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I want to make wings for a Parasite of Mortex. I do not want to buy another kit just for wings, and right now I can't get a hold of any wings either. Since I wanted to use a Tyranid gargoyle for my PoM, I am afraid I will find someone who will not accept it for being too small, so I am thinking of using a warrior body.

So how can I make wings that look good and not cheesy?

Use a wire frame and fill in the membrane with GS.

Or buy some aftermarket wings, or use the swap shop to grab some.

I would try to make an armature with wire, to make wings like a bat's.

I would build up the arm bit with GS, and drape thick paper soaked in diluted PVA glue across to make the membranes. When dried it will be quite hard. The finger bones can than be put on top with thin strands of GS.

Bat or bird style wings?

Bat wins, for the Parasite of Mortex. I got some coat hanger wire. I like the sturdiness of it, but it is really thick. I guess it's ok for the top part.

Do you think green stuff if I use it as the "fingers" will be strong enough if I run it off the coat hanger? I like the idea of using paper and covering it with PVA glue. I never used green stuff before, so not sure if I should use it for the fingers part.

I'd just pick up some bits. The time you are going to spend is going to outweigh the savings.

If you go for GS wings, you can use wire to make a frame, then flatten out the GS and let it start to set for about 40 minutes. Then it will be soft enough to shape, and hard enough to stay the way you shape them.

Davor wrote:Bat wins, for the Parasite of Mortex. I got some coat hanger wire. I like the sturdiness of it, but it is really thick. I guess it's ok for the top part.

Do you think green stuff if I use it as the "fingers" will be strong enough if I run it off the coat hanger? I like the idea of using paper and covering it with PVA glue. I never used green stuff before, so not sure if I should use it for the fingers part.

I would use paper clip thickness wire for everything. Use several strands of it to make the armature for the arms, and two strands twisted together for the hand and finger bits. If you don't want to use GS, wind strips of PVA soaked paper around the wires to bulk them out into limbs. Then drape the wing membrane piece of paper over the top.


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For ease of twisting these wires together, get some florist's wire. It is quite soft and can be bent easily with the fingers.

In the long run, do try modelling with putty. It is very useful for customising models.

k this is how i do it

make the armature, make it nice and thick and thin in between the wing span

cut masking tape into strips and layer them to create a square of masking tape, place the armature in the square and tape up the other side, cut out the wing and apply green stuff if you want,makes great wings

All good advice. Make sure you you leave a bit of the wire armature sticking out the end of the wing that'll go into the body too so that you can drill a hole and use the armature itself as a pin, and you'll have a very strong joint.

Check here too. It seems to be a pretty often overlooked part of the GW website, and has some decent stuff, although it's definitely more expensive than going through a bitz site.

GW and various other bitz places sell bat wings separately. I'd recommend one of the larger sets of wings, such as Winged Nightmare or Dark Pegasus. The harpy wings will be much too small, the Dragon wings may be too big.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/armySubUnitCats.jsp?catId=cat440125a&rootCatGameStyle=

If you've never done modelling before, I'd not recommend starting with such an ambitious project.

EDIT: *chuckles* Ninja'd, it seems.

I am the 14 minute ninja...

Wait, that's probably not a terribly flattering epithet.

And eh, you added relevant information on sizes. I've no clue how big any of those things are.

If you don't want to go through all the trouble of modeling them, Forge World makes Shrike wings that you can buy.



They are about $20-25 for three. Get 2 packs of wings and two boxes of tyranid warriors and with a little conversion for the PoM, you have a PoM and 5 Shrikes.

Wifey will not let me buy anything right now, and I can't blame her. I have so much stuff not done, she will not be happy if I did, especially if it's only for one model.

I like the masking tape idea, I will have to keep that in mind next time. I can't believe I forgot about paper clips. I just found my last few I have, going to have to go the dollar store and get more for who ever needed them .

Thank you all for the suggestions, you were a great help.

I would suggest a Warrior body for the Parasite rather than a Gargoyle because the info in the book says the Parasite is the size of a Warrior. As for the wings, I would suggest buying some. I know you said you don't have the $ to buy some, but you'll end up spending close to or more than as much $ on the green stuff depending on where you get it from, and unless you've been sculpting stuff before, they won't look nearly as good.

GW does sell wings as separate bitz on their online store, for really pretty cheap.
http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/armySubUnitCats.jsp?catId=cat440125a&rootCatGameStyle=
http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/armySubUnitCats.jsp?catId=cat450009a&rootCatGameStyle=

You could always head over to Michaels or Hobby Lobby and look into the little bins that have toys in them. They are normally plastic and not very articulated, mostly used for Dio ramas in schools they look like this.



3 to 5 bucks. Clip the wings, and have a go.

Buying wings is naturally easier than making your own.

The good thing about making your own is that the experience will come in useful for other scratchbuilding projects.

It depends on how much enjoyment you get out of the modelling, really.

spireland wrote:I'd just pick up some bits. The time you are going to spend is going to outweigh the savings.

+1, I tell you from personal experience.


If you still want to try, the best way I've found is to find a few peices of plastic of cured GS rods and make the rough shape of the skeleton for your structure. Then you gradually build the item using layers of GS and parts of plastic that are properly shaped/detailed. This requires a lot of sculpting, shaping, time for curing, trimming shapes etc. Its tedious, but you can literally make anything with it.


Coat hanger is a bit thick IMO. Paperclips would be much easier to shape and work with.

Here is an example. WIP leg for my DP made out of a lightning claw and part of a left over DP arm from the GW kit.



And here is a picture of the work so far. Time consuming but very rewarding IMO.

I already have GS from when I bought it last year, so I thought I may as well try and use it since I don't need to buy anything right now.

I am surprised how fast it gets used up. I also wanted to try and get the experience. Wow this is a lot of work. Man I need a lot more practice. One side I got ok, the other side, is meh.

Hopefully I will get better with practice. It was fun and frustrating at the same time.

Thanks for your help guys, it did help.

The best practice is to just start making crazy crap. Use all your spare bitz so that you don't have to spend any money....I did that with a ridiculous magnet project last month and it was the first time I ever picked up a tube of GS.

Kitchen towel with layers of thin superglue (once it's been put on an armature) work but use in a very well ventilated room as it really gets to your eyes.