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I've been working on my homebrew Primaris Chapter, Night Ravens, for a while, but hadn't thought to post anything online until very recently. I've decided to start a little blog/thread from now on. I've started taking photos of the models I've already painted up and will be posting them in the showcase forum, and here I'll be putting up my work in progress as I go.

Comments, questions, criticism and advice all welcome!!

Currently I'm working on a Redemptor Dreadnought, and while building it I was struggling with deciding how to pose it and make it look dynamic, and thought it looked quite good if it was lifing something in the power fist and sort of leaning the other way to counter-balance. I just needed to find something to put in the power fist that wouldn't need any green stuff or too much skill or fiddling.
Turns out an old Tyranid warrior I never got around to painting from 4th edition fits pretty perfectly!

So here's my Redemptor holding a Tyranid warrior:

Night Ravens Redemptor lifting Tyranid Warrior update - Primed and started basecoat.

Sprayed with Chaos Black, armour basecoat Kantor Blue.

So I've finished the base coats, and I'm really happy with it so far. I went with green and yellow on the Tyranid Warrior, I wanted something that will stand out and contrast nicely with the Dreadnaught, which will be mostly dark blue with some black and red.

I'm planning on brightening up the green and yellow on the Tyranid Warrior so that it really pops, hopefully end up with a sort of praying mantis/grasshopper type look.

Next its washes and highlighting. This is where I always go wrong, and end up thinking it looked better before I try and highlight. Can't seem to keep paint straight lines and it turns into a horrible sloppy mess! Wish me luck!

That looks fun, best of luck with the rest

Just noting, in case you do something similar in the future, the whole situation would look more real and polished if the Warrior's feet were repositioned a bit. The legs are currently in a balanced crouch, as if standing normally instead of kicking and flailing and the hooves are positioned as if against an invisible plane. Straightening a knee, angling a feet down from the ankle etc. would increase the feeling of struggle you want to convey to the viewer.

Don't be afraid of some cutting and stuffing, it's fun and rewarding!

Thanks for the advice!

In future I'll absolutely do something about the legs, you're right, they don't really look like the Tyranid is struggling and thrashing. I was a little intimidated to do cutting and repositioning, not got much experience modelling yet and I've never used green stuff of anything like that.


I used a tyrand warrior that I had previously bulit and was attacehed to a base and primed, so all I did was remove the base. Next time I do something similar I'll try my hand at the cutting and stuffing!

So I've shaded and highlighted my Redemptor.

I'm happy with some and less happy with other parts, my highlights still need a lot of work and are pretty sloppy in a lot of places, I just need to keep practicing I think, maybe a finer brush too. Oh and a steadier hand!

I like how the Tyranid colours have turned out, I was going for something fairly bright to standout against the darker coloured Dreadnought, and I'm pretty pleased with the glow effect on the plasma gun's coils. I tried to get a sort of rusty look on the metal parts, especially the exhausts and thats turned out well too.

Next step will be to apply transfers and do the base, nothing too fancy, just some texture/technical paint and a bit of static grass. And I might try and tidy up some of the highlighting a bit. Not sure, I might just end up making things worse!!

As always, comments, criticism and advice is welcome!


Anyway, here it is:

I've finished!! Since the last post I've applied transfers and painted the base, and added some static grass, then I went back and touched up the paint a little bit, mostly trying to correct the worst of my sloppy highlights and a few other touch ups here and there as well as painting the teeth on the Tyranid Warrior.

I've got to say, happy with the final result, I think It'll make a really great stand-out piece in my army.

I think I've got a bit better with my painting of this model, and next time I try something similar I think I'll push my modelling skills a little further and try to do some chopping and repositioning, I'll have to get some green stuff and see how I get on with that!

This was my first big model, I've never built or painted dreadnoughts or monsters or any vehicles before, only really infantry up until now (the biggest thing I've painted before now is Tyranid Warriors, and that was years ago). Some aspects were a lot easier than with infantry, due to the size of some of the details, but in other ways I've found it far less forgiving. Brush strokes really show up on the big flat armour panels!!

Now to decide what to do next!! I have a Repulsor, a 10 man squad of Reivers and a 30th anniversary Primaris Veteran Sergeant still in their boxes.

I'm currently making the effort to photograph my already painted Night Ravens, and posting them on the Painting & Modelling Showcase forum, but I'm trying to post them more or less in the order I painted them to try and have a chronology to track my own progress and as they aren't WIP haven't included them here. Once I've caught up on that I'm planning on doing some whole army photos.

Anyway, as always, any and all comments, criticism and advice is welcome.

Couldn't attach all the images in one post, so here are the other angles.

Nice dreadnought, I like how he’s grabbed the nid! Good effort on the highlighting, it’s tough to keep the highlights consistent on a marine, but something as big as a redemptor must be even harder. Looking forward to see what’s joining the ravens next

Classic pose.

"I have come to destroy you."

I've decided that what the Night Ravens need next is a Repulsor.

As I mentioned already, I had a Repulsor, a box of 10 Reivers and a 30th Anniversary Veteran Sergeant waiting to join the Night Ravens, but as i already have 6 Reivers, and every squad has a Sergeant already, it had to be the Repulsor.

This is my first tank, and only my second vehicle of any kind after the Redemptor, so I've decided to photgraph the build as well as the painting. To be honest, I enjoy painting more than building the models, but so far this one isn't too fiddly. Glueing the sides of the hull on didn't go exactly to plan, I've ended up with some small gaps along the joins, but hopefully the won't be too noticeable once its all painted.


My progress so far:






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I've got to be honest, I'm not the biggest fan of the Repulsor itself. I don't hate it, but it isn't a great looking tank!!

I'm toying with leaving the bottom as is and not adding the skids at all, or maybe only adding the skids at the back, behind the side doors. Has anyone tried this? How does it look once painted? I don't want to end up with a model that just screams that it is unfinished. I suppose after painting it wouldn't be too hard to had the skids if it looks really bad, but if anyone has tried it or seen one without the skids I'd appreciate your opinion and/or photos if possible?

Also the turret looks far too overloaded!! I want to be able to use the model on the tabletop so I won't be leaving any armament off, but I'm considering my options with what I can trim/leave out without interfering with it in-game.


Here's what I'm thinking:

Leave off the whole antenna assembly behind the turret

Leave off all the supplies/ammo boxes on the sides behind the doors. Possibly place the autolaunchers/fragstorm launchers here instead of on the turret.

Possibly reposition the Krak launchers to somewhere on the hull instead of on the turret, not sure where yet or if at all.


I think the model looks better and more tank-like with the turret closed, but I was really looking forward to having the marine poking his head out the top and painting him up in techmarine colours to contrast with the tank which will be almost entirely dark blue. Not sure now....


Any thoughts on this?

Didn't get a whole lot of modelling done today, only added the doors and the hull weapons. I've gone with the hull mounted lascannons, since I have an all Primaris army and there's no other way to get a lascannon! Storm bolters for the over-the-door guns.

Not sure what to put over the rear door/hatch but I'm tempted to go with another storm bolter. All the Replulsors I've seen seem to either have the heavy stubber or the rocket pod, so an storm bolter at the back would be something different. Still haven't added the skids on the bottom, still unsure if I will or not, and I've left off the casing around the engines at the back for now. Not sure if I'll add that or leave it off. I quite like having the engines a bit more visible... Anyone got any thoughts on this?

Finished building my Repulsor, ready for priming. I've left off the skids around the bottom, not sure whether I'll add them on at the end or not, but I'm thinking not at the moment. Just need to decide how to paint the little legs. Probably metallic, but might try for a sort of glow effect.

I've gone a little off plan with the weapon positions, I've never liked the auto launchers/fragstorm launchers and krakstorm launchers stuck on the sides of the turret so I've moved them. Krakstorm launchers on the hull like little fins at the back, one of the fragstorm launchers mounted on the hull front facing and the other in the weapon slot on the back. Which meant I needed to find a place for the weapon that should be mounted on the back. I decided to put the Icarus ironhail heavy stubber (with slight modifications) in the turret marine's hands. I also left the engine casing and all the antennas off and haven't added any of the supplies/boxes that stick onto the hull on both sides.


It still isn't the best model, and is still very busy looking in the turret, my own fault since after stripping it down I decided to keep the hatch open and put a gun in the marine's hands as well as the ones already there.

I'm pretty happy with it so far, let me know what you think!

Made some more progress with the Repulsor. All primed and I've finished the base coat on the removable weapons, turret and gunner. Went with Techmarine colours on the gunner, so red. The plan is for him to be a darker shade than the Company red that'll be on the tank. I wasn't sure what colour to paint the weapon casings on the turret, initially I was thinking black, but I'm planning to paint a fair amount of the hull black rather than all dark blue, so wanted something else. Went with brown in the end. Not sure if it works. Have to wait and see. If I really don't like the brown when everything else is painted I might go back and change it. Not sure yet.

Finished the base coat on the hull. No need to make sure I don't screw it up when I shade and highlight!



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Not sure why the photos are on their side, they were the right way before I uploaded them.

Finally finished the Repulsor. I've got to say I'm very happy with the result!! I tried a couple of new things and am definitely improving in some areas. I took a couple of chances when I built the model, moving the position of a few bits and leaving off some of the model's components. I wasn't sure how it would look once finished and painted and was a little worried that it would look like I hadn't finished building it, but I really like it and think it looks better than the how the model is "supposed" to look.

The changes I made to the model components/positions:

- I decided not to put the frag launchers/auto launchers on the turret, instead one is mounted on forward facing on the front hull, the other is in the rear weapon slot above the rear hatch/door.
- The icarus missile pod/icarus heavy stubber could no longer go in the usual position above the rear hatch, so I canabalised the Icaraus stubber and the regular pintle mounted stubber and put it inthe turret gunner's hands.
- Krak launchers are not on the turret, instead mounted on the hull at the rear, positioned like fins.
- I left off all the supplies/ammo boxes usually mounted on the hull at the back on both sides, i thought it looked too busy with them on.
- I left off all the skids/feet around the bottom of the model and instead left the little legs exposed. I figured these are the source of the ant-grav/ repulsor field and I never like the look of the skids.
- I left off the casing around the engines at the rear, just thought it looked better without it, exposing more of the turbines and it gave a reason for why the guard rail/ handle is there.
- I left off all the antennas etc on the turret. It just ends up looking so busy, especially since the gunner is now also holding a weapon in his hands along with the pintle mounted one.

Painting-wise, I tried to push myself with the headlights, and with the light from them on the hull just below. This is the bit I'm least happy with. the headlights themselves are messy and the paint is too thick and the lighting effect below them is too stark. I tired to get something subtler at first, but it turned out really badly, so started over. I was tempted to just go back and paint over again with the regular dark blue of the reast of the armour, but its not so bad and I've decided to leave it.


I'm happy with trhe overall colour scheme. It definitely fits with the rest of the Night Ravens and I think I've managed to find natural places for the dark blue and black of the chapter colours and the red for the company colours without it looking too busy or forced.


I'm happiest with the gunner. I wanted him to be a darker shade of red (for tech-marine traditional colours) than the company colours, and painted the pauldrons black with the dark blue trim. I think his colour has turned out really well and I'm super happy with the highlights on his armour too (less so with the highlights on the tank itself, but they're ok). And I was worried about screwing up his eyes, I think they've turned out well, both the green and the blue on the targeting thingimybob.
I even painted a little crosshair on the screen for his hand-held Icarus Heavy Stubber!!


I was trying for a sort of blue/white glow for the legs to show they are emitting the repulsor field. Overall I'm happy with how they look, I think it gives the right impression, but its not nearly as glowy as I was originally hoping.

Anyway, here it is:



















I'm going to try and get some more photos, without my hand and hobby station in shotand post them over on the showcase forum at some point too.

Hope you like it, and please give feedback, both on my painting and what do you think of the adjustmensts I've made to the standard layout of the model and weapons?

Nice work dude!

Also glad to see I'm not the only one who's repulsors dont go together properly at the front. I've built 3 now and each one is the same. Still it's an amazing model and yours looks dope.

DiscoKing wrote:
Nice work dude!

Also glad to see I'm not the only one who's repulsors dont go together properly at the front. I've built 3 now and each one is the same. Still it's an amazing model and yours looks dope.

Thanks, I’m really pleased with how it’s turned out. Getting the hull to fit together was such a pain!! Not an easy model to build at all!

A model to be proud of. I quite like what you did with the repulsors.

Nice clean paint job on the tank

Looking back at the dread I love the shot with the dreads armor plates open to see the sarcophagus. It almost makes me think the marine inside is saying “Who’s eating who? Omnomnomnomnom!”

Aash wrote:
Couldn't attach all the images in one post, so here are the other angles.

You did a amazing job on this model, and the decision you made to make it lean slightly to "counter the weight" was a excellent idea and it really looks great.

Nice.

edit - Since it wont show the picture, im talking about the Dreadnought holding the Tyranid.