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A short while back, I finished off my largest commission job yet, but had promised the buyer that I wouldn't show it off until after the event that he wanted it for...

Well, that event has come and gone, so I can finally unveil a Special Ops-themed Space Marine army in the Under The Couch Commission Gallery.





This was a hefty project, which included Teleporting Assault Squads, a stripped-down Dreadnought, and retooled Tactical, Devastator, Scout and Terminator squads.





Despite grossly underestimating just how much work was involved in this job, I had a lot of fun putting it together, and have heard from the buyer that it (obviously in its fully painted form) took 2nd place for Best Army at the Liber Animus IV on the weekend.





You can see the entire army here.

Absolutely gorgeous, do you have any painted pics of the army?

VERY cool insaniak!!!  I hope his painting skills did them the justice they deserve...  Gives me some ideas of my own.

Very very cool insaniak.

Since I can't place them, what did you use to make the boltrs on the tac squads?

 

-Ashrum

They were actually painted by Rachel from Iron Halo Painting... I don't have full painted pics yet, but what I have seen looks great.

The bolters are from the Scout Biker box.

Head explodingly awesome Insaniak, and I admit that this raises my opinions of you as a modeler even higher. Every marine is fantastic, and kudos on all those teleporting swirls and metal apothecary bits added to every backpack. The deathwatch as devs is a very cool touch (not used as deathwatch, right?), and the Hero objective marker is quite sweet. Also, are those bases casts of your own? Well done if so, they look very good.

Amazing work Insaniak, would love to see painted pics if they're available.

- Boss Salvage

stellar work as always. What are things wizzing around the foot marines though?

Great work as usual. There is a simplicity that really brings out the added details without making the models look busy. I may have (read that as must) steal your idea of the ammo pouches on the chests. I also REALLY love the cut down sniper rifles. Excellent.

Keep showing your work. It's great stuff.

ender502

Nice!

With a few changes, that converted Dreadnought would look perfect in an Arbites force.

Very nice indeed.

Where did the over the shoulder, shoulder pads come from?

Brave Rifles

Fantastic work bro. I love the plasticard work on the dread- it's very impressive. How do you manage to bend your plasticard into tubes without distorting it? I find that heating it often makes it become distorted. If I cool it down enough not to make it distort it's too hard to bend into nice curves.

Posted By Boss_Salvage on 05/23/2007 5:39 AM
and kudos on all those teleporting swirls and metal apothecary bits added to every backpack.

I still dream about the backpacks...

Definitely not the most fun part of the job Would have been much easier with plastic Apothecary parts, but the buyer supplied all of the parts, and metal packs was what he had. Many fingers suffered drill bit-puncture wounds to bring you those backpacks...

Posted By Boss_Salvage on 05/23/2007 5:39 AM
The deathwatch as devs is a very cool touch (not used as deathwatch, right?),

Yup, they're just a regular Dev Squad, modelled as Deathwatch for a little colour. That was part of the theme that he wanted... he basically sent me a list of units, and a rundown of what he wanted in each and a general look that he wanted for them, and I took it from there. For the Deathwatch, it was basically 'I want the second Dev squad to be Deathwatch, and one of the Heavy Bolters should be modelled with it over his shoulder...'

The main exception in the design process was the Dreadnought. He wanted a Dread, and had a list of equipment for it, but no set look, although he thought maybe something robotic looking. I had a brainflash, about half-assembled the stripped-down dread, and showed him that... and he thought it was perfect for the theme, so it stayed.

Posted By Boss_Salvage on 05/23/2007 5:39 AM
Also, are those bases casts of your own? Well done if so, they look very good.

Nope, the bases were (mostly) provided with the other bits. I know I've seen them online, but can't remember who makes them.

The bases on the objective marker were built from scratch, though.

Posted By Kid_Kyoto on 05/23/2007 5:54 AM
What are things wizzing around the foot marines though?

That's a teleport effect... The Assault Marines have personal teleporters instead of jump packs. The swirly bits are emanating from little gubbinz built into their backpacks.

Posted By Brave_Rifles on 05/23/2007 8:21 AM
Where did the over the shoulder, shoulder pads come from?

They're shoulder pads from the Ork Boyz sprue

Posted By Drake_Marcus on 05/23/2007 9:57 AM
How do you manage to bend your plasticard into tubes without distorting it?

I don't

I have a range of plastic tubing and rod in various different sizes, which comes in handy for all sorts of jobs.

Posted By insaniak on 05/23/2007 2:29 PM

Posted By Drake_Marcus on 05/23/2007 9:57 AM
How do you manage to bend your plasticard into tubes without distorting it?

I don't

I have a range of plastic tubing and rod in various different sizes, which comes in handy for all sorts of jobs.

WOW. I knew you were good but this totally blew all my opinions out the window. these are so creative and awsome. Hats off to you.

For anyone interested, there are now painted pics of these guys up in the Iron Halo website here

She managed to do justice to your work, but the lighting work is pretty rough. I imagine that's also a factor of how much the customer paid per figure, but overall it still looks like a brilliant army.

the numerals and letters painted on the knee pads are really awful.

Also the colour scheme is just a rip off of the red scorpion scheme used by Forgeworld.
It's really not very original or well executed. I was expecting a much higher quality from someone who advertises themself as a professional painter.

But... maybe as has been mentioned the quality of the paint job is down to the price the custoemr paid.

Even so to not paint these fantastic conversions to a really high standard is still a crime in my opinion. It's an adequate paint job, but it could have been really amazing. Your work really gives a painter a lot to do and to work with, its a shame this person didn't capitalise on that fully.

That's supposed to be source lighting on the assault marines, isn't it? Nice attempt I suppose, but probably a weaker part of the paint job. There rest is decent, I like the choice to do the vet (?) with a solid yellow helmet and a lesser marine with the head stripe. Though note the one head stripe that slops a bit of yellow onto the marine's 'nose' bit ... *head shaking*

I had missed the marine with stein though, nice conversion Insaniak

- Boss Salvage

Posted By Boss_Salvage on 05/29/2007 5:57 AM
I had missed the marine with stein though, nice conversion Insaniak

That was one of the specific details requested by the buyer. He wanted a mini holding a stein of his favorite beer (some obscure Kiwi beer, apparently) to represent himself in the army

Posted By Gundammecha on 05/29/2007 4:57 AM
Also the colour scheme is just a rip off of the red scorpion scheme used by Forgeworld.
It's really not very original or well executed. I was expecting a much higher quality from someone who advertises themself as a professional painter.

The colour scheme was specified by the buyer, rather than the painter. It was actually based on the Relictors, with the yellow thrown in to brighten them up a bit. I suspect that any resemblance to the Red Scorpions is purely coincidental.

So far as the quality of the painting goes, while I have no idea what sort of budget was involved for the painting, I do know that the time frame was a little limited, at least partly due to me taking a little longer than planned to finish the conversion work.

The light-sourcing does look a little rough blown up, but from the couple of pics showing them on the table, I think it works just fine.

I had kind of assumed that the rough lettering was intended, to give it a hand-painted look... but I could be wrong.