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Starting up an ork army for the winter, I get to thinking about all those amazing conversions and scratchbuilds I've seen here and elsewhere and also some things i've not liked as much. So for discussion and also any tips you'd care to offer up:

What makes something 'Orky' rather than 'look, i dun stuck a leman russ hull on top of a rhino and painted it bad, now it's orky'? What effects and style indicate good from bad? What are the secrets to making models that are supposedly made from other races scrap and make them look good and plausible? (I am thinking about things like that running pose stompa I saw on here, the defiler-esque thing with four digger arms and so on, they have a feel that's immediately Ork, is it rivets in everything, over emphasis on big exhausts, etc).

I want to make a stompa of my own at some point and I've seen some amazing ones and on ebay some truly dreadful ones.

Give me your wisdom!

ramshakle plates, loads of bolts, weird supports holding things together, big engines, bigger exausts, guns that look like they will end up blowing up and alot of red since red wuns go faster!

It looks cobbled together from bits of other stuff, spare parts and handmade parts, without concern for operator safety.

Stuff is held together with trusses, elastic bands, rivets, rough welds and globs of epoxy resin.

Size and brute strength is emphasised over efficiency.

The design aesthetic varies hugely though everything constructed under the supervision of one MekBoy probably has a theme running through everything.

Off-topic but LOLS at ur avatar - Brian Blessed rules!

"FRESH HORSES!"

Also, it never hurst to stick three to two-dozen Grots and Snots on top.

If its broken, its orkish...
If it looks broken, its orkish...
If its non-symmetric, its orkis...

...basically.

Watch MadMax beyond Thunderdome and the check out the guys on the Red and Green show with the wacky contraptions they make out of cars.

Also one way to get a really orkish contraption try to come up with a concept first, lets say a Trukk HalfTrak with Rokkit Launchas, then limit yourself to your little brother's toy box and a couple plastic models from when you thought military models were cool, then try to build the half trak out of things that would not otherwise be made into a half track and cover it with plates cut out of other models. Really, even though Orks seem ramshackled and random they kind of are not, they just suffer from being the biggest load of junk peddlers in the universe. Everybody else out there has mass production while Orks still throw stuff together from what they find on the ground and in their buddie's Mek Shop. But really, they might just have a use out of sticking a Leman Russ Hull on top of a Rhino for a more impressive pressence or better visibility. And now that you mention it I have a half a dozen Rhinos and a few Leman Russ's that need to get glued together!

"Crude but effective"

Basically it should look like it was made with no regard for safety or aesthetics, which is very very different from just being modeled badly out of toy trucks, cardboard, and so on. In particular the construction should be heavy (thick plates, sturdy chassis), riveted, and only a little imprecise - imprecise where it doesn't matter (like the exact location of rivets, or the edging on an armour plate).

I agree with nurglitch, I much prefer the 'eavy armour look to ork vehicles than 'some crap slung together'. Try searching for kr00za's work on thewaaagh.com, that's some serious inspiration.

i like what everyone has said so far but one thing i think really makes something look orky is if it looks like it it would actually be impossible for it to work.

Now i don't mean that you put treads on the top of a tank and it's supposed to work, but things that just look ridiculous.

Some examples i could think of: treads that are too small or large for the vehicle they're on, guns that are way too big and heavy to actually be supported by the chassis of the vehicle they're on, things that look very fragile but might actually be tough ie. a skeletal looking rear end of a truck with a monstrous sized battering ram in front.

Basically anything that looks slightly impossible but is held together by base ingenuity and the power of the waaagh!

massive mother ing everything
huge choppas, enormous gunz and and slashy stabby bitey thing sticking off everyting
chock a few grots here and there for good measure

Daggermaw and Klotz, I think, describe pretty much exactly what you should avoid with regard to Orkish modeling.

Think like an Ork. That's the best bet. If it's killy. Make it killier. If it moves, make it move faster. Make it louder, more ostentatious. Take what it is, and apply what an ork would do with it, given that Ork technology can work without any actual working parts.

I'll give you my 2 cents on this, being a long time ork player and a die hard conversion nut.

*WARNING: Opinions detected, put on your big girl panties*

Let's be totally honest, there are a LOT of horrible ork "conversions" out there. For every Ein or Krooza or GrimTeef or Scarpia out there, there are a hundred people that think haphazardly gluing random bits together and slopping paint on it makes it "orky". Some see orks as mindless, bolting random crap onto existing kits with no real rhyme or reason. Some think that adding rivets on every inch of surface area is all you need.

I couldn't disagree more.

One of the orks biggest advantages is the perception of stupidity. More often than not people underestimate the orks. Especially now in 5e where orks can actually field an extremely shooty army. Yes, shooty orks, it can happen. Their materials might be crude (scavengers that they are) but their abilities more than compensate. Weirdboyz channel pure energy into devastatingly violent attacks. Mekboys forge incredible weapons, vehicles, and towering killing machines from scrap materials. Warbosses grow to immense size and wield the power to command hundreds of thousands in a mighty Waaagh. Even the lowly grot possesses the knowledge of combat and the ability to (innacurately) fire a blasta.

So what makes something orky? Function before form. Purpose before style. Loose cabling, open hatches, rusted joints. Also, copious violence. Orks are savage, brutal by nature. Vehicles are often fitted with rams, spikes, defensive and offensive measures of all types. Hell, orks invented the Death Roller. Now THAT is orky, a ten ton metal drum with one purpose in life: flatten all opposition. It might look crude, because it is, but it's brutally effective.

Do orks use random metal plates and rivets? Of course they do! But look closely, at least in the GW fluff, backstory, and imagery. Those plates are not randomly thrown on, they cover passengers, drivers, or gunners. As others have also said, something can look crude but still be modeled cleanly. Simply throwing random plates and rivets on a vehicle does not necessarily make it orky. The devil is in the details.

Basically, orks and orkish tech are:

Brutally Cunning
Cunningly Brutal
Crude but Effective
Loud
Dirty
Violent

As others have said... the Orks don't just rivet on random panels to make their trukks look "Orky" so that the Space Mareenz (hurr) know exactly who it is who's coming to whoop their metal asses, they find some bit of battle wreckage or scrap steel, a nice big bit of heavy plate, and add it on to their vehicle to protect the engine, crew and weapons. If you really wanted to make a vehicle look Orky, find a big panel you can see both sides of... say, a Trukk side panel, and put a stonking great hole in it where it's taken a hit from a rocket or a close range heavy bolts. NOW you rivet a panel over it, and it serves a purpose, it's a repair, not just a random riveted panel.

If an Ork gets shot up in a battle (remember, the GW fluff suggests that when you lose an individual from your force during a battle, that dude isn't necessarily dead, he's just incapacitated, so could be wounded etc) he'll be looking at putting some extra armour in the space where the bullets came through last time, or he'll be repairing the holes in the panel that got shot up. Ok, he might also have gained some bionic bits from the Dok but that's another thread

A nice simple mod to personalise your GW Ork vehicles is to get some small drill bits (two or three sizes to represent bolter, heavy bolter etc) and drill bullet holes on the panels either at random or in a line to show a strafe of gun fire... then get a very sharp blade and drag some vee-shaped slots or splinters away from the holes, instead bullet holes.

if you want some serious ideas look at lemmingspawn 's threads, i regard him as the ork warboss
his work is about the best you will see when it comes to ok.

I think Teek's got the right idea. Also, for one glorious second, I was sure that I'd read "Orks invented the Death Star".


Mmmmm, Deff Star......

In my uneducated guess, big, loud, and armed with lots of guns that might explode in your face, is orkish. Lol, deff star.

"orky" depends on the application

I think the new kits exemplify it pretty well. lots of uneven surfaces because of haphazard work. yet a thought to function and overall brutality.

when a vehicle is looted, for the most part it retains its identity but more "worky bitz" and "know wotz" are added. weapons are changed, usually a ram is added to the front, battle damage haphazardly repaired.

A battlewagon may have started as an imperial vehicle (land raider usually) or could have been entirely scratch built by the mek in charge of its konstrukshun

since these are built for nobz, meganobz, or warbosses they tend to be a little more over the top, very spiky, loud dakka dakka. a deffolla is propa.

what ISN'T orky is when people just raid their bitz box and slap things together whithout any sense of purpose. yes trukks are ramshackle but they still have function.

best I can suggest is go look at the "jobs a good un" area on the-waaagh.com there is a lot of really good work there

NaZ

To paraphrase:
If it moves and it shouldn't, rivet it.
It if doesn't move and it should, add more oil and hit it harder.

Big exhausts, re-used (looted) parts.

Watch Scrapheap Challenge (Junkyard Wars) for ideas.

Da Tater Titan ( http://www.the-waaagh.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=26595&st=60 ) is a good example of how to Orkify something