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Argh! So close to the end! I cant wait to see this done.

Am really looking forward to seeing the finished thing. Great work!

Very nice work.

So unusual to see some Necron scenery but very welcome.

This is one of the most incredible projects I've ever seen on Dakka Dakka.

In the last chapter we finished the construction of the Temple and somewhere off-camera I primed the whole thing, with the exposed LEDs masked off of course. Since most of the outer shell of the Temple is composed of white Urethane resin, I primed it using dark auto-body primer, which bonds best with this kind of smooth resin.

While the Temple is drying, it's time to take a look at the base structure. Another crazy idea came up that changed everything yet again.



Up until now I had been planning on making this one whole structure, with some way to detach the Temple for battery access. But if I was going to have the Temple removable anyway, why not have the whole thing modular? This would make the whole project easier to ship and store, and give it the added benefit of being a whole set of scenery.

I built walls across the top of the foundation piece, which would serve as both a decorative, defensible position when the temple was removed, and it would brace the temple tightly when the set was assembled. I fancied-up the central area with extra plating and designs, and a circular feature in the center to compliment the iris gate on the roof of the temple... maybe some kind of access route to the core of the planet? Who knows, maybe they need to get buckets of lava in a hurry.



I'll take a second to talk about plating this monster. Every exposed face of foam, every rough seam and odd corner received a plasticard facade. This meant that for each and every face to be plated, I had to take a piece of paper, rub it with graphite to find the edges, cut the paper to the outline, then use that paper as a template to cut an identical piece of plastic. Yeah.



Now to work on the Obelisks. My plan for these giant phallus monuments was to have one attached to the base, but broken off and ruined, and the other would be removable like the Temple, making a set of three pieces that could be arranged in different ways.

In order to help the standing Obelisk stand on its own, I hot-glued a rock to the inside of the base to make it more bottom-heavy. The Obelisk would attach to the base over a small square piece for stability. Here you can see the base of the Temple, primed and in place, and the second Obelisk laying in its intended resting place.



I hacked up the second Obelisk, filled the interior with blue foam and filler and then smoothed the jagged edges out. I carved some cracks into the laying piece, glued it down and started working on the ground cover, including making a couple of craters and using bark, gravel and lightweight spackling to give contour to the ground.



PVA glue and a few different grades of sand, from super fine dust up to coarse gravel and shredded cork, then a few extra coats of PVA to soak and bind it all together. Then I set it aside to dry thoroughly before priming.



Painting time! The primer I used was not true black, but actually dark grey, so in order to preserve the shadows I would need, I washed the temple with black paint, particularly the undersides of everything. The Temple is upside down here so the wash flows upwards.

Now I stood back and had to make my final decisions on a color scheme. My criteria was: it had to be dark, "dingy" as my client even requested. It had to be metal, no polished marble or granite on this piece, and it had to be interesting to look at, with definition between the trim and body of the structure.



I decided on a dark gunmetal highlighted to pure platinum on the very edges for the main body of the structures, and a brass-like warmer toned dark metal trim color. I tested my trim mix on the stairs on the base, carefully bringing the color up. It seemed to work, so I attacked the Temple head-on.



I wanted to proceed slowly, I really did. But from here it was like a chain reaction. I finished the whole front of the Temple in one go, decided that the color scheme was perfect and somewhere the sun was rising, setting and rising again, completely ignored as I literally destroyed a handful of golden nylon brushes on this thing.



One of the final steps of the Temple was to insert my glowly green plastic strips into the prepared slits to create the Necron-y mojo.



I was careful not to overdo it, despite the temptation. I could easily make it look more like something from Tron than the grim darkness of the future and all that.



I finished the front door panels as well, another fiddly process that sounded easy on paper, but turned into some kind of grim, dark Katamari Damacy debacle, with pieces of metal panels, green plastic and foamcore glued together into a random ball, collecting other bits and pieces as I tried to straighten it all out. But in the end, it was exactly what I hoped for.



Now back to the base piece again, which I masked off for ease of highlighting.



I painted the ground and rocks, then one of the final steps was the rest of the gold glyphs. I undercoated in yellow first.



Then I used Vallejo flesh wash and pale yellow to shade and highlight the runes, almost going for a NMM look, but to really make it stand out I gave it a wash of burnished gold at the end.



A few last touches to the temple, like broken green rods inside the structure, and overall light weathering and it was done!

At this point I had to wait for our photographer to come and get some real studio shots, and so with that, I'll post the the final pictures next.

Awesome project.

But just one thing don't put any blood on it,the necrons don't leave any blood or anything else,they just atomise everthing to dust.

Melkhiordarkblade wrote:Awesome project.

But just one thing don't put any blood on it,the necrons don't leave any blood or anything else,they just atomise everthing to dust.

No, no. This project left blood on me.

Terraformer. You are a Triumphant, unicorn slaying, beast who bestrides the line between Titan and God. Amazing......

Here is an assortment of finalized studio shots.

Holy... this has instantly inspired me to start necrons. They will be my next army. I have spoken.

Jaw-Dropping and Inspiring!!! Excellent work, Terraformer!

Would love to own that.

That looks so awesome!

Wow just, wow spot on with design and the end result is breathtaking great work mate!

Holy !!!
Is it possible to take a pic of the completed temple in the dark with the LEDs on?

(I need to make something like this when I actually start/finsh my necron army!!!)


M.K

Fantastic! Truly inspiring. Absolutley spot-on in design, perfectly executed. Well done, and any hints as to your next project?

Matt.Kingsley wrote:Holy !!!
Is it possible to take a pic of the completed temple in the dark with the LEDs on?

We had a hard time getting pictures in the dark, issues with over-exposure, etc. But I'm still sorting through what we have, so I'll post what I can find

Really kewl, but what happened to Wilson?

Holy McJebus

Another excellent terrain piece. Wish I had seen this earlier so I could stalk yo... erm... I mean the progress

Your attention to detail is fantastic.

Truly superb and very inspiring.

Glad to see your painting skills match your building skills and imagination.

truly your deserve your name ...

That is awesome work. I have been inspired to get back to terrain building.

That has got to be the best necron terrain I have ever seen! The green strips and black marble effect are stunning.

Damn! That is all.

Perkustin wrote:Terraformer. You are a Triumphant, unicorn slaying, beast who bestrides the line between Titan and God. Amazing......

Posted that before i saw the studio photos, i now add your photographer to the list of Triumphant beasts.

CadianXV wrote:Fantastic! Truly inspiring. Absolutley spot-on in design, perfectly executed. Well done, and any hints as to your next project?

Thanks so much

As for what's next? Two words: Space Hulk.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Perkustin wrote:

Perkustin wrote:Terraformer. You are a Triumphant, unicorn slaying, beast who bestrides the line between Titan and God. Amazing......

Posted that before i saw the studio photos, i now add your photographer to the list of Triumphant beasts.

Hehe, thank you, I'll pass that along, our photographer will be happy to share triumphant beast status


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Here are a couple more semi-dark shots of the LEDs in action.



And a finished WIP pic while it was still on my desk.

As a Necron player I can't even put in to words how good a few pieces of that caliber would make the battlefield look.

You are truly an artist. Easily the most skilled terrain builder I've seen.

thank you terraformer!
those semidark pics are great!

OMG THE BEST THING I HAVE EVER SEEN good job sir

You know, sometimes things just do seem to happen for a reason. I was cleaning up my "friends" list and deleted you by accident. Duh. So added you back and then thought "huh, it's been a while... I think I'll head over and see if there's anything new".

Wow. Just... staggered. Simply amazing. The detail is stunning, and the atmosphere the LED creates Not only is your work incomparable with anyone else I've seen on Dakka (many are awesome, but there's only 1 Terraformer) but you also inadvertently solved a problem I've had for years with a single picture. I literally , it was such a logical and simple solution and had eluded me for years.

So thank you for sharing this project, it's great to see new work (and I'm really looking forward to the Space Hulk!) and also thank you for showing the "how to" WIP. You have changed how will I model in the future.