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This should be good! Have you seen the Alpha Forge stuff by the way? They do an asteroid miner force and it might be worth a look at.

Llamahead wrote:This should be good! Have you seen the Alpha Forge stuff by the way? They do an asteroid miner force and it might be worth a look at.

The Alpha Forge stuff is interesting, though possibly a little bit too cyborg for my taste. It would make an interesting "counts as" Necron force though

Quick Update Time!
I only had a couple of minutes with the camera this morning, so here's a quick teaser of the cast body with some new modified legs and an update of the psyker



The cast body looks better with these legs than it did with the greatcoat ones; though I still need to add things like tubes and valves to them so they look more like tough leather/canvas with mining adaptions. The thing on his back is the air canister for their breather units, with the tube going under the scarf, theoretically to connect with the breather mask on the head. I quite like this design... I may have to redo the moulds with this on every body to save having to re-sculpt it each time. I'd obviously need some alternatives with a flamer canister as well, or some packs, but that's the point of having multiple bodies to cast isn't it

The psyker has some re-sculpting that needs doing around the back as it's a bit chunky and, quite frankly, rubbish; but he looks really nice next to the priest as they are both wearing chunky body armour with a raised collar. I think I need to do this sort of thing for any carapace armoured troops...

Question about the legs that are with the cast body. Does it look odd with the long jacket, or would it be better off with Catachan legs instead so it doesn't have the flared jacket bottom? Either way I will need to bulk out the top of the legs as the body is too fat for the normal legs as I padded it out to fit onto the greatcoat legs I did. I'm wondering if bulking up the legs a bit so they look more like this would suit the bodies and concept more than greatcoats

The psyker is coming along well,I must say this whole blog is interesting and original.You have excellent sculpting skills which makes the log all the better.Even though it is a way off,I can't wait to see you put some paint on them.

Deff Dread red Edition wrote:The psyker is coming along well,I must say this whole blog is interesting and original.You have excellent sculpting skills which makes it makes the log all the better.Even though it is a way off,I can't wait to see you put some paint on them.

Thank you
The priest is actually ready for painting, so I need to pick up a can of undercoat to spray him and the contents of Space Hulk... so your wish may be closer than you think. Maybe...

How about doing some Borg?

Been having a think this morning (mostly while reading the Troll Forged forums). I think I need to face facts and have a go at sculpting everything, not just the body and a few bits here and there, otherwise it's going to start getting very expensive if I have to buy Cadian arms and catachan legs every time I want a new unit.

I may start again with the bits, now I know what they need to look like, and make them fit with the Cadian/Catachan parts without having to add green stuff like I did in the teaser photo.

Fear not. I'll put together and paint the one in the teaser picture first as you've all been so patient

Miss Dee wrote:How about doing some Borg?

?

And I think that creating all your own parts will certainly save cash in the longer term. Plus it means you can get them exactly as you want them.

Dude. Stop being so awesome. I'm getting jealous here and I may have to come to you and steal everything.

Not that Borg.

SilverMK2 wrote:Plus it means you can get them exactly as you want them.

And therein lies the main problem. I can't decide exactly how I want them, for I am FickleBoy™


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infilTRAITOR wrote:Dude. Stop being so awesome. I'm getting jealous here and I may have to come to you and steal everything.

If you're lucky and I ever get enough time to finish something or ever manage to work out how to make a cast that doesn't produce a billion tonnes of flash, or create enough parts to get someone to produce it for me, I may start selling bits, so you don't have to be jealous any more
*wishful thinking!*


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Miss Dee wrote:Not that Borg.

The dodgy ebm band (The Borg)? The dodgy pop star (Michael Borg)?

No. I'm not going to do any Borg I'm afraid; though I would like to make "counts as" versions of all the special characters; which means an OTT cyborg Stracken type in the dim, distant future.

This is a fun army to watch, thanks for sharing it and I look forward to seeing a finished Malfian.

Your wish is (nearly) my command. Thanks to a bout of insomnia early this morning, I've finished putting together the test model. At last I hear you cry!



I'm really happy with it and can see where I need to go with the new body/legs/arms. The boots need to be tidied up a little and have some more details adding so they look more like heavy, maglock boots for vacuum work rather than a big lump; plus I need to create legs without the jacket bottom and tidy up the thigh pads (not sure what they are for, but hey). Other than that... I'm really pleased it.

Anything anyone thinks could be improved upon?

As you can see, he's already got a name... no background or anything yet. That will come, along with Dark Heresy and Inquisitor profiles, when I don't have a major deadline hanging over my head

I've just been and read back over the whole thread; it's interesting to see that the current design has almost no relation to the original sketches; but in my mind they aren't all that far apart. I guess this is the plus side to running a blog for something like this; watching it evolve and having a full record of it. I'm glad you've all come along for the ride; all comments, ideas or criticism is gratefully recieved

As you say, the boots need some work. Other than that, the only negative thing I can say is that I am not sure what the pipe on his shoulder is doing.

Otherwise he looks very professional. The extra bulk and equipment looks really impressive.

How is the tank on the back going to be painted in relation to the model? At the moment it might be difficult to tell exactly what it is. I personally like the look of a metal tank in a fabric harness.

Love the spade too.

That test trooper looks ace will be following this ..

SilverMK2 wrote:As you say, the boots need some work. Other than that, the only negative thing I can say is that I am not sure what the pipe on his shoulder is doing.

I don't know what the pipe is for either. Blame it on the lack of sleep or something. I think at the time I was thinking it would be for pressurising the body suit if they go into low/zero gravity... but I'm not sure... I just liked it

I just remembered... they are supposed to have a high percentage of cybernetics, so maybe it's something to do with that too?

SilverMK2 wrote:How is the tank on the back going to be painted in relation to the model? At the moment it might be difficult to tell exactly what it is. I personally like the look of a metal tank in a fabric harness. Love the spade too.

I'm thinking some sort of battered metal colour with peeling paint for the tank; possibly yellow paint?, or something... I really don't know what colours their uniforms are going to be yet either. That's a future post topic

I don't want it to be too obvious as it'd make a perfect target for someone on the battlefield, but you're right, it does need to stand out from the uniform a bit. Future tanks may be a little more rounded so it doesn't just look like part of someone's armour.

Speaking of armour; I came up with an idea for the elite's carapace armour last night and I need to find some solid plastic tubing that is wide enough to fit a head inside so I can create a neat collar; probably about 1cm diameter?. I was thinking a biro barrel, but the plastic is too thick and the plastic-card suppliers I can find don't have tubing that wide... my google-fu is failing me today

Not sure if I've posted in this thread yet, but I'd just like to say that I love your army. I just wish I had your greenstuffing skills .

The latest guy looks awesome - and keep that pipe on his shoulder, it looks cool . They need paint, NOW!

This is all new to me too. Just grab some GS, a paint shaper and one of the metal sculpting tools and have a go. I don't think it's actually that bad if you take things slowly. Just remember to let it cure for a while when you do something, otherwise you'll end up doing what I've done a few times and accidentally squashing some carefully crafted detail or other.

I'm still trying to get to grips with finer detail and fabric-y shapes (just take a look at those boots!), so don't worry. just have a go and keep practising

As for paint... I'll be buying some primer at lunchtime, so you should get something next week as I did promise to paint this guy before starting on the new sculpts.


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I guess if I'm buying primer I should really decide on colour schemes as I may need more paints too...

Homeworld : Mining colonies
Tactical roles : Tunnel/city fighting; low/zero gravity worlds; ship to ship combat

Originally I had browns in mind when they were going to have big leather coats on, but now... I really don't know. A brown force will potentially look really dull on the battlefield.

Ship to ship actions probably don't really care about camo; tunnel fighting again probably wouldn't really need camo as you don't need to hide from snipers so much... but city fighting would need some form of camo. So I guess greys/olives of some sort?

I would perhaps go for brown overalls, yellow and black/silver warning hashes for the weapons, yellow for the tank, grey straps.

Then a really pale elf flesh type skin colour with a thin wash of ogre flesh or something.

The orange and black warning would bring the colour and pop to the model, the yellow tanks bring a nice block of colour (plus it fits in with the mining equipment, which seems to be yellow in most places), and the brown/grey fit in with working in an enviroment where it is dirty and there is not much light most of the time.

I like the peeling paint idea for the tank too. In another thread, someone suggested putting a small amount of superglue on the area you want to look like it is peeling, and use a pin to keep prodding and teasing the glue as it dries, and then it looks like the paint is flaking off.

Not tried it myself, but I can see how it would work.

I saw that tip; I definitely need to give it a go. I'm also coming back around to browns; your right it does fit more with their initial environment... so it makes sense.

I will be brightening up the army as a whole with the HQ units anyway, so browns should be ok; especially with dirty, chipped yellow tanks. Flamer canisters will be red; so it makes sense to have oxygen a colour too.

The skin is definitely going to be very pale; bordering on albino. Maybe tatoos...

Glow tats?

That could be kind of cool... some electric blue and/or orange there

IMO, colour schemes need three colours: two main colours that compliment each other and give the look you want, and then a tertiary colour that looks good with them, but is bright and ties the whole force together visually. In terms of your fluff, maybe blacks, browns or reddy colours would work for the two main colours, and then perhaps you could use white, yellow or bright red as your tertiary?

I might stick together a couple of test cadians to play with first...

Are you the numa numa guy? ( icon look similar hehe )

I personally am not really a fan of red on brown (unless it is a really, really dirty red). I would be more inclined to go with a bestial brown cloth, and a lighter brown armour, or the above mentioned dirty red (almost teracotta?).

I would certainly stick with yellow for the tanks, perhaps the breathers too.

I would almost definately try to get the hazzard marks on them somewhere as well.

But this is just me, they are your models, and looking at your (I seem to recall) painting of those ork DA models, you are fairly adept at painting, so can probably pick out the best look for them

No, not guilty

I just make funny little characters that look (kinda) like people : http://endtransmission.co.uk/category/graphic-design/little-heroes-graphic-design/



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Just went into GW to pick up some paints and the guy suggesting I take the painted figure in so they can give me some pointers. I think they guy thought I was new to painting as I was umming and ahhing over what colours to get.

Looks like I need to tidy up the feet a little more and take them up on the offer; just to see their confused faces when I don't hand over a Cadian.

Leth looks awesome. For the plastic tubing look at plastic pvc pipe and cable routers in a DIY shop. It'll probably be cheap enough. For the camo I'd be tempted to go metals as it would work as reasonable camo in starships and the underhive and in normal tunnels wouldn't matter. Part of this is just the fact that I reckon a metallic guard army would look good and it just seems to fit to me.

endtransmission wrote:

SilverMK2 wrote:How is the tank on the back going to be painted in relation to the model? At the moment it might be difficult to tell exactly what it is. I personally like the look of a metal tank in a fabric harness. Love the spade too.

I'm thinking some sort of battered metal colour with peeling paint for the tank; possibly yellow paint?, or something... I really don't know what colours their uniforms are going to be yet either. That's a future post topic

You could do the tanks up in accordance with British Standard colours for pressurised gas

(p.s. Yellow would be chlorine or ammonia! Breathable gasses would have white shoulders or a bright green)

Flinty wrote:You could do the tanks up in accordance with British Standard colours for pressurised gas (p.s. Yellow would be chlorine or ammonia! Breathable gasses would have white shoulders or a bright green)

Good call, thank you. It's amazing the random things you learn when painting a small plastic toy

I wonder what colour Promethium would be using the british standards? Bright red for flammable, or burgundy like acetylene?

Acetylene has particular problems when heated, hence it has a special colour marking in the UK. The Fire Brigade hates the things because they can explode several hours after being heated due to decomposition of the gas inside the cylinder. Standard practice is to evacuate the area for several hundred metres around the cylinder and then fire water on the cylinder for at least 5 or 6 hours

I would use red though

I like the idea of yellow with black icons and/or diagonal stripes - ie primarily as a warning to other miners - 'ere be dangerous materials! Be careful! I think it would nicely offset a more drab coloured (dusty?) uniform - but that is just me. If you are worried that they might stick out enough to improve my ork accuracy, you could always model cloaks draped over the top attempting to camouflage them somewhat (should work good with your scarves and bulkier trappings too)