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Hi there,

What started out as an attempt at doing a single truescale marine with some bits I had lying around has turned into something much, much bigger! I wanted to do something a little bit different with this marine so I made him a member of the Deathwatch. I love the idea of a whole squad made up of individuals from different places working together for a common goal.

So I made this guy, an Ultramarine:



He still need a bit of work on his eyes and the scope and a few other places, but you get the idea. I thought seeing as it was my first attempt with truescaleing that I'd have a go at OSL as well. Here's how that turned out:



I think the OSL looks pretty good on the hand and the arm, but something went wrong on his leg and I'm not sure what exactly. I'm fairly happy with it for a first go.

This one guy has turned into something quite a lot broader in scope!

So to get the most out of this project, I thought I'd do my first WIP log. Hope you enjoy it!

Edit- can anyone tell me why the photo links aren't working please?

You might want to change the links between the things?

Oh, man. Did I ever have a hard time figuring this out. Don't worry, it's not so hard. I'm not sure what Malika was trying to say, but here's what I would suggest.

It looks like you've figured out the picture uploading process pretty well, so no need to worry about that. Once you've got your pictures uploaded, click on the picture you want to insert in your post. Underneath the picture on the right is a column called "Share This Image". Copy the code in the forums space and paste it straight into the post (no need for additional code, it's given to you exactly how you need it).

Like so:


I hope that helps! Good luck with the Deathwatch!

Cheers,
Rawson

Anyway, while I get the photos sorted out, here's a run-down of what the squad is going to look like. The general idea is that I'd like them to be almost like a self-contained army in their own right. I want to make each one an individual and play up to the strengths and character of each chapter represented. This is not for gaming in any way, just as a project to entertain me and look awesome. Here we go-

HQ

1- Dark Angels. Watch Captain. Wrist mounted plasma pistols, (from techmarine plasma cutter) and Relic Blade (the Grey Knights one with the =I=)
2- Exorcists. Librarian. Force Weapon (GK warding staff)

Specialists

3- Salamanders. Techmarine. Heavy Flamer, Thunder Hammer and Servo Arm (see pics in a minute )
4- Blood Angels. Apothecary. Not sure what weapons yet.

Close combat

5- Space Wolf. Bolt pistol, master crafted chainsword, an abundance of knives.
6- White Scars. Spear and shield (? not sure about this guy yet)

Mid range/ All rounders

7-Ultramarine. Bolter and Power sword.
8- Black Templar. Bolter and Chainsword.

Weapons specialists

9- Raven guard. Sniper. Sniper rifle.
10- Imperial fists. Anti-Armour. Melta gun, Melta bombs, Chainfist (thinking of replacing the chain blade with a one-shot melta )


The only thing I know is missing is a heavy weapon. Not sure what to do about that, as otherwise I think they seem pretty balanced. Maybe take one of the HQs out? I think I'll cross that bridge when I come to it More pics on their way!


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Rawson wrote:

I hope that helps! Good luck with the Deathwatch!

Cheers,
Rawson

Thanks very much mate, I'm going to give it a go now


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Thanks to Rawson who Explained the pic linky thing.

Here's a bit of a look at what I've been getting on with so far.

Salamanders techmarine. You have to imagine him with a heavy flamer instead of the assault cannon, and a Deatchwatch shoulder pad, as I'm still waiting for some ebay bits:



Plasticard is my friend!

And Sally next to a regular Marine:




Here's the sniper rifle the Raven Guard will use. I'm trying to get him on one knee- not so easy with Terminator legs :S



And finally for today, a blu-tacked together space wolf, very WIP:



Thanks for looking!

Great work! I can't wait to see them all.

@ Stormrider- Thanks! It's the converting I really love. I like painting but part of the reason for doing this project log was to give me a bit of a poke when it got to that stage. Hopefully though as these models are all so varied it should keep my interest.

needs a crimson fist in the saqud. And that OSL actually looks more realistic than most. It's subtle and not over the top. well done.

Imperial Monkey wrote:needs a crimson fist in the saqud. And that OSL actually looks more realistic than most. It's subtle and not over the top. well done.

Thank you very much

A Crimson Fist, eh? It did cross my mind but I already have an Imperial Fist and a Black Templar, and I didn't want to go overboard with the Fist successors. What role do you think he would play?

I'm half considering making my Space Wolf a Long Fang and finding another close combat guy, but I'm struggling to think of another (mainstream) chapter who specialise in CC who are not Blood Angels (he's going to be the Apothecary)

I've been juggling this lot around for ages- it's driving me nuts!

Your marines look very good so far. I like the idea of a kneeling sniper. I happen to have a pair of true scale kneeling legs if you have need of them. PM me and I'll send them to you.

These guys are looking really good, an army in it's own right

Extremely nice. Looking forward to seeing an entire army of these guys

these are looking really cool, Im just happy you have chosen different chapters to myself!

For a heavy weapon guy though, you cant beat a Heavy Bolter for general "badassdomness", this is a WIP shot of mine:

subscribed to this though. Keep up the good work

Thanks for all the comments guys, each one is a real motivation!

SilverMK2 wrote:Extremely nice. Looking forward to seeing an entire army of these guys

Stop it- don't give me ideas! ... Although... I'll get back to you once I've done the first ten

ephrael wrote:Your marines look very good so far. I like the idea of a kneeling sniper. I happen to have a pair of true scale kneeling legs if you have need of them. PM me and I'll send them to you.

Thanks very much, I might take you up on that. I'm having a go at the moment and they're not looking too great. Turns out a kneeling terminator is considerably harder than I thought. I've gone from taking a running kick at a football to something vaguely kneeling, albeit on an ammo box. Maybe it's like he's moving from cover to cover and he's just dropped down on a handy bit of rubble to pop off a shot?



The picture makes it hard to see but it's not pretty, IMO.

On the plus side, I did a bit more this afternoon- now my Space Wolf looks a bit less like a balding Long Fang and a bit more like the kind of Space Wolf who'd actually use a Bolt Pistol and Chainsword (although thankfully not like the kind of Space Wolf who is in a constant mid scream/yawn)



Aaaaand finally, the booty shot



The rough areas will get filed down once it's fully dry, then there will be plasticard spacers on the bottoms of feet (should have done this first but oh well) and the butts will be filed down a bit to look more like regular SM butts with the step in them. But having learned from many mistakes, I'm not doing anything to them until the GS is well and truly cured!

Oh, and japehlio- that looks sick. Might have to get me one of those. Thanks for the sub too!


Ok, one last thing, I'm just throwing this out there... I have a spare Rhino kit- can it be truescaled? :S

master of asgard wrote:Thanks to Rawson who Explained the pic linky thing.

And finally for today, a blu-tacked together space wolf, very WIP:



Thanks for looking!

My pleasure!

How much time are you spending per marine? These guys are pretty awesome! As a space wolf player myself (along with the rest of the world) I vote that your space wolf marine gets a snarling face (AKA mid scream/yawn face) instead of a calm face, especially since he's a CC specialist.

japehlio wrote:these are looking really cool, Im just happy you have chosen different chapters to myself!

I'd be interested to hear what chapters you are doing. On a different note, I've just found on ebay chapter-specific shoulder pads from Forge World that look really nice. Uh-oh...

That first Ultramarine is sick! Your doing an amazing job and cannot wait to see more.

One thing I find odd is that you havnt filed off the armour plates on the thighs, those really scream out "Terminator Armour" almost as much as the 'lines' on the back which we have to cover.

As for the rhino, it sure is. You might want to keep in mind the FW sisters of battle Repressor, it would be an easier way than a complete rebuild...

also, if you want a link to my Deathwatch WIP try this: http://www.astronomican.com/showthread.php?22433-Deathwatch-Kill-Team&p=370116

Rawson wrote:
How much time are you spending per marine? These guys are pretty awesome! As a space wolf player myself (along with the rest of the world) I vote that your space wolf marine gets a snarling face (AKA mid scream/yawn face) instead of a calm face, especially since he's a CC specialist.

Well since Rawson has been known to give good advice in the past I'm going to go with it. After all, I think part of the fun of these logs is taking other people's advice and ideas! Here is an impetuous young Blood Claw leading the charge. He was sent to the Deathwatch to hone his skills and gain some maturity. He's still got a lot of wolfing up to be done to him.



As for how long each model takes, it's hard to say. I think I spend just as long admiring them, looking at them from different angles and re-positioning them as I do actually working on them. I can get the basic body, legs and GS work down in maybe half an hour or so, but then the rest is a bit more dependent on the model.

Mr.Malevolent wrote:That first Ultramarine is sick! Your doing an amazing job and cannot wait to see more.

Thanks very much! I like how he's got lots of gear and stuff, still have to force myself to do the final touches on the paint job though. Maybe tomorrow!

japehlio wrote:One thing I find odd is that you havnt filed off the armour plates on the thighs, those really scream out "Terminator Armour" almost as much as the 'lines' on the back which we have to cover.

As for the rhino, it sure is. You might want to keep in mind the FW sisters of battle Repressor, it would be an easier way than a complete rebuild...

also, if you want a link to my Deathwatch WIP try this: http://www.astronomican.com/showthread.php?22433-Deathwatch-Kill-Team&p=370116

Oooh the Repressor is pretty nifty eh? Also, nice work on the Imp Fist! I think your Captain sounds really cool after reading a bit of the Storm Wardens fluff. And yes, I'm glad we didn't choose the same things!

I know what you mean about the thigh plates, and I did have a bit of a debate with myself about them. If they were normal marines I probably would have taken them off. However, as Deathwatch veterans I thought it was kind of fitting for them to have a bit of extra armour to make them look a bit bling. Also one of the things I'm hoping to practice in this project is a bit of freehand, so I thought they might be a good place to put some =I= logos and stuff.

Tomorrow the SW will get finished, and I'm going to do as much as I can on the others while waiting for my bits order to arrive (probably on Tuesday with the bank holiday) I'm also going to finish painting the Ultramarine!

They ARE terminator chest plates you are using, yeah?
Interesting, there seems to be two schools of thought.

A: Use almost ALL terminator parts, albeit with a power armour torso-back. Termi arms, cut up and mixed with a few power armour sections

B: Use only Termi legs, the rest is power armour bits with spacers and green stuff.

it seems you are school A, whereas I am B. Strange, no?

Another interesting debate I had with some mates was "Would the deathwatch marines remove all non-armour decoration". As in, other than the shoulderpad, they are, fluff-wise, supposed to be all black/identical. We agreed that technically they should, but its much more fun from a hobby perspective to individualize them, isnt it? Plus, a space wolf without fur isnt really a space wolf, is it?


(ps, I could use a vote as to which non-character I do next lol, Im leaning towards the sally or wolf)

Yeah I'm using
-Terminator legs
- Terminator Chest with a normal marine back, spaced out with plasticard and GS'd around the back and shoulder joints.
- Terminator arms
- Plasticard on the bottom of the feet, and sometimes to make a mk8 neck guard.

I find the dome thing above the termie's belt gives me the perfect height for putting the torso on. Bit of green stuff, a plasticard belt, then it's all over but for the ammo pouches and grenades. I use no other power armour except the head and backpack, and sometimes the hands.

As for the question of decoration, yeah I guess technically they should remove that kind of thing, but like you I'm definitely not going to! I want them to look cool and individualised. I'm not going crazy over the tip with iconography everywhere, but a little bit here and there adds to it I think. I'm really looking forward to the Black Templar- I've got a special plan for him!

As I have currently done both a Salamander and a Space Wolf, I think go for the Sally as they are more subtle and you have more imagery to explore for yourself. Everyone knows what Wolves look like, but Sallies are a bit more rare these days.

master of asgard wrote:Well since Rawson has been known to give good advice in the past I'm going to go with it.

Something to add to my resume

I actually did a pretty exhaustive search on truescale stuff a couple months back in prep for a now aborted truescale GK paladin army and so have tons of pics on my hard drive saved from dozens of sources. The general method you're using (a mix of termie and power armor parts) would have been mine also with a few tweaks. Ironically, I've also downscaled my vision to a squad of 5 marines also for use in a Deathwatch RPG.

The pic below is one from my files and uses regular marine shoulder pads on terminator arms. I think the scaling is a bit truer there compared with terminator pads. You may have to file down the shoulder to actually fit in the pad though. Using some termie parts bulks up the marine nicely but using all termie parts (except for the back chest obviously to attach the backpack) ends up with a marine that is too bulky IMHO (see second pic)... kind of the opposite of the undersized current marine models with different weird proportions. As for the leg actuators and hip plates, I kind of like the idea of keeping them and using the servos at the elbow terminator arms. They visually scream "POWER" armor to me more than the nicely fitting plates you get on the stock marines. I'd still fill in the calf parts to be nice and smooth but I'd leave the thighs with the actuator rods and hip plates visible. I'm ok with my truescale marines not looking exactly the same as the stock models style wise as long as the changes are believeable and cool looking. My plan is to go with the following:

PA Head
PA Back Chest and backpack
Termie Front Chest
Termie Arms
Termie Legs (with greenstuff filled calves)

Another thing that I see done in the pics but don't recall being mentioned by the OP (sorry if you did and I missed it) is that you're extending the backpack by chopping out the middle and combining two packs into one to make them bigger. I've seen that in a few other projects and it definitely looks cool if done right. I just don't know if I could do it right, lol.

Woop update time! I finally finished the Ultramarine. (except the base, they'll all get based at the same time) The pics revealed a couple of things such as the roughness on the belt and chest eagle highlights, and the lack of writing on the sword arm parchment, but those have been fixed. So without further ado, some pics of a Deathwatch Ultramarine!



Some slightly wonky freehand but it looks ok IRL




The thing in the right hand vent is a bit of plastic shavings which has been removed!


And a group shot. This one shows fairly nicely the =I= symbol on his shin and "ULTRA" written on the other shin:



And finally for this post, a sneak preview of the White Scar's weapon


As for the comments about scale and shoulder pads- I see what you mean, but also this is a nice chance for me to practice my conversion skills, making Termie pads into normal SM pads. I totally agree with warboss that the bits at the elbows and knees look cool and make it seem like "power" armour. And yes, I am doing the 2 backpack thing- sometimes they go together really easily and sometimes it's really fiddly with lots of filing and GS work! I'll do a step-by step tutorial on it later today (btw, you might also need some GS on the back, as the front and back plates are different sizes)


Enjoy the pics, and any C&C is very welcome. I want to use this to improve and try out new techniques.

I would enjoy a tutorial - looking to make a few TS marines myself

Graarrghhhh!!! I've just realised why Truescale marines don't kneel. You can try this at home. Kneel down on both knees and sit on your heels. Note how your heels will connect with the bones of your buttocks. Clearly, your shin bone and your femur are roughly the same length for this to happen.

Terminators do not have this! Their thigh is significantly sorter than their shin. So much for truescale, the problem's worse than we thought!

I think I might just have to have my Raven Guard standing up, depending what ephrael's ones look like. Phew, rant over. I'll do that tutorial now

Yeah, the "normal" femur/tib-fib ratio is a bit over one. The problem with the terminators is that their femurs actually decend into the knee joint significantly on top of being short as the shin armor depending on the scuplt just extends up over the front of the virtual knee. I suspect you'd have to cut and model a separate knee pad out of the shin armor to get it to look/work right. Nice work in the thread so far, though! Don't beat yourself too much about it as marines are so off scale compared to normal humans that it surprises most people when they see just how much... even done correctly, they really are steroid superfreaks that are barely human!!

@ warboss Thanks for that, it's pretty interesting. Daft, but interesting! So far I have him resting one knee on some rubble as shown in the mock up further up the page. Might just leave it at that and sculpt it to make it look good.

But, as promised, here is a little tutorial. My first one! Sorry the picture quality isn't great on all of these, it's quite overcast here right now.

Truescale backpacks

For this you will need: two SM backpacks, a sharp hobby knife, a modelling saw, plastic/super glue, greenstuff, maybe a file.

This isn't really a double backpack, it's more like a 1 1/2 backpack. It helps if you have two of the same ones as the holes and stuff are a bit different. You can always fill these in with GS at the end if this is the case. I've tried to colour in where you need to cut off in the next picture. This one on the left is the best to use because it hasn't got so much detail you need to cut off, but I didn't have enough so I used some others.



First of all, take off any detail like skulls and vents on the back face. Use a sharp/new blade! You can keep the skull for later if you're careful.



Next you'll need to line up where you're going to cut. Basically it's about 3/4 along, just before the very bottom part of the backpack slopes up into the little vents.



I've used a knife here to try to show it and to make a little mark for my saw. I guess you could use a knife or clippers but the knife is too much hard work and clippers are messy.

Saw saw saw.


Ok, repeat with the other backpack, but make sure you cut this one on the other side (I have made this mistake ) You'll end up with something like this:



Simple so far, it's about to get a bit more tricky.



With a casual glance at the photo above you might think this looks fine, but look carefully and you'll see that the tops of the two packs are not making a straight line. This is a fairly easy mistake to make and is a result of the cutting process using the saw. You'll see below that when I do line the tops of both packs up, there is a massive gap and in fact one is cut in a different place to the other:



So I strategically cut each one down a little bit with my hobby bade to try to get them a little bit more aligned. I also used markers like the holes on the back to try to ensure that each was the same size. Don't worry that there's still a gap, it's smaller in real life and that's what GS is for!



I glued the two bits with plastic glue (and made the mistake of not letting it set properly before going onto the GS work) and got this:



Pretty good, now is the time to shave off that little rivet on the bottom if you haven't already. Fill in your gaps with GS as shown below. I would suggest filling in any holes that are cut in half or any vents which don't quite look right.



There it is! At this point you're good to go. If you managed to keep the skull from earlier you could stick them back on, hiding some of the seams with the GS in. You can choose to go minimalist with the GS like I have here, or simply put it on a bit thicker to make it a bit more solid. For my Ultramarine I gave him some extra sensors and an eagle on the back because he's in Deathwatch and they're supposed to have lots of fancy gear:



Hope this was clear, if you have any questions or ways to improve this technique I'd love to hear them!



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Ok now for some actual stuff. Here's a sneak peek of what I've got planned for my Black Templar:



And, do you think this Dreadnought is big enough to be considered Truescale?



Finally I was wondering if it is frowned upon or against forum rules to scrounge for bits (offering trade) on here or should I go to the swap shop?

Enjoy, C&C always welcome!

Great work! Looking forward for the sniper guy. What about a truescale jumppack guy?

The dread looks pretty cool

Thanks guys! I'll post some more pics of the Dread a bit later. Fluff-wise, would there be such a thing as a Deathwatch Dreadnought? I suppose if he really valued his time in the Deathwatch as a marine, when he got interred into the sarcophagus he could request to rejoin them, but then a Dread is such a valuable resource to a chapter I wonder if they'd let him go? At the moment he's got some DA gubbinz on him, which I guess could be replaced or remodelled into =I= symbolism.

Hope the tutorial was useful. As for a jump pack guy... Well I do have a White Scars CC marine in the pipeline, so maybe he'll get a jump pack! That would suit his style of fast attack after all. The sniper will either get some work today or tomorrow, so keep an eye out for him! He's gonna have a beaky helmet and a special lightweight backpack for all the sneaking and stuff he has to do

The Raven Guard might get jump pack envy of the White Scar!