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There's a good article here, or there's my trials and tribulations in the first couple of pages of my Guard blog.

I'm not sure where the best place to buy the silicon and resins are in Oz though. In the UK it's a place called Tomps.

If you do look at casting any bits, I'd just make the tail so you don't have to try and recast any of the actual GW models. Work out the best point to cut the legs off the model and then work the tail out from there. Even if you still need to do a little bit of sculpting to get the tail to join on smoothly, you'll have saved yourself time

@ endtransmission: Thanks for that - will definitely have to look into it.

Well, a small tournament has come along and so I need to pick up the pace a bit on my army. I don't think I'll have time to do my Prime properly first time round, so I've done a quick conversion using a warrior, the head carapace of a Trygon, and using upside down monstrous scything talons as bone swords

Front


Side 1


Side 2


After the tourney finishes, I'm considering using a Ravener body to make my official Tyranid warior Prime - which will fit in nicely with building on the serpent theme...


I have also started churning out the painting on my gargoyles. With 6 fully painted, and 9 well and truly on their way, I hope to have a full brood of 15 ready soon for the Tourny.

On the Tourny, it's 750 points, with the following OC:
1 HQ
2-6 Troop
0-1(2) Elite
0-1(2) Fast
0-1(2) Heavy

Essentially, you are allowed up to one unit in fast, heavy and elite, plus one unit in one of those slots only (so 0-1 in 2, and 0-2 in the third).

My current thinking is to leave my Zoeys, 1 gargoyle brood, and one hormy brood at home, giving me -

Prime - Twin boneswords and Deathspitter
4 warriors - 3 deathspitters, 1 barbed strangler
13 Hormagaunts
15 Gargoyles
2 Hive Guard
1 Trygon Prime

My only worry is that this force might struggle with objective missions...

Haven't been posting much recently as housesitting for a while and finding it hard to find the time to paint convert.

I have been doing some work though, and have tried doing a better job of the carapace on a termagant (trying to get it right before I finish my Trygon!)

The real life model looks a bit smoother then the pics (below), but not by much. I still don't seem to be able to get that smooth transition I desire. The scab red goes down ok on the black
(when I thin it down enough), and the blood red goes down well on top of that, but then I find the orange just doesn't look right... and then the yellow doesn't wuite look right either...

Any tips anyone has on how to do this transition smoother would be much appreciated. I am currently using black base, two coats of thinned down scab red, two coats of thinned down blood red, 2 coats of thinned down blazing orange, and finally two coats of thinned down sunburst yellow. I am considering washing the armour after this step with red, and then re-doing two coats of the yellow, but not sure how this will go...

Pic 1


Pic 2


Pic 3


I have been also working on improving the conversion of boneswords for my Prime.

Having looked at an idea from Dark Gear's blog (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/276421.page, I decided to try a different take.

The results are below (without green putty yet). Going for more of a 'arms morphing into boneswords' look rather than my previous 'hands holding boneswords' look.

Let me know what you think so far...





The one on the right fits together better, however I'm hoping they'll both look good after I've put the GS in...

Thoughts, comments and suggestions appreciated as always!

I think you are definitely improving. I imagine it looks quite striking from a distance (rather than blown up photographs). Your paint may not be thin enough yet - hard to tell - but the main issue at the moment is probably the jump between the colours you are using.

Try this: (thinned and coat until solid)
1. Black base coat.
2. Scab red
3. 1:1 Scab red/blood red
4. Blood red
5. 1:1 Bood red, blazing orange
6. Blazing orange
7. 1:1 Blazing orange/Sunburst yellow
8. Sunburst yellow
9. 1:1 Sunburst yellow/white edge highlights

The 1:1 mixes should help to smooth the transition.

Start you brush at the dark end and draw towards the light end each stroke. With each step, start progressively further away from the dark end.

You may also want to concentrate on only the ridges from about step 5...

It's a lot of steps - you may find some are unnecessary, or need to be broken down further - but you won't know until you try

A wash of some kind at the end will help merge the layers further (Baal Red and/or Sepia possibly?) and then re-edge highlight.

Of course - this all assumes you want to put this much effort into rank and file - but it will be good practise for your HQ!

Good luck - look forward to seeing the outcome!

@ Arakasi: Thanks for the tips. I think I'll have to try this... and yes, I think part of my problem is my paint isn't thin enough...

Although I probably won't go to this length on all my rank and file (there will simply be too many of them in the end), I do want to get it right on the samll guys first before I do my characters/big guys.

Tried the red wash on the Termagant - definitely helps with the smoothness of the blend, however leaves him looking brighter then I would like. I think I'll just have to try and get it right without putting a wash over at the end....

Pics below:






My gargoyles are also coming along nicely - I now have an additional 5 completing my brood of ten for the tourney. If I get time, I may add in a few additional details here and there, but for the purposes of making sure my entire army is ready for the tourney, I'm calling them done for now...



My boneswords are looking better then I expected. I've always been a bit nervous about using greenstuff, but I didn't think this attempt was too bad at filling in the holes, smoothing out the edges and even adding a little bit of detail (vains going up into the base of the swords):





Will start putting up progress updates on my new Prime as they become available.

Boneswords are looking good. Using Greenstuff to match existing details is much easier than creating entirely new detail - I find it a good step for building confidence (not that I've got to the creating entirely new detail stage yet myself...)

@ Arakasi: Agreed.

Ok, started doing more painting on a hormagaunt and a termagant using thinner paint and the additional steps as suggested by Arakasi.

I've also decided to document this as a step by step process so that if it doesn't work out, people can offer suggestions at where I've gone wrong. I'm essentially trying to get a smooth transition of colour from the black up the top of each scale, through red and eventually a bright yellow at the tip of each scale (like fire).

My proposed method is to start with a base of Chaos black, then Scab Red, Then a Blood red Scab Red mix, then Blood Red, then a blood red/blazing orange mix, then blazing orange, then orange/yellow mix, then yellow, then possibly a yellow white mix.

Step one - Scab Red

First Coat:

Some more progress on the carapace:

2nd coat of scab red




And the first coat of scab red/blood red mix:




Blending nicely so far, lets hope it continues!

I really like the way you've contrasted the carapace with the skin tone. Well done.

Looking good! Now you just need better/bigger pics so we can see flaws you'll never see from 3 feet away

Scratch that - apparently I clicked on the one small pic...

@ lord marcus: Thanks - I was hoping for something a bit different and that aspect of it turned out quite well. Now I just need to try and perfect the blending process and I'll be set.

@ Arakasi: Thanks - yeah, I've tried using an actual digital camera rather then my phone camera to try and up the quality of the pic a bit. Not sure whether to use Dakka's 'adjust pic' function, but the current pics of the termagant and hormagaunt are unadjusted.

Here's the second coat of the Scab Red/Blood red mix. The blend is still looking pretty smooth, but I'm starting to get worried that I won't have enough room to put down all the colours through to yellow or yellow/white mix... Not sure what I can do about that, obviously it will be easier on the bigger models but really hard on these smaller ones I'm suspecting...

Now applied the first coat of straight blood red. I definitely think the transition at this stage is smoother, still having concerns though that I'll run out of room for the final layers...

Unfortunately - you won't really know until the end I guess. But that's why you have so many of the little blighters to practise on! (That's what I delude myself with my Orks at least...)

Possibly you have left too much of the darker shades - ie not started far enough up the plate with each colour - but I'd wait until finished to see if a) it actually is an issue and b) to get a better idea of the spacing you need for the next one.

On the plus side - according to 'eavy metal - it won't come together until the last layer. If it comes together before then, you peaked early!

My Tyranids are snake creatures.

I sculpted a snake base for my Termagants and cast 67 copies.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Hive_Fleet_Kielbasa

It was pretty easy after a couple of initial mistakes.

My warriors have tails made of Milliput. Too expensive to buy Ravener kits just for the tails.

@ Arakasi: Yeah - I suppose you're right... and yes, I do have lots to practice on (I think I've got 72 Termagants and 52 hormagaunts...)

@ Kilkrazy: Wow - this is pretty much exactly where I'm hoping to end up. I decided to focus on getting a core force together initially so that I can start playing in tourneys, but then hope to develop a serpent/snake Nids army. My one fear with Snake based warriors was that the lay 40k Gamer might not be able to distinguish them claerly enough from Raveners - what has been your experience with your warriors in the tourney scene? everyone ok with them as warriors even though they 'slither'?

Latest painting update - second coat of blood red. Really liking the blend here - doesn't come across as well in the photos but looks pretty smooth in real life. Really hoping the orange through yellow comes off as good as this is.

Latest update on the carapace painting - first coat of Blood Red/Blaxing Orange mix. The orange is already looking a bit overpowering, even mixed with the red... Although I'm tempted to go over with a red wash now to deepen it, I'm going to play this one out to the end first and see what the end result looks like... then I can go back and try different things on later models...

If it's a bit overpowering, you may need to go for 2:1 or even 3:1 Blood Red to Blazing Orange. Hard to tell from the pics - not large enough in the gallery...

Yeah, I need to get a better digital camera - as once I crop in with the 3MP it doesn't blow up enough after that...

I'm hoping the orange will become less obvious as I progress through to yellow.

Anyway - here is the next step - second coat blodd red/blazing orange:

Just for something a bit different, here's a WIP pic of my Warrior Prime:



With the lower body of a warrior, and the upper body of a ravener to beef him up a bit. Next step is to attach the boneswords with the larger arms. Also thinking of using a carnifex head on him to make him look like a real brute - will have to play around with that one though as the carnies head might be a bit too big...

Back onto the carapace painting, and now we're really starting to look a bit orange - first coat of thinned down blazing orange:





I'm really hoping the yellow balances out all this orange... I guess I'll see.


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Second coat of blazing orange:





The blending seems to be turning out ok, it just looks very very orange - again just hoping the yellow balances out the orange in the end...

Keep going! You can always use a Baal Wash at the end to tone it down/bring it together and then re-edge highlight if necessary

@ Arakasi: Yeah, I'm hoping I won't have to, but we'll see. Also, using varnish can help a bit, and gives the carapace that 'wet shiny' look which seems to work well on Nid carapace...

Next pic shows the first bits of yellow with the Orange/Yellow blend - already starting to brighten the minis up

Unfortunately the pics are not detailed enough (not on my laptop anyway) to see exactly how well you are pulling this off... You may want to just concentrate on the higher ridges for your pure yellow (still working towards the edge, but in thin lines on the ridges) - also good if you feel you are running out of space


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Still - I can tell it's much smoother than your previous attempts

@ Arakasi: Yeah - I can see I'll have to either get a new camera, or find a way of taking the photo closer to the mini without needing the flash... (weather hasn't been good for natural light pics here...)

Ah well... at least it gives you an idea of how it's looking, and it's definitely smoother than the last ones...

Here's the second coat of the yellow orange blend. I'm starting to feel a little less worried about the orange now, I think the yellow may just end up offsetting it enough...

Looking insanly good. Also a good conversion idea, but wouldent it be eisier to first convert them and then paint them?

@ MrTau: Thanks! And yes - definitely better to convert them first. My main issue at the moment is that I'm on a tight schedule for a tournament coming up soon, so I'm just trying to churn out a fully painted army for that before I re-start the serpent conversions. Hopefully I'll be able to create a 'tail mould' which will make the conversion process faster and more consistent in the future!

Another update on the carapace painting - first coat of straight yellow:






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And the second coat of straight yellow:





Have no more concerns about the mini looking too orange now - it just needed the next layers to make the orange band smaller - glad I stuck with the process rather than changing it mid-way!


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Some more on my Tyranid Warrior Prime Conversion:

Ok - Back to a bit more painting - I have now applied the first coat of thinned down Yellow/White. It's interesting how I was really getting worried about how orange it was looking, because that's now not an issue at all. Doing the multiple steps is also helping with a reasonably smooth gradient of colour, and although it's not perfect I reckon it will look fantastic on the table top once they're all done.






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And the second coat of thinned down yellow/white - They're really starting to pop now:

Ok - Have now applied a thinned down coat of pure white. Mainly I've just used little lines right on the edges, as I didn't want the white to come through too strongly...

You probably didn't need to go as far as pure white - what you did was what I had in mind for your pure yellow stage. Your yellow/white would then have been an edge highlight (ie a very thin line along the very edges - not a blend) It looks good, but I think it was better pre the pure white - how do they look in person/real life?

I'm not too sure about the white. On the one hand, it really does make the carapace pop! On the other hand, it might just be a bit too bright...

Overall I think I prefer it at the stage before, however I wanted to go all the way at least once so that I had a basis of comparison.

Once I've done a second thinned down white coat, I plan to put some varnish over the top which should help to darken it a bit, smooth out the colours and give the carapce that 'wet' look. Next time I'll try finishing off with the yellow white edging as suggested, and see whether or not that looks better with or without the varnish...

Ok, after doing the second thinned down white highlighting, I've decided it probably would be better to finish with the yellow/white mix.

Also - after a few attempts I've managed to get some bigger pics of my little guys so that you can see all the mistakes I've made better...

As you can see, the blending looks reasonable until the white really. On the white coat, I don't think I removed enough of the paint from my brush before doing the highlighting and have put too much white on...

Next step is to try varnish over the top to see how it smooths the transition, and if I like the 'wetter' looking carapace... not sure how the photos will turn out though if I need the flash...