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Wow so many replies, thanks guys! I really appreciate it. Glad you enjoyed the biker boss.

Gobert: Go right ahead! As I've mentioned earlier one of the reasons I write hobby threads is to share ideas and techniques with fellow hobbyists.
I agree that it's all about the details. I enjoy adding a hint of realism to every vehicle I convert, so that they could actually work in theory.

Tyranid Horde: Thanks man! I actually managed to find a few small bits that were lost somewhere into the box. Turned out better in the end

Syro_: Cheers! Graduating has already been postponed a bit as I was supposed to finish my studies this spring. Just had to take some time for myself due to hardships over the last year or so. Not stressing about it too much though. All in it's due time


I have been working with something completely different once again.

The topic of this months dakka painting contest is "Space Marine". At first I thought about skipping that one, as I don't have any marine armies. As a matter of fact I have not actually painted a single marine over the course of ~16 years of wargaming.
Then it hit me: I had a bunch of Wolfguard Terminator bits that I was supposed to use for some sort of conversions that never took place. I acquired them from a friend when he decided to sell his Space Wolves in order to buy some knights.
I have always loved the idea and look of terminators, even thought about making an army out of them back in 6th. Especially the viking feeling of the Wolfguard or the spiky chaos terminators tickle my fancy.

I dived right into my bits box and spread all the marine parts on the table. In order to get myself into the right mindset I turned on some Amon Amarth (viking metal) and started to dry fit different bits together. After an hour or so of wondering the cocktail was ready: I would assemble a single assault cannon wielding Wolf Guard Terminator and place him on some sort of snowy base.

In addition to this, I have always wanted to try my hand at painting non metallic metal.
I remembered that I had found a great tutorial for it a few months back. After browsing trough it again I decided that this would be the time I would try it for the first time.
It might be a bit overwhelming to try painting every metal part with NMM, so I decided to do it only for the gold parts.

Before trying the new technique on the model itself, I tried it on a couple of shields I had in the bits box. They did not turn out very well, but it gave me a basic idea how the colors would work together.

Early stages.


After base coating the model I dived right into the golden parts.
Mixing colors and trying to decide how the light would reflect from the surface took a quite a bit of time. As you can see, I still have a ton to learn.


The current state of the model.






The non metallic gold looks okay in my opinion so far. I was just not able to make it shine properly, even though I used pure white for the highest parts. I might have to add another layer.
What I've learned though, is that fixing something again and again only results to having thick layer of paint and ruining it in the end. So I might settle for this as a first attempt.
As an addition I practiced layering with glazes just a bit on the armor. Did not spend too much time with it though, as mashing too many new techniques on a single model will be overwhelming.

One thing I'm not happy with at all is the barrel of the assault cannon. Still thinking about trying some form of grey to make it look better (like in the first image).
And I still have to figure out something for the shoulder pad. I suck at free handing, so I might paint it with a single color and do some layering with glazes.

I have been working with this for almost a week now. This is one of those times when I'm wondering if it's worth it, as I have a ton of modelling projects that I could do for my current armies. So progress wise this does not move things forward, but on the other hand learning new things is always fun.

I did not post any earlier updates regarding to this, as I was not sure at the beginning if this was something I would actually finish. Too late to turn back now

Tell me what you think and any suggestion are taken into account.

Certainly an impressive bit of painting. Lots of depth. Taking the assault cannon back to grey could be a good idea. There is a bit of a disconnect having the metallic and non-metallic right next to each other. All in all it is looking very good.

Thank you.

I agree, the metallic looks a bit weird to next to non metallic gold.

I took a step back and decided to paint the weapon back to gray. In addition I tried some highlighting and layering with bluish grey, in order to create non metallic steel kind of effect.
Also finally glued the model together.

Here's some more WIP images:



The black shoulder pad looked a bit too pale, so I decided to do some sort of free handing to it. I found an codex image with a similar kind of logo, so I chose to use that one.
Painting it took a while, a lot longer than it should have. I'm not a good at drawing, which straightly translates to painting. I've became better at this over the years, but still lot to learn.


Also wanted to add some runes on the back. The runes actually spell the word "Fang".




The pictures are very dark, as I took them by my working desk during the painting process.

Slowly getting there...
Next up some cleaning and finally building the base. It feels weird to post so many WIP images from a single miniature, but that's the only thing I've been working with recently.

That is a lovely figure - you nailed the balance of warm and cold tones I think.

Beautiful work on that terminator, it looks great. It's also nice for me seeing a 40k model I recognize and am used to.

Legit. The freehand looks very good, and the barrels mesh much better now. The ammo hopper on the back is a great bit of detail to break up the grey.

Ezki,

Beautiful Space Wolf for this months competition.

Exalted.

Cheers,

CB

If you hadn't painted the cannon back to grey I would have asked why you didn't do NMM on that along with the NMM you've already done. The grey cannon is much better and the freehand is ace. Looking forward to the finished piece!

youwashock wrote:Legit. The freehand looks very good, and the barrels mesh much better now. The ammo hopper on the back is a great bit of detail to break up the grey.

Tyranid Horde wrote:If you hadn't painted the cannon back to grey I would have asked why you didn't do NMM on that along with the NMM you've already done. The grey cannon is much better and the freehand is ace. Looking forward to the finished piece!

Cheers guys!
The barrels do indeed look better. The initial reason not to paint it at the same time as I did the gold, was the fact that I had no idea which colors to use. I had once tried NMM steel in the past using only grey, but that did not work out very well. I think I got a bit discouraged by that. But after somewhat succeeding with the gold I wanted to give it a go using a new guide I found.

Syro: The terminators are a classic and very iconic models from the 40k range. Glad you like it!

Also thank you Kestral and Captain Brown!


The last step for this project was to create the base. I wanted to create a snowy base with some rocks on it to fit the northern feel of the Wolf Guard.

As far as the materials go, I used some cork and tree bark as the rocks, some Noch rock compound to fill the gaps, mix of baking soda, water and PVA glue as snow and lastly some texture paint to fill in the blanks.



As an extra bit of detail, I started thinking about making some icicles to hang (propably not the right word) from the ledge. Did not have any idea how to do it, but after searching around a bit I managed to find a couple of sources stating that they could be easily melted out of flying base stands.
I fired up a candle and started playing around with some of the old snapped stands. I knew they would come handy some day, so I did not store them for nothing all these years

It was not as easy it looked:


The first iterations went horribly wrong. During the very first attempt the stick actually caught fire. Not badly though so no danger there, but it blackened the whole stick rendering it useless. Note that I'm a voluntary fire fighter so I'm "qualified" to play with fire a bit

Few tries later I managed to get a batch of decent looking icicles. The trick is to learn when the plastic is just at the right temperature and how hard you can stretch it, or it will snap in half. Using some sort of pliers is also very essential, as the material gets really hot. When the stretched pieces cooled off (takes just a few seconds) I cut them out, getting two icicles out of every stretch. Using a file I made the thinner edge a bit pointier.

I experimented a bit more with different kind of paints and polishes to see what kind of finishes I would get.


The image is very dark, sorry about that.
- The most noticeable difference was with blue wash. It turned out a bit too dark, so by mixing the paint with water might give a nice mildly blue finish.
- Lahmian medium and the matte nail polish had a very similar finish with each other, offering a sort of a cloudy surface. Icicles are rarely completely transparent, at least if they are large enough.
- The old citadel gloss made the surface very reflective, as expected. This could be used to make smaller melting icicles with sunbeams reflecting from the dripping water.
- Rightmost is just plain plastic without any paint. This looks good enough too, but I think adding some paint will make it more interesting.

Couple of layers of gray, some snow and a few grass tufts later the base was ready:



And with that, the model is complete!



I'm actually quite pleased with it.
First marine I have ever painted, likely won't be the last.

Once again learned a great many things with this project and most importantly, it was really fun to do.
I need to keep practicing the NMM in the future, but that technique is reserved for display and / or competition models only. With my speed it would be a pain to try and apply it to tabletop models. Investing in a painting handle or something might also be a decent idea, as I noticed that some paint has been chipping off from the edges as I held the model in my hands. Luckily it can't be seen too well with bare eyes.

Thanks for looking! Any feedback is always appreciated.

Wow, great terminator Ezki. I've always had a fondness for termies.

The NMM looks pretty good for an early attempt. I've never tried it myself but I think, looking at the wolf head on the cannon, it probably needs more dark tones on it. At the moment it looks quite mid-tone dominated and most good NMMs I've seen tend to be quite heavy on the dark, transitioning up to really bright highlights, but not too much mid. I think? Still, good effort!

I love the display base and the icicles too, great way to make the mini pop.

That's a really great looking termie! Looking good on the NMM and those icicles are a lovely touch!

Boss. Super good work. The base is a work of art all in itself. You should definitely paint some more marines. I will need to remember that icicle trick.

Thanks guys! I'm really glad you like it.

Youwashock: If I get an inspiration to paint more marines, I definitely will! Not going to start a marine army anytime soon, but for modelling projects they really are fine pieces.

Bellerophon: Thank you for the feedback. This kind of constructive critisism is always very welcome!
You are correct, it might need some more dark tones. Currently the lighter parts don't pop as much and there is too little contrast. Lot to learn still.

This is the look I was after:


Nothing to show this time. I've been working 6 days a week in addition to running the youth department in voluntary fire department, building a PC for a friend and getting my hobby car to shape for the summer.
Spare time has been really limited and will be for a while. Will try to grab a brush later this week!

That's a great-looking Wolf! Definitely makes me want to try NMM also, just have to find a suitable model..

Ezki,

One of my votes went to the Terminator.

Cheers,

CB

mcmattila: Thanks! If you find a suitable model I bet you will pull it off really well!

Captain Brown: Thank you very much! Really enjoyed your's too! Totally missed the voting though, as I have been absent from the forums a while :(


Three weeks since last update, boy does time fly.
Not much has happened since I finished the Terminator. Studies, other hobbies, work and all sorts of distractions have kept from painting. The sunny days have also made it hard to stay at home. Well, spring and summer have always been a bit quiet on the modelling field for me. And speaking of hobbies, my co-worker got me back at playing Airsoft. It's something I used to play a lot when I was younger, but have not touched any of my stuff in six years. Tried a couple of games out of nostalgia and got stuck with it once again. Another hole in my wallet...

But enough of that. After all I have something to show you guys at least!

As promised earlier, more Harlequins!


Not much painting done. I have just brushed the first layer of purple on them. When I get these done I will have a minimal battalion to field! Does that count as an army? I'd like to think not, so I can say that I still have "just" four armies

Also did some modifying to my Succubus conversion for the very WIP vampire / horror / wych elf themed army. There was a single picture of her a few pages back, but here is the new version:




As a comparison, the older version:


And the source of inspiration once again for those who have not seen the older pages:


I decided to swap the wings for a different kind, which suit the model better in my opinion. The older ones were fine too, but I wanted her to stand in more relaxed position. Her head is a new one (I think?) from the Realm of Chaos kit. It was donated to me by a friend after I casually told him that it would fit my model perfectly. This way I would not need to mold the horns out of greenstuff. The model looks a bit like it could fit in a Slaanesh themed army too, but hey ho. Anywas, I wanted her to look like an actual succubus rather than a regular wych with some more details. I'm going to attend to the monthly painting contest with this, so I might have to postpone painting those Harlies a bit. With very limited hobby time I doubt that I will get both done by the end of the month.


Then for something really cool!
I was asked to take part in play testing of a new Mordheim campaing that is in the works! It is in early stages, but playable.
There is a group of ~8 players plus the actual designer playing together, discussing about rules etc.

As I was new to the game, I had to spend a few moments browsing trough the rules. Luckily we are playing a couple of test scenarios with the regular rules so that everyone gets comfortable with them. I picked up on the rules pretty quickly, as they were quite close to the old Warhammer Fantasy rules.
As I have a thing for vampires at the moment, I decided to go with the Undead warband.


There were a lot of miniatures available for borrowing, so I was lucky enough to complete my warband and test the game. Later on, I will definitely create some models of my own.

Our battlefield:


My zombie horde advancing trough the ruins.


My warband was very Zombie themed. I wanted to have a huge horde which would be able to overrun the smaller gangs. The problem was that they were really really slow, especially for my usual play style in 40k. I might rewrite my warband for the actual campaign.

Had a lot of fun. I'm excited to start a new small(ish) modelling project for this campaign, as it lets me paint all those cool fantasy miniatures with an actual purpose.
More to come in the future!

If you guys are interested, I could share some more detailed stuff of the actual campaign as it progresses. We don't have any non-disclosure agreements, so it's okay to write from the games.
Not sure how accurately I can describe the rules, but that gets clarified in the future.

Thanks for reading and keep on wargaming!

Good to see you again!

Airsoft! Used to do a little of that, myself. Still have a couple guns stashed away. Maybe when the kids are older we can shoot up some soda cans or something.

Exciting new minis. Digging the updated Succubus. And never sad to see Eldar. Love me some Mordheim, too, so lots to love in this update. My favorite gangs were Undead, Sisters, and Mercs. Skaven could be a lot of fun, too.

Mordheim was one of my favourite games growing up so always happy to see someone playing it, I'll be interested to see how the campaign progresses.

The Succubus conversion looks good, better than the original I think.

Looking forward to what you'll do with Mordheim! I've long been interested in the setting and the modelling opportunities, though not so much in playing the actual game.

Good to see you back Ezki, and with some promising looking models.

The succubus is particularly nice. I agree the new wings suit her pose much better. She could definitely fit in nicely with a Slaanesh force

The zombies should give you some nice conversion opportunities if Mordheim plays like my imagining with character development. Given your Elven leanings will they be undead elves?

Ezki,

I recognize those foam fantasy battle walls and towers....although mine have some washes to break up the grey.

Cheers,

CB

Gobert: Thank you! Character development is in a big role in Mordheim, although zombies or wolves do not gain any experience. Using elves as a base for zombies might be cool. I'm also thinking about "raising" zombies out of all the other warbands that I face during the campaign. Will see that in the future, as conversions take a lot of time and this might be a one time thing. Hopefully not.

CB: I'm sure to give that hint to the owner of those terrain pieces

mcmattila: I'm also very interested in the setting. Warhammer fantasy style minis with 40k level grimdark theme? Count me in!

Midget Gems: Thanks! Mordheim seems to be rarely played where I'm from. It might also be that I have not met the right people.

Youwashock: Thanks man! Lots of cool gangs in the Mordheim setting. My choice was easy as I already have some undead models and it was pretty much the only gang not picked by anyone yet.



Progress has been slow, but I'm getting there:




Yeah, one of the wings fell off. That is luckily an easy fix which I'll do when it's painted.

I decided to go with bluish skin as per the original source of inspiration. The colors on the clothing were chosen the same way.
Will have to repaint the wings, as I messed up the blending totally. This happened mostly because it's so darn hot in my student crib without any air condition and the sun shining to the living room all day. Makes it hard to concentrate properly, all the way to the point of getting annoyed and angry at my paints

The deadline for the Dakka painting contest is in ~21 hours, so I'll try to finish her up before that. I won't have time to use every technique I could, but trying to make her look decent.
It's also time to start learning when to call a model complete. Something I'm still struggling with.

Looking good, good luck finishing in time

Nice painting skills, looks awesome!

Coming along nicely! Bummer about the wing. Maybe stick a pin in there, too? When to call it done is something many struggle with. I am trying to learn that myself.

Saw your finished model over on the painting challenge thread and I dig the blue skin! Keen to see what else you've got planned for this army of yours.

That's a sexy Herald.

You can call it a Succubus if you like, but we all know.

Thank you very much guys!

Youwashock: Yeah I think pinning is the way to go once again. Only problem is that the part where the wing is attached is so thin.
I think calling something ready is a general issue with anything related to creating something from scratch, be it painting, drawing or composing music etc. One of the hardest skills to learn.
As a game programming student, I have noticed that perfecting small things with some features for too long becomes an issue every now and then

Tyranid Horde: Thanks pal! It was so late in the night that I did not have time to update the same pictures here yet.
Can't wait to start working with the rest of the army. Sadly I think the project will be moved to late summer / autumn, as I "have" to finish the Mordheim warband during the campaign. During summer time I'm also a lot less active when it comes to painting.

Excommunicatus: Well it surely looks like one too. Maybe the brainwashing works both ways?


Bam! Got the model finished just in time.
I sort of failed with the skin a bit, as I tried a bit too much and the paint ended being too thick. Painting skin is one of the big things I want to learn to do properly, especially with models like this.
Still pretty alright for a model painted in two afternoons. Aesthetic wise I'm happy with it and I think pose turned out well. I'm also glad that the layering and glazing on wings looks somewhat smooth. Used pretty much the same technique as with Eldrads cloak a few pages back, only with a little bit darker colors.










So, now I can say that I have finally started working with the Drukhari project. The next step will be either painting the Wyches I converted a year ago, or making one more Succubus and two Archons. I'm still a bit stuck with the color scheme for my vehicles and Kabalites. Maybe something similar to this. Also still not sure how to convert the Kabalites, or just use them as is. For this project I think my strategy will be proceeding with one unit at a time, adding them to my existing army. This way I can play with them, even though all the models are not converted. It would be a bit too daunting to strip / prime the whole half painted army I already possess.

Only one model finished during the last month! Not very good. But as I predicted the painting tempo has been getting slower and slower when we are moving closer to summer.
It's hard to justify sitting at my desk while the sun is shining and the urge to fix my hobby car is getting the better of me. I'm also working full time during the summer without any summer leave, so that eats a lot of the currently available time.
But to be fair, I have painted more models in the last six months than in last ~3-4 years combined

As I said in my reply to TH, I'm quite sure that the Drukhari project will be started at late summer at the earliest. The Undead Warband for Mordheim will be taking a huge chunk of my limited hobby time (not that it's a bad thing!). Not making any promises to any direction though, as my mind tends to wander around and the urge to paint something totally different might strike me at any time

So next time, hopefully some Mordheim!

Nice work as always Ezki.

Cheers,

CB

Nice finish. Looking forward to what's next, be it Mordheim or something else.