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Time to plant the seeds of a new army!
I've wanted to do Tyranids for a while as a nice change of pace from my clean-lined marines and techno-demonic chaos. My painting goals are to make heavy use of contrast paints, drybrushing, and glazing for some nice organic gradients.
Model wise, I've always like nids, but there's been some goofy design elements that never really clicked with me. Namely the bio "guns" and goofy dinosaur heads. My conversion goals for this army is totry and go more bestial and alien, more "cosmic horror" type look. More squid faces, eyeless worm mouths, spines, bee-hives, feathers, veins, all that good stuff. At the end of the day, they should still look like the gribbly space bug-dinosaurs that the core Tyranids idea hits so well.

I decided to do up a Genestealer for my first test model. I think stock genestealers are pretty goofy looking and have a lot of room to get scarier. First to change was the head, which I chopped the face off of and greenstuffed an upsidedown Pink Horror onto to to get something truly horrific. The limbs were the next conversion, as I think Tyranids have a bit of an "akimbo" issue with all their multiple arms. The models can get really jumbled because of the limbs, so I think reposing them will be one of my main conversion opportunities with this army. Scything Talons are perfect for folding down compact like bird wings, and tucking them up close to the nid's body looks much more naturalistic and also helps keep the model's silhouette readable. The Rending Claws I decided to elongate with an extra joint, making them more into gangly ape arms. There's been a couple genestealer art pieces where they look like freaky monster monkeys, loping along and climbing on things which I think is a perfect aesthetic to lean into.
Painting wise I wanted something fleshy and familiar, to contrast with the more alien features. Something like an earthworm .

That's cool, recognisably Tyranid but properly scary. Well done!

That's a very freaky conversion. I've had similar thoughts about 'Nids being very anthropomorphic for what they're supposed to be, and you've done a great job of 'alienizing' the more humanoid elements while keeping it recognizable. The color scheme as well is really good; the sporadic pink tinge and spots look very natural. Looking forward to more!

An army done to that standard will be a thing of terrifying beauty.

Awesome idea and really great miniature!

Very nice. You have a great eye for dynamic posing.

Yeah, brilliantly executed. Please do more!

Thanks guys! Catbarf, your nids have especially been a great source of inspiration,

Onto the next test model!

Painted up a Tyranid Warrior. I might play around with the spine colours a bit, try out some neon greens or pinks, but I'm pretty chuffed with this little squid-porcupine-raptor!

I cant see the pics on my work PC :(

that turned out really cool
for alternate colors on the spines, maybe look at bio-luminescent predators?

The Warrior looks even better than a Genestealer. Really stunning work!

I thought the genestealer looked fairly neat but wow the warrior knocks it right out the park! Nice one!

fantastic

I absolutely love these

Something about that Genestealer feels a little off to me, but that might just be because it looks so much more "alien" than the normal Tyranids.

Really digging the Tyranid Warrior though, great work.

The Tyranid Warrior is funking awesome. Please do a whole army and let me battle them. Thanks.

I made some dogs with bees in their mouths, so when they bark they shoot bees at you.

These are great. Keep going.

Really creative use of nids' weapons. Great doggies!

Beedogs? Beedogs!

I love beedogs

Excellent work again. The Warrior being a little more anthropomorphic than the Gaunts underscores the difference in intelligence. From the look of things it's not so involved of a conversion that you couldn't make a bunch more if you're so inclined.

Also they remind me- particularly with the coloration- of Bullsquids from Half-Life. The subtle patterning and color variations are still a great touch and add a lot to an otherwise realistically monochrome scheme.

sexy