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Is that blood pact based on a GD from a while ago? I recall seeing a very similar one with a more elaborate base in a WD a while back. Great work by the way!

BrotherStynier wrote:I realize Im probably doing that being picky thing again, which I a sorry times a million for because I do love this model even though there are things I would do differently if I had your skills, but...

I was glancing through The Saint, cause I was hoping to be helpful and stumbled upon the part where they are talking about the Ghosts Headgear. It turns out the Scouts wear Black Wool Caps, while everyone else gets Berets and Forage Caps.

Though I see no reason why the Scouts can't wear what ever kinda hat they want.

Empchild wrote:Just remember Brother that he is doing it based around the Geron Mission and not all of the participants of that were from the scouts.

Yeah, their headgear and even weapons get described in varying manners across the novels to be fair. Also, as I mentioned before, I'm taking some creative licence with appearance in order to produce something that is both realistic, faithful to the novels and still visually "appealing".

I think there were three scouts on the Gereon mission - Mkoll, McKvenner and Bonin.

I'm not certain yet whether to go for the Gereon team or just a selection of my favourite characters.

Madocyw wrote:the cross body messenger style bag seems, to me, to fit in better with the Tanith idea than would a harness system. looks amazing - can't wait to see it finished.

Glad people seem to agree on this.

Savnock wrote:Nice work striking a balance between fine detail and yet maintaining the large-head GW scale. Even with the incredible detail (like the folds on the t-shirt) the sculpt still fits in well with the GW command model you put it next to.

Can't wait to see the whole squad: likely to be a good GD candidate.

Thanks for the kind words! The head really isn't that out of scale any more to be fair. Cutting back the jaw and back of the head really helps bring it back into more realistic proportions, while still fitting visually with regular GW figures.

samius wrote:Is that blood pact based on a GD from a while ago? I recall seeing a very similar one with a more elaborate base in a WD a while back. Great work by the way!

Yeah it took inspiration from the same piece of artwork and from Banshee's 54mm Blood Pact sculpt which won gold at GD France in 2006 or so I think.

Cheers,

Dante

CMDante wrote:

Scrazza wrote:Oooh, so you are going to create Varl as well? Hmm, I always thought Feygor was the one who knew about explosives.

Yeah but...

Spoiler:

he dies on Ancreon Sextus

You're right, but still. I can't imagine non of them dying, they have to at one point.

Sculpting and conversion work finished now (excluding sticking the knife on - currently held in place using blu-tak):




Very pleased with how he has turned out and looking forward to painting him and working on the base.

I had expected the arm holding the weapon and the cape to be much more of a challenge than they turned out to be and both were actually a lot of fun in the end. The hood may look a little odd, but it's been deliberately flattened as it will be against the wall to his back.

More pictures are available on My Blog

Comments and questions welcome!

Cheers,

Dante

Wow.

/Subscribed

It looks great. Now paint it.

Great work can't fault the proportion or detail work. Just not sold on the fact he is wearing a t-shirt like the one i've got on now.

absolutely stunning - I especially like the creases in the t-shirt from the strap across his chest, very nice detail. Hugely looking forward to seeing the next step

These are looking fab. Love traitor General so I look forward to this.
Glad to see that you are going for a more realistic musculature because, frankly, the catachan arms just look ridiculous...
Are you going to do members of the Gereon resitance like Cirk and Landerson at all?

That model is pure class. Gorgeous sculpting, and for me absolutely screams Tanith.
Love the attention to detail, the beret badge, the hands it's all perfect.

You should send a picture of this to FW, they would probably want to put this chap into production. I know I'd buy him.

Ash 1 wrote:
You should send a picture of this to FW, they would probably want to put this chap into production. I know I'd buy him.

Same here!

A Tanith line looking like this would make me start a Guard army, double quick!

Fantastic stuff!

Brilliant as expected bud.... I smell gd gold!

Alpharius wrote:

Ash 1 wrote:
You should send a picture of this to FW, they would probably want to put this chap into production. I know I'd buy him.

Same here!

A Tanith line looking like this would make me start a Guard army, double quick!

Fantastic stuff!

I was thinking of just this on the bus home today...
SEND THEM A PICTURE> DAKKA WILLS IT!

Wow man! Stunning model. Absolutely. Painted a squad of these will possible be THE BEST 40k squad entry ever. So bear that in mind with my commentary!

I think personally with your work (or all miniature art...), I've been most impressed with the fearless genius that pushes the boundaries of 40k imagery. In that sense the Gaunts ghosts are a little boring subject - but your's a perfect representation. Exactly like one would vision them and better than what GW can do!

What I've been most impressed with where the Magos and the early Rogue Trader work. Your immense skill is now up there with the full time pros, but somehow I crave for something raw and fresh. Some rock'n'roll.

This is where I personally think you need the swamp man, Eszrah ap Niht. No-one knows how he looks. This is where you get to add the gothic and the surprise. And where you get to pro-long the "time-line" and claim them your gaunts.


from Wiki:

Eszrah ap Niht
Alive
Eszrah ap Niht is a son of a Chief of the swamp dwelling Partisans, rebels who live in the Until swamplands of Gereon. He was given to Gaunt by his father, after the Ghosts saved their village from attack by Chaos Marines during the events of Traitor General. He is commonly referred to as 'Ezra Night' by the Ghosts, Larkin himself coining the name. Initially, he and the other Partisans could only communicate through Mkvenner (as he is trained in the ways of the Nalsheen, who used proto-gothic as their private language). However, Gaunt now fluently speaks proto-gothic after the time spent on Gereon with the resistance. From His Last Command onwards, it is shown that several members of the Ghosts who were on Gereon had learned to speak Eszrah's language, although not as fluently as Gaunt. Gaunt and Zweil have been shown to help teach Eszrah how to speak and read Imperial Gothic, which he demonstrates his amateuristic grasp in Only in Death to a degree. He has taken the duty of protecting Gaunt very seriously and almost never leaves Gaunt's side. He once goes so far as to offer to kill Ayatani Zweil, the role of whom Eszrah initially does not understand and believes him to be a jestyr. Eszrah is armed with his reynbow, a primitive weapon akin to a crossbow which uses magnets to propel quarrels tipped with a highly dangerous venom extracted from swamp moths of the Until on Gereon. Before battle he smears himself with gray "wode", or moth paste, which has peculiar abilities to somehow blend in with his environment. On Gereon Eszrah received a gift in the form of Sergeant Varl's prized pair of sun-shades to help him cope with the unaccustomed brightness outside of his native swamps and he has never removed them since, except when he briefly lent them to Ayatani Zweil in His Last Command and traded his glasses for the Sword of Hieronymo Sondar in Only in Death, to which he swears vengeance against the Blood Pact, who he believes has killed Gaunt.

He is an expert at stealth, rivalled only by Mkoll, who has an uncanny ability to spot him. His unusual appearance often unnerves people seeing him for the first time, as his skin colour is noted as being 'gun metal gray' due to the effects of the woad. Due to the fact he has worn it for so long, when he is 'cleaned up a little' his skin seems naturally grey. He counts very few people as friends, limited to Gaunt, Ludd, possibly Rawne, Mkoll and Beltayn. That said, the partisan's definition of 'friend' extends only to 'a trusted hunting partner'. When Gaunt is seemingly killed, Eszrah takes the news very seriously. Because he was ordered by his father to protect Gaunt, Eszrah felt that he had no more purpose and decided to go on a suicide mission to kill as many Blood Pact as he could to avenge Gaunt, which he calls the 'blodtull' on the Nihtgane daeda waeg ("Corpse Road" according to Eszrah when Mkoll asks for a translation). Mkoll eventually accompanies him, and during their mission, they come across Gaunt purely by accident and rescue him, after Mkoll mistakes him for a dying POW. With Gaunt alive, Eszrah returns to the regiment. In Blood Pact, set two years after Jago, Eszrah's speech and writing skills have improved greatly, enough for him to hold conversation in Low Gothic and read properly. He attends Zweil's nightly "occasions of enlightenment" to listen to the ayantani's teachings, and is encouraged by the old priest to write down Nihtgane folktales and myths in copybooks. When writing his name, he spells it "Ezra Night".

An entire army modeled like that would force me back into collecting and playing a Guard army. An outstanding job, can't wait to see him and the rest of your proposed force painted.

Mat

I've been telling you people want to buy what you're putting out for a while now

This guy looks awesome as I've told you. I'm dying to see him finished and painted. Having the wall to his back will really drive this model home as the pose really kept me guessing until you wrote about that

Thank you all for the kind words. The continual input throughout has been a great source of inspiration and really helped keep me moving on this.

Scrazza wrote:It looks great. Now paint it.

Not sure whether to jump right in with the painting or start on converting up a few others while I'm in the sculpting and converting "zone".

Perkustin wrote:Great work can't fault the proportion or detail work. Just not sold on the fact he is wearing a t-shirt like the one i've got on now.

You're wearing a t-shirt made of milliput and ProCreate?!

The choice of clothing is one that seems to divide people, however I think there is good reasoning for it. In the Adrian Smith artwork which I referenced at the beginning, the Ghost's are always depicted in green military issue t-shirts. Also, given that I plan to hopefully get around to doing a small squad of these guys, I need to find ways to differentiate them.

Therefore, as Bonin is a scout, I decided that giving him a berret and have him moving fairly light with just a t-shirt, his armour and cape, he would take on a stealthy appearance which would help portray some of his character. The pose and intended base will help further this too.

For other members of the squad I intend to have full Ghost's uniforms, though final painted appearance is also a constant consideration as a fully black uniform and camo capes doesn't really leave much wiggle room to produce an eye catching paint job. It is here that artistic liberties will probably have to be taken and no doubt many which will further divide peoples opinions.

Captain Roderick wrote:absolutely stunning - I especially like the creases in the t-shirt from the strap across his chest, very nice detail. Hugely looking forward to seeing the next step

Thanks, the model could be considered quite plain with it's large, texture-less surfaces, however I think the little details go a long way to adding character and a quality to the finish so I'm always happy when others agree!

Imperial Monkey wrote:These are looking fab. Love traitor General so I look forward to this.
Glad to see that you are going for a more realistic musculature because, frankly, the catachan arms just look ridiculous...
Are you going to do members of the Gereon resitance like Cirk and Landerson at all?

Hadn't really thought about it to be honest! I think they would probably be after I do a few more Ghost's at least if I do, do them.

Ash 1 wrote:That model is pure class. Gorgeous sculpting, and for me absolutely screams Tanith.
Love the attention to detail, the beret badge, the hands it's all perfect.

You should send a picture of this to FW, they would probably want to put this chap into production. I know I'd buy him.

Alpharius wrote:
Same here!

A Tanith line looking like this would make me start a Guard army, double quick!

Fantastic stuff!

Imperial Monkey wrote:
I was thinking of just this on the bus home today...
SEND THEM A PICTURE> DAKKA WILLS IT!

Lol, I'd love to have miniatures cast and produced by Forgeworld one day, unfortunately I don't think they accept non-professionally sculpted conversions! This kind of praise really makes me think the effort has been worthwhile though and I am massively appreciative of it from you all.

MajorTom11 wrote:Brilliant as expected bud.... I smell gd gold!

Lets not get ahead of ourselves!

migsula wrote:Wow man! Stunning model. Absolutely. Painted a squad of these will possible be THE BEST 40k squad entry ever. So bear that in mind with my commentary!

I think personally with your work (or all miniature art...), I've been most impressed with the fearless genius that pushes the boundaries of 40k imagery. In that sense the Gaunts ghosts are a little boring subject - but your's a perfect representation. Exactly like one would vision them and better than what GW can do!

What I've been most impressed with where the Magos and the early Rogue Trader work. Your immense skill is now up there with the full time pros, but somehow I crave for something raw and fresh. Some rock'n'roll.

This is where I personally think you need the swamp man, Eszrah ap Niht. No-one knows how he looks. This is where you get to add the gothic and the surprise. And where you get to pro-long the "time-line" and claim them your gaunts.

Cheers mate, your regular encouragement and nudging to push myself for more is always a big motivating factor.

combat engineer wrote:An entire army modeled like that would force me back into collecting and playing a Guard army. An outstanding job, can't wait to see him and the rest of your proposed force painted.

Mat

An entire army?! Something I don't think I will ever manage!

grey_death wrote:I've been telling you people want to buy what you're putting out for a while now

This guy looks awesome as I've told you. I'm dying to see him finished and painted. Having the wall to his back will really drive this model home as the pose really kept me guessing until you wrote about that

I'll try not to keep you waiting too much longer mate! I've been looking at a lot of military modelling work for inspiration for scenery for the base. I even found some awesome paints for doing chipped paint work that I think will come in very handy! I'll try to stick a little review up of them soon.

Cheers,

Dante

Any idea what sort of camo you are going for with the cape?

Actually when i analyse the mini it is not so much the t-shirt itself it is the floating shoulder pads and lack of equipment. Theres just this unwarlike look to him, he looks like he has only had time to put his trousers on and his cloak.

Initially you were going for a look very similar to the protagonist of Killzone 2 and i was a little disappointed when you scrapped the idea of webbing and waist satchels. You can mention interrupting the lines of the miniature but he should be a miniature soldier first, classical sculpture second.

So in short he does not look like a soldier even, i'm afraid, by ForgeWorld standards (was gonna say GW there but that wouldnt be true lol). This in itself would not be a crime and it is only because of your very high standard of work i say it.

Thats an absolutely honest 100% deconstruction of what i dislike about the model, anything i didnt mention, i like.

Be that as it may, it does accurately represent what we've been show on the Tanith in artwork:



Not the best picture, and I'm sure someone can find a better one, but, there you are!

CMDante wrote:

MajorTom11 wrote:Brilliant as expected bud.... I smell gd gold!

Lets not get ahead of ourselves!

Um... I don't think we are getting ahead of ourselves at all buddy! You are off to a great start, this is exactly the kind of thing to get the attention of both the judges and the fans. The best part is I know the paint job will not let it down in the slightest!

Perkustin wrote:So in short he does not look like a soldier even, I'm afraid, by ForgeWorld standards

Mate, you don't need to be festooned with body armour and belt-kit to look like a soldier.
This chaps got jump boots, commando beret, a rifle, a big knife, spare ammo. Probably also got a Sharp stick and some harsh language to boot - looks 'born again hard' to me . . . .

The Tanith first and only arent exactly renowned for body armour, I was always under the illusion that they were stealthy, silent, and relied on skill not firepower.

But that looks like wonderful GS work, puts me to shame!

Amazing sculpting!

Hi Dante, I dont think iv posted in here before, but i have been keeping an eye on what you've been up to. Firstly, let me say, fantastic sculpting. The lines and details are beautiful, and the pose is 'just right'. The only things i would like to see are a watch face on the right wrist and a little more detail in the cloak pin.

This mini make we want to go back to my IG stuff and really get stuck into some really sculpting again, but i can never find the right inspiration for a piece. How did you decided on what to do and where to go? what was your original inspiration? (sorry if this has been answered earlier in the thread)

Lastly, very rarely do i find a post on dakka that i disagree with so strongly.

Perkustin wrote:Actually when i analyse the mini it is not so much the t-shirt itself it is the floating shoulder pads and lack of equipment. Theres just this unwarlike look to him, he looks like he has only had time to put his trousers on and his cloak.

Initially you were going for a look very similar to the protagonist of Killzone 2 and i was a little disappointed when you scrapped the idea of webbing and waist satchels. You can mention interrupting the lines of the miniature but he should be a miniature soldier first, classical sculpture second.

So in short he does not look like a soldier even, i'm afraid, by ForgeWorld standards (was gonna say GW there but that wouldnt be true lol). This in itself would not be a crime and it is only because of your very high standard of work i say it.

Thats an absolutely honest 100% deconstruction of what i dislike about the model, anything i didnt mention, i like.

If you were to add anymore 'stuff' to the mini it would ruin the line and feel, also IMO it would look a little "unrealistic". The Tanith are light and stealthy infantry, designed for recon etc. Trust me,its hard to be stealthy wearing a rig full or gear.

The mini is easily equal to or surprising FW standard (i know there are a lot of FW and GW bits in there, but still). I have to say, i think that he is a perfect representation of a Tanith soldier, and your should be very proud of your work.

All in all, Great Work! Keep it up!

Holy man, that is some awesome work, best Tanith I've seen (and I've been looking around alot lately) as for the web/LBE gear, meh I think he looks great without it. Besides ask anyone who has ever worn that crap, its damn near impossible to be "stealthy" in it. If it's not snagging on a tree it's smashing you in the crotch when you try to run I may just be angry and cynical about it though. I can't wait to see how this guy progresses, I'm half motivated to go work on my guys and at the same time half discouraged, I sure hope Larkin and/or Brostin are planned, hell any of them really, just keep it up

Thanks for the comments guys.

As I said before, I knew from the start the clothing and equipment choice and style would divide people. At the end of the day, I've gone for the look I wanted to because I feel it makes for the most interesting piece and provides more opportunity for an interesting paintjob while still maintaining a 40k and Tanith look and feel.

I disagree with the notion that the final look and aesthetic should be secondary to "real world soldier equipment" accuracy. As I've said before, the lines and shapes of a model are very important in my opinion in making something that people hopefully enjoy looking at and which holds a subtle "flow" which adds to the character in a difficult to describe way, but which seems obvious when witnessed. Besides, if you look at photography from era's such as the Vietnam war and the Pacific theatre of WW2, soldiers weren't always in full parade ground BDU - I don't think it's difficult to believe that he may have removed his jacket and webbing?

Hits_the_spot wrote:Hi Dante, I dont think iv posted in here before, but i have been keeping an eye on what you've been up to. Firstly, let me say, fantastic sculpting. The lines and details are beautiful, and the pose is 'just right'. The only things i would like to see are a watch face on the right wrist and a little more detail in the cloak pin.

This mini make we want to go back to my IG stuff and really get stuck into some really sculpting again, but i can never find the right inspiration for a piece. How did you decided on what to do and where to go? what was your original inspiration? (sorry if this has been answered earlier in the thread)

Thanks, glad to have helped with the motivation. It's a tricky thing to put a pin on and describe really. I started the project with a rough idea of what I wanted to achieve and then began to collect inspiration images and parts and the figure sort of developed organically from there really. When I first saw the legs, my mind immediately went to "how do I make these look different from the typical pose they are used for?". The first thing that struck me was the idea to have him sliding along a wall with his back to it in a sort of "creeping" fashion. Once I had locked onto this it was all about working out a natural pose for the arms and head that would help "tell the story". From there, it was all about doing the actual masses and details which also develop somewhat organically as the process continues.

I'm not sure if this answer really helps, but if it's inspiration you are after the best place to start IMHO is to look at photographs of similar subject matters to get a feel for poses that look natural and help convey a story or character trait. I have an old "How to draw the Marvel way" book by Stan Lee that has an interesting point about dynamic posing in terms of catching the subject at the beginning and end of motions when the limbs tend to be most animated.

Also, GW produces a phenomenal amount of quality artwork that I always find inspiration from when pouring over it. I've purchased a selection of their art books over the years.

Finally, this place is a great source of artwork that will inspire - http://www.cghub.com/

Artists who regularly work for GW also have portfolios there - http://karlkopinski.cghub.com/

Cheers,

Dante

CMDante wrote:

Lol, I'd love to have miniatures cast and produced by Forgeworld one day, unfortunately I don't think they accept non-professionally sculpted conversions! This kind of praise really makes me think the effort has been worthwhile though and I am massively appreciative of it from you all.

Maybe not conversions, but Chris Fitzpatrick(who designed and sculpted much of the 7th ed Dark Elves line and, IIRC, sculpted some of the 3rd ed Dark Eldar line) DID get a job with the GW studio simply from sending them some of his amateur sculpting from college.

I'm sure if you fully sculpted a Tanith model(or 3) with this much love and detail and send them(or quality pictures of them) along with a CV, it would get the attention of some one at FW. You may even have a better shot if you took the time to schedule an appointment in person.

And you're LOADS better than Fitzpatrick was.

I'm not sure of the in's and out's of Chris' story, but I am sure he will have sculpted more full figures than I have (1).

Besides, I have a good job which pays significantly more as it is. While being a miniature sculptor would be an ideal job in my mind, I'm not sure how easy it would be to both convince the mrs. and accept the pay cut/re-location required (that obviously assumes I'd even stand an icicles chance in hell of being offered a job in the first place!).

Flattered though I am by your exceptionally kind words, I'm happy to keep doing this as an enjoyable hobby at the very least for the time being.

Following Migs' encouragement, I'm considering starting work on converting up an Ezra model. Think I'll start collecting some inspiration images this weekend.

Cheers,

Dante

Right, I've started work on sculpting Ezrah using fimo for the core body work.

At the moment I'm looking at images of African tribesmen and American Indians for inspiration for clothing and styling, any suggestions or images anyone else thinks would be particularly useful, feel free to share!

In the books, the cloaks, jewels aroun the eyes and warpaint are fairly well described, but I can't remember much of the descriptions about clothing, hairstyles etc. I vaguely recall one Nightgane being described as having dreadlock-like hair and a long drooping moustache, but I don't think it was Ezrah and that doesn't really fit with the image I have in my head for how he looks. Does anyone have any decent descriptions of these things?

I'll maybe post some pics of what I have so far later on, but at the moment it's just simple musculature of the legs so probably quite boring.

Cheers,

Dante