAND wrote:Ok so I couldn't wait for replies to my question and I went ahead and got my friend to find me a termiguant weopon to graft onto the "faetal" gaunt (or faetagaunt as it will hence forth be called) so in an afternoon of frenzied slicing and greenstuffing the "faetagaunt" went from this....





To this.





Basically the greenstuff will be painted a toxic green colour and represent the "yolk" of the eggsac that is feeding the Faetagaunt. The rest of the gaunt will be painted in my mate's army colours and then the whole thing will be encased in a teardrop shaped ball of resin so that you can see the faetagaunt inside and then six or seven of these will be hung in a cluster from the stomach of the Tervi"

Any thoughts?

Cheers
BLACKHAND

Blackhand I have to give you props for awesome conversion work.

/Offtopic
But ...uhm...it maybe my slightly perverse mind but...with these first two pictures it really looks like the male anatomy...uhm...dropping a 3rd testy. >.<
/Ontopic

Anyways, other than that, the Tervigon model looks good, although what I noticed from the picture (in the codex) that all the new big nids look like they have the Carnifex back hind legs for there back legs and then Scything Talons for the front legs. But I do like the spider look, makes it look faster and a bit more freaky when it's "birthing" termigaunts.

Keep up the good work and I'm looking forward to seeing a painted/finished result.

A++

Cheers~

Mewiththeface wrote:I hate to burst your bubble but since you used GW parts, when you cast it, you broke their I.P. and right now you are considered stealing from GW.

Yes, thank you for pointing out the obvious. He should be fine unless he starts selling them. Can we please now go back to discussing how awesome this is?

Thanks guys,

@anung um rama - Thanks a lot man, its really cool to know your watching the thread and liking it.

@silvermk2 - I find that pouring the mould as one piece saves a lot of time and mucking around and makes such a close fit when finished that you can pour the resin in and squeeze the mould to get the bubbles out, very handy.

@kaloran - thanks!

@mewtheface - I knew when I was taking the pics and posting them that someone was going to mention this. As Anung said I am not selling these casts, this is a favour for a friend. If I do decide to build one of these for a commision for instance I would use seperate models to create several unique faetal gaunts as opposed to casting the same one again and again. I'm not doing this to cheat or steal from GW only to create something a bit different and hopefully cool.

@fexor - Um yeah, I guess I just don't see male genitalia everywhere I look
About the back legs, I know but I couldn't afford a whole new fex kit to use in building the Tervi so I had to use leftover bitz, I could have carved up some crushing claws to make big legs but when I showed my mate the scything claw only mock-up he loved it and we went with it.

@anung un rama - Thanks again bro.

Thanks as usual for the comments, they are always welcome.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Mewiththeface wrote:I hate to burst your bubble but since you used GW parts, when you cast it, you broke their I.P. and right now you are considered stealing from GW.

Very cool man. Ive also never seen someone do a cast in one shot. Ive been gathering a bunch of info on the best ways to do this, for some ideas I have for my Ork army. Ill deffinetly give your method a shot when I get to that point. Very nice conversions

I suppose you will put him/her/it on a base. How about a Gaunt lying there beneath it like he was just ... ehm ... born

that would be a cool thing to add.

@kingcracker - Succinct and to the point thank you!. And yeah pouring a mould in one piece is genuinely easier as long as you plan the master ahead of time.

@ Anung and munch - I have had vague ideas of an eggsac that has split/burst at the end with the gaunts head and gun barrel pushing out covered in slime and amniotic fluid, ok maybe more than vague ideas but I will have to if time and costs allow me to try something that complicated.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

I suppose the possible downside to a one piece mould is that you may gouge the original with your scalpel when you cut it out? Other than that, it seems a sensible alternative to the usual two-stage two-piece mould process, depending on what you'll be casting.

@clang - If you have a brand new sharp knife blade and put tension on the area you are slicing its not much of a problem. The good thing about pinkysil is that its really stretchy and when you put tension on it it will often pull away from the master. As usual though its the overhangs and extremeties that are the problem but I think that will be the case no matter what product or method you use

Cheers
BLACKHAND

And we have an update!

I got around to painting up a couple of the gaunts and tried out the clear resin in a mould I made for the eggsac

Here is the progresion from resin cast to eggsac



and a few shots of the eggsac





I cant believe I didn't realize that the curve of the sac would distort the gaunt inside but I guess it will take care of the worry I had that all the gauntsacs would look to similar. All you have to do is turn the sac slightly and the gaunt inside looks totally different. I think I will tone down the green of the "yolk" that I put in the gaps of the gaunt model (this was a solution to the problem of doing a single mould for such a complex model) it seems to drown out the reds of the guants body. Otherwise I'm pretty happy with how it came out, next I need to find a way of polishing the sacs up to a nice gooey shine and I can start assemble the underside of the Tervi'

As always C&C is welcome.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

love that egg sac! reminds me of aliens lol

That looks great! I can't wait how it'll look on the finished model.

Still don't like the scything talon legs though.

That egg sack is possibly the best thing i have seen in warhammer..

Looking awesome!

One question though... does the codex specifically mention eggsacs?
Everyone seems to be doing eggsacs but when I first heard about tervigons, what immediately came to my mind was Alien Queen-style birthing tube.

Codex shows them dropping out from inside the Tervigon's torso. No birthing tube in sight. Or egg sacs for that matter, but both ideas look great visually in the conversions I've seen.

The egg sac does look mucho coolo - my only concern is that it will look best dangling down, which in turn means quite a high tervigon torso is needed.

Hmm, how about a tervigon with its back abdomen simply covered in gooey round eggs - some insects, amphibians and fish do that with their young. It would be much easier to model than all the elaborate egg-laying tubes etc.

I think the egg sack is really good man, I wouldn't really complain about the distortion of the gaunt inside (IMO it looks better with it) but feel free to fix that. It is your work.


Keep it up.

@zid - Thanks!

@anung - Thanks man and on the scything talons, the friend I am building the Tervi' likes em and so do I sorry

@Dan22 - Wow, Thats a first for me , never had my pics photoshopped into the twilight zone before, thanks man!

@inquisitorbob & flashman - I know it doesn't show eggsacs in the codex illustration but it was adequately vague enough that I felt we could get away with them.

@clang - My first idea was to have the sacs like tumours coming out of the carapace but we decided that would show weakness in the carapace which would be out of place. The plan is to hang them exactly as you said there will be 4 or 5 of the big ones hangin in the middle with 3 or so smaller ones made of rippers to show "zygote" gaunts arounf the edges of the carapace. The middle eggsac will hang the lowest and will be attached to a 6cm base to make the Tervi' more stable I'm going to use more of the clear resin to make a pool of birthing fluid on the base perhaps with a termigaunt rising our of the goo ready to blast away. By attaching the eggsacs to the base and having the wieght rest on it I'm hoping to save the tips of the scything talons from bearing the wieght and snapping off.

@ultra mortalitas - I might not have been clear enough in my last post, I'm happy enough with the distortion effect as it makes the identical gaunts look different to each other which I like, the only thing I will change is to buff the crap out of them to get a good shine on them, make em look fresh from the ovipositor so to speak.

Thanks as always for the great comments, This blog and your feedback has really helped me keep working away at it.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Wow! This looks excellent so far. I'm excited to see the finished product.

Remember this from anywhere? It is my first thought when i saw the egg sack

Tyranidsaurus Fex DNA?

Wow this is great cant wait to see more!!

So are the rumours true that your friend wants you to make 5 of them?

Amazing work, look forward to seein git finished.

Outstanding so far. Loving the egg sacs.

That is really cool mate. I am not sure if I missed it or not, but what how did you go about making the egg sac?

Thats nuts, awesome take on it.

insaniak wrote:Outstanding so far. Loving the egg sacs.

Coming from him, that's like the special effects Oscar of Dakka.

This! my dear friend is veery awesome got really good ideas and you execute your conversion work just brilliant! and that cocoon/egg thing is simply a thing of beauty, ad I have actually never seen something like that done to nids before, big thumbs up

The embryonic gaunts look great. If you're making more than one tervi, then at least one should be egglaying, leaving a trail of secreted gaunts in the stages of breaking out of their eggs and getting up like the newly birthed alien in Alien3.

Anung Un Rama wrote:

insaniak wrote:Outstanding so far. Loving the egg sacs.

Coming from him, that's like the special effects Oscar of Dakka.

So true...
Now we all have to wait a year before he dishes out the "outstanding" compliments again and we get to stamp "Insaniak Certified" on our models....

Wow, thanks for all the comments guys its pretty humbling to know so many people are watching what I'm doing and most of them actually like it!.

@takeabow - thanks!

@ultra mortalas - Yes I do, I toyed with tinting the clear resin in the eggsac a vitriolic green but was worried that it would stop the resin from setting so I left it clear. Lucky I did as the weather here is incredibly humid at the moment so the resin is taking days longer than usual to set as it is.

@death gear - Thanks man

@andyfish - Oh where do I begin, first off WELCOME TO DAKKA!!!! (finally!), Secondly, yes, the friend I am building this for has delusions of running a 'Nid list with 5 Tervigons and 3 Tyranifex's hoping to pop out 350 termagaunts in a game but if he wants 5 of these Tervi's he will probably have to continue dreaming.

@insaniak - Wow, just Wow. It means a lot that you felt my work was worth enough to post a comment. I'm glad I went out on a limb to try and create something unique thats grabbed people's attention...let's just hope my paint job will do it justice

@wrexasar - Thanks man , and no I didn't show a lot of the process for the eggs as it's similar to the casting process for the gaunts. I just made a master of the eggsac from greenstuff and Kneadit ( a epoxy putty that cures really hard and allows a lot of sanding and shaping) made a rubber mould of that and inserted the resin gaunts (already painted!) into the rubber mould. After that it was just pouring in the clear resin and waiting 48 hours (though as I said above the weather has pushed that time out to about 3 days) and out comes your eggsac!

@qualude - Cheers mate

@anung un rama - I'm very concious of it, thanks. To be honest its guys like you, munch and ultra mortalis who are watching this thread and always making contributions that is keeping me motivated.... not to say that praise from insaniak isn't welcome

@rose mountainz - Thanks man, it was my hope to do something that was a bit different and Nid's take to slime and amniotic fluid like a ...well... like a Nid'!

@ meangreenstompa - I've had so many ideas about bases and the possibilites are endless. The rubber moulds give you so much scope to create some really wacked out variations of the eggsac. The best I've come up with yet was a Gaunt using his gun symbiont to blast his way out the eggsac, I'd love to model the goo and fluid spraying everywhere and the ruptured sac peeling away from the newborn...or maybe this project is getting to me, cheers!

@nightwatch - You can get a stamp? Where from ? do they send it out or do we have to apply

Thanks again everyone for the comments and ideas, between the full time job, studying, an incredibly understanding fiance and a 2 year old demonspawn child, I get nowhere near as much time modeling as I would like but this blog is making it worth the late nights slaving over the greenstuff and resin!

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Edit: due to my incedible stupidity (thanks to nightwatch for pointing it out )

"insomniak".
I chuckled briefly, and went back to the rest of my daily life.

I am not a huge fan of the spider-tervies, I like the design concept of the middle limbs fused with the birthing orifice or ovipositor, and your eggs are just begging for an ovipositor... or prehensile vag as i like to call them lol.

But the eggs themselves.

RIDICULOUSLY AWESOME. Seriously, so well executed it hurts. I salute you sir.

MajorTom11 wrote:RIDICULOUSLY AWESOME. Seriously, so well executed it hurts. I salute you sir.

Yeah. Right in the egg sack!... get it?....


What?...... *gets backhanded by Majortom*

thats awsome

just a question about that remolding thing you did to copy the gaunt for the egg sacs, do they loose alot of detail when you do that?

looks awesome so farbtw

Yeah, I agree. Especially like the yolkiness and goo. It actually looked like an egg yolk! The green goo makes it look alien like!

Pretty Gribbly things *claps hands in glee*

Seriously though that gant in the sac is awesome. I love the way the clear resin has distorted it. Are you certain that was unintentional? Because if not then its a pretty awesome side effect.

greetings readers not much progress this week , I poured a new rubber mould for a smaller eggsac to fit a ripper in. I am going to add a few of these smaller eggsacs to break up the monotony off several of the large ones, don't want them to end up looking like translucent udders on a nid cow if you know what I mean, you probably dont....

@nightwatch - Cheers man I would have never noticed my goof.

@majortom - The legs seem to be the biggest controversy on all the tervi" guilds I have seen on line but i'm happy with em. I like the idea of vestigal arms helping with the birthing as well but am leaning towards adding a bunch of tentacles amongst the eggsacs to aid with the birth process and by having them as tentacles I don't break the "nids only have 6 limbs" rule.

@Ultra Mortalitas - Thanks now all I can imagine majortom as is a poor dude with translucent testicals with gaunts writhing around inside...the horror.

@sweetlou - Thanks man , welcome to dakka

@blitza - No way, the silicone that I use to make the mold holds detail down to fingerprints and bits of hair on the master. It pays to take care when doing the moulds cause all kinds of crap like dust left over from sanding or drips of superglue can obscure details. The resin itself is very liquid and finds most nooks and crannies to reproduce most details (hate air bubbles though , damn them all!!!!) so to answer your question in the most longwinded way possible , no I don't lose detail when I make copies of the gaunts

@munch - Thanks, the greenstuff "yolk" was originally a way of filling in voids in the master to make a simpler mould for the resin, its turned out to be quite a cool detail in it's own right.

@yani - Completely unintentional and a very happy side effect. It seems the model gods are happy with this project!

Thanks again people for commenting.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Ok so I have some pics, its been a long couple of weeks waiting for the clear resin I'm using to cure. I was so bored I even began basecoating the Tervi' itself though not too much as I figure I will be handling the carapace quite a bit and don't want to rub off the paint as I put it on.

First of are a couple of pics of the ripper sized eggsac I made up to add a bit of variety to the eggs.



and a comparison shot between the rippersac and the gauntsac.



Some pics of the Tervi as it is at the moment.







and some closeups of the eggs hanging below the Tervi









To finish up I have to build a couple more chimney/vent thingys and glue on the last few eggsacs then greenstuff a membrane around the tops of the sacs to connect it to them to the carapace. I'm hoping that a coat of varnish will bring the eggsacs up to a nice gooey shine as I have had trouble polishing the resin with anything I have a home.

Thanks again for reading Hopefully I will have this project finished in the next couple of weeks

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Thats amazing~!

IronfrontAlex wrote:Thats amazing~!

It certainly is, isn't it?

A really original take on the idea - bravo!

it almost totally looks like the on on the illistration on the codex

Man that's cool. I want to think of something witty and thought provoking....but all I got is "daaaaang that's cool!"

That looks unbelievably cool! I can't wait for it to be painted!

That looks unbelievably cool! I can't wait for it to be painted!

My only criticism is it looks to low down. If you make the tervie's legs longer, it might look better.

Tim the Biovore wrote:My only criticism is it looks to low down. If you make the tervie's legs longer, it might look better.

That above is about the only criticism I can think of for this otherwise 'fully sick' model!

Those egg sacks are just screaming for a bigger model... I'd love to see a few dozen hanging from a giant beasty.

@ironfrontalex - Cheers man

@alpharius - Thanks a lot

@burb1996 - "daaang thats coool" is good enough for me!

@Munch munch - Thanks

@Munch munch - Thanks again

@tim the biovore & boss 'eadbreaker - I'm with you on this one, my initial idea had them dangling between 1-2 cm off the ground under the belly but the sacs ended up being far larger than I thought they would be. Looking back I should have made a master for the eggsacs before I moulded the carapce so that I had the scale right but hey thats the fun of scratchbuilds!

@ Drake_marcus - Happily I will have all the moulds for the eggsacs left over after this project and if I ever have the urge to build a Bio-Titan than a few will definitely be added to it.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Yeah, all you have to do is cut the legs off at the 'elbow', and GS it bigger.

Yo man that looks great!! Reminds me of the video we had to watch during developmental psychology.... except at least the nids dont make me turn to my dad and ask him how he could of done that to my mother twice!!! Oh because the video was about birth...so ya.....GREAT WORK!!!!

Wow! That looks really (2x) cool. I still don't like the legs but apart from that that's a very impressive conversion and I'm already looking forward to your Biotitan.

For starters; Eggsacks: GREAT! it's all insectoid and tyranid-like, so both thumbs up for that..

Second: Spider-fex body.. I mean, c'mon! here you have an awesome model, and you stick to -pardon me- lame conversion as a trice-damned spider-fex body? No offence, but I had expected something better then the usual "everybody's doing the spider-fex" approach..

All in all, it's a great conversion, but just the fact that you used a spider-fex body is akin to a thorn in my eye.. I'm sorry, but that's just my honest oppinion..

The egg sacs look incredible - without a doubt, the best tyranid conversion of any kind that I've seen to date. Such an original approach too!

Thanks so much for the resin mould tutorial - I've been looking for one for ages, and yours is clear and simple. Can't wait to see the finished product!

That is quite possibly the best tyranid conversion I have ever seen, congrats sir on a fantastic piece.

@tim the bivore - I'll think about extending the legs but to be honest I'm rapidly reaching my the end of my interest with this project, I have 20 or so grey knight marines to get painted up!

@ricekake67 - I really don't know what to say...thank you ... I think? I would explain that human babies don't come in eggsacs but I don't think this is really the right place to discuss things like that

@Anung - Damn one miniscule mention of a Bio-titan and I'm locked in to another months long 'nid project!! thanks man (2x)

@FerrumIgnatus - First off thanks for commenting glad you like the eggs they were a lot of work. Second , the legs have been a real bone of contention among the readers of this blog. To be honest I didn't realise that a lot of other people had done the spider-tervi and even if I had I would still have had to go this route as they were the only spare parts I had. Couldn't really afford a new fex kit on top of the cost of the resins.

@scarper - Thanks man, glad you like the tutorial on the resin it's really fun to work with and it's quite amazing how much your imagination goes into high gear when you are no longer constricted to what the GW produces.

@zhetssuken - Hey thanks a lot , just wait till it's painted up!

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Loving those egg sacks! Brilliantly executed idea!

You could make a nest type thing filled with eggs and baby 'nids as an objective too!

BLACKHAND wrote:
@zhetssuken - Hey thanks a lot , just wait till it's painted up!

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Oh I await that eagerly, once it is finished you best post several good pics or better yet a video with a full 360 view of it.

This is the coolest project I have ever seen!

*pops head out of no where* What did i miss?

Nice work Black hand, and agree about making the legs longer. Good luck

A quick suggestion: I know this would be difficult but, why don't you try and make it look like one of the eggsacks have dropped of the fex and have the tyranid inside set in a pose of ripping himself out of it? (now if you excuse me im going to take my pills before i bite someone's finger off )

Ok so it may look like I have been slacking off...if by slacking off you mean stocktaking while looking for a new house to live in while helping your fiance find a job while getting sidetracked with stormtrooper conversions..then yes I have been slacking off

In between the distractions I glued on the last two eggsacs, added a gaunt to the tervi base and filled in the spaces between the sacs with a mix of clear resin and dark angels green and goblin green to represent tyranid amniotic fluid. I had some left over so I poured it onto the base to fill the hollow I built into it, want it to look like a a gross pool of goo that the gaunt is rising out of. I was pretty worried immediately after mixing the paint into the resin as I had no idea if the acrylic paint would stop the resin curing or not, happily ift had no effect and it all dried perfectly. No for the part you are all waiting for, the pics!







And a couple of pics with the Tervi over it, not yet attached.





So to finish up I need to finish is scratchbuild some more vents and paint him up and he's done.

C&C welcome as always

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Brilliant work on the base.

Ovaj Google Prevođenje je sranje.

LOL, yeah it is

burb1996 wrote:Man that's cool. I want to think of something witty and thought provoking....but all I got is "daaaaang that's cool!"

You could've said that it was "Eggs-ellent" or "Well Eggs-ecuted" or...

Actually, that's all I've got.

Oh wait! "You certainly don't Yolk around when it come to creating awesome models!"

*runs from the inevitable groaner retaliation*

Ah, bad puns...
But as always, it's looking excellent! Maybe you should make another egg sack, rip it up and set it on the ground so people aren't questioning why a termagant magically appeared with no evidence of it's birth.

your sick in the head blackhand...and I love it cheers great stuff

Wow, thats a really cool take on it, I love the egg sacs andd the base.

BLACKHAND wrote:
@Ultra Mortalitas - Thanks now all I can imagine majortom as is a poor dude with translucent testicals with gaunts writhing around inside...the horror.

WHO TOLD Y/*

cough

I mean I don't know what you are talking about




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh and p.s....That turned out wickedly amazing, the way you clustered the eggs is unique and I retract my comment about the legs, normally people just dont seem to pull off the look of a birthing beast without the vestigial birthing arms to kind of reinforce the look of the role, but you have done so without need of them.

Hats off sir! from me and my termagant filled scrotum LOL

The puddle looks nice, though mixing resin with color would probably be too much work for me when doing bases.

That's a great model you build there. I'm looking forward to your next project.

By reading this whole thread and looking at the step by step my head has imploded.

This is some really fantastic work blackhand. This is the first Tervigon project I've seen to pursue egg sacks, and you've pulled off the effect incredibly well. Really great stuff, I'm looking forward to your next big project!

epic thing how much the cast cost you?

@pluatan4th - Wow, those puns were truly horrible...not that that will stop me from using them everytme my friend feilds the model.

@mumnc munch - I haven't wanted to make a burst eggsac as I thought I would have to buy more silicone to cast an entire new sac but I realized last night in a
caffeine induced flash that I could just use the old rubber mold and make a void out of modelling clay and insert it in the mold to show where the gaunt was
birthed from the sac..ok so that was the worst explanation ever but it will work..I think.

@empchild - thank you..your not the first to say it

@deathwolf - thanks man

@majortomm11 - Hey we all have things that make us unique, most of the time they aren't stomach churning deformities is all, thanks for the comments!

@unung un rama - Mixing the paint with resin wasn't difficult just frightening as I wasn't sure it would set after I mixed it, BTW Don't model important projects at 2 in the morning in a tired haze!

@twisted_trasher - I apologize for the head imploding sir!

@teek - thanks man

@devastator - All up the build cost around $90 in materials excluding 'nid bitz so not so bad


Thanks for all the comments guys it feels damn good to be on the home stretch with this project!

Cheers

BLACKHAND

Oh, I got another pun for ya. "This model gets me so egg-cited"

Thanks munch , I know I can always count on you

So here they are the final pics of my Tervigon!
To qualify I am really only a tabletop standard painter and while this is not my best work, its not far off and while I look at him/her/it and sometimes think he/she/it deserves a better paintjob I think about all of my mates nids who have absolutely no paintjob and know that he/she/it will stand out anyway...so...yeah this is about as good as the paintjob will get (shamefaced rant over)

Also I realise that the tervi' doesn't have the same amount of chimney/vents on it's back as the codex pic but I ran out of the nid guns I was using so until my mate can source some more, he/she/it will have to make do with four. For all those people who wanted a burst eggsac, I tried! I used a lump of modelling clay to form a void in an empty eggsac but in order to get the clay out and create the burst shape I had to cut into the sac while the resin was not fully set, I got the shape that I wanted but the resin was covered in fingerprints that have set into its surface and the whole thing became a cloudy, textured mess so until I can figure out a better process..no burst eggsac I'm afraid (and you thought my shamefaced rant was over )

Anyway without further ado...my Eggtacular Tervigon!






















So yeah, apart from some touching up, and my usual inability to leave a model alone when I've finished it, this project is finally done!

That said please feel free to keep leaving your comments and suggestions, they were really helpful while I was working on him/it/her and I'd like to hear what you think of the final product.

Cheers

BLACKHAND

this is amazing! i wish i were as talented as you!

Wow. I hate to be a bearer of bad-news, but it looks unsupported by the legs.

I would give the back plates a heavy devlan mud wash, but other that that this is great!

Tim the Biovore wrote:Wow. I hate to be a bearer of bad-news, but it looks unsupported by the legs.

Get in line.

Great model BLACKHAND. Keep up the good work.

@tim the biovore- Tim tim tim timmy tim tim, I realize you will never like the legs and I understand the reasons, but you've forgotten one critical fact...My incredible laziness. Once I had started with the Scytalons as legs I was simply too lazy too bow to public opinion and make sturdier back legs

@darkangelsRK - Would you beleive the whole model has had 2 washes with devlan mud? My lighting rig for photos is still two bright and yellow and I'm working on it, cheers.

@Anung un rama - Oh Anung, anung anungy nung anung... see above Thanks tho man


Oh and part of the problem you may see with the legs is that they aren't glued on! I made long wire pins for them that will keep them secure but to make it easier to transport I didn't glue them on for good. Plus when you knock the scytalons at the moment the twist and bend at the join with the carapace rather than snapping off....that would be bad.

Cheers,

BLACKHAND

Looking splendid, especially the egg sacs. Good idea to not glue the legs, it would be a shame if this model got damaged.

Absolutley spectacular. You are really making me happy!

BLACKHAND wrote:Oh and part of the problem you may see with the legs is that they aren't glued on! I made long wire pins for them that will keep them secure but to make it easier to transport I didn't glue them on for good. Plus when you knock the scytalons at the moment the twist and bend at the join with the carapace rather than snapping off....that would be bad.

You didn't glue them on? EXCELLENT! Now you still can change them.

Love the progress, love the eggsack idea and nice job converting a model that GW makes really good... then doesn't bother to cast any model for.

I hope you don't see this as a snooty suggestion, just an idea. adding thickener to a paint can allow you to pain veins on the egg sacks, and add that little bit more detail. I don't want to preach to the congregation, just an idea to maybe add a bit more to an already amazing looking pace.

Thats an awesome conversion. Those egg sacks are... Well, disgustingly and yuckily cool. Great use of the clear resin!

Simply an outstanding project BlackHand, I don't have a better way of explaining it. If and when GW comes out with an actual Tervigon model, it will STILL pale in comparison to this beast. This thing is absolutely perfect in its execution, it reminds me of some sort of spider-esque monstrosity, unleashing its hungry children, ready to devour the first thing they see! I would love (or hate!) to see this thing on the battlefield...it's pieces like these you don't mind getting killed by!

Is there any accompanying army for the Tervigon? I'll have to check your stuff to see if there is!

Wow! I only have three words for your amazing Tervigon.

"Bring it down!"


"Exterminatus" also came to mind but that usually rips out the planet below my feet.

Great job. That thing is gross, but looks really good. The translucent look the the sacs are a good touch.

Still, its gross.

That's disgusting and amazing, I love the transparent sacks....you will have a lot of people gaping at that model.

Wow thanks guys, it's pretty gratifying to know people are liking the Tervi'

@CommissarKhaine - Thanks man, I kind of had to make the legs removable cause the friend I made this for has a habit of throwing all his models into a box to transport them...though he has promised to be more careful with this one...right Scott?

@munch munch - Almost didn't recognize you with the avatar change, I'm glad I bring you happiness.

@Anung un rama - If nothing else your stubbornness is admirable.

@Da Big Mek - Dude the veins are a great idea! please don't ever feel like you can't make a suggestion, after all Anung Un Rama continually makes the same suggestion to change the legs despite me repeatadly shutting him down

@Bascilica - Thanks man disgusting is what I was going for, as well as creepy and frightening.

@Accolade - Wow thanks man, your making me blush. Honestly though I am happy with how it came out and the look on my friend's face when he cradles it against his chest and strokes it is worth all the effort...as well as little creepy, unfortunately you won't see any more of nids out of me as I dont play them myself, I'm more a daemonhunters player not counting my FW heavy Tau army of course (damn those beautiful and hideously expensive models!)

@JB - Thanks for the kind words man, really like your IG work its given me a lot of inspiration for my Allied Guard.

@GruesomeTwosome - Cheers man, gross works for me

@Gavo - Thanks man , I hope to have a lot of people gaping at my sacs too

Thanks again guys

BLACKHAND

I never learn, do I?

thought you might like a couple of pics of the Tervi in action, she spent the first couple of turns behind a building popping out gaunts after birthing 32 of the little bugger she came out to play but only got wipe out the last few guys in my GK termie squad.....oh and didn't get a scratch on her!






Cheers

BLACKHAND

Ultra mortalitas wrote:Ovaj Google Prevođenje je sranje.

Ma uvjek je bio.

Cool! I'll definitely keep this thread in mind when I start on my Tyrannofex.

Well 5 pages of reading and laughing later I am current! This project is absolutely amazing and incredibly inspiring. I just started a Nids army and this will def be bookmarked when it comes time to add to the battleforce I picked up. Great job man!

Oh and when are you starting on the biotitan

Cool

With a similar conversion ability-ideas-materials knowledge, and a better paintjob standard (I'm sure U can do better than this), you will gonna seriously have chance to collect some golden deamon statue.

Did you never thought about this?

You should..

Really and honeslty impressed.

Toban

Thanks Toban, I am getting a bit of pressure from my friend to build him another 3 of these (3!!!) and yeah i'm sure that I can do better now that I've built the first one and have seen al the misatkes I made witrh this one.
The paintjob is a tricky one as the scheme is so radically different from my usual pallette, I work in black, red and metals almost exclusively and this was my first time doing such a large area of khaki. I probably could have practised more but by the end of this project I was pretty over the whole thing Thanks for the vote of confidence though and if I do end up doing another Tervi I will post it up on dakka for you guys for C&C as this definitely helped me do as well as I did.

Cheers,

BLACKHAND

PS. I actually sent some pics to the GW web guys but they have'nt answered back or put up anything on the website but I'm still hopin to get a reponse.

OMG now...

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH

SHOTGUN!!!!!!!

RAAAAAGGGGHHHHHHhhhhhhh

Bill needs his pills, (forgive the pun)

Awsome model!!

I know this is almost thread necromancy but who gives a S**t! This plog just hit 10,000 hits!!! Woot!

Thanks everyone for looking and commenting!

Cheers

BLACKHAND

WOOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You did a great job on that congratulations

That is amazing! 10,000 hits well deserved.