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Thanks for the info on the chain, I'll have to buy myself some And just to clarify, I love the flail as is - it's a nice, easy to make improvised weapon, and it does look awesome. I don't think the head part looks 'wrong' at the mo, it's just that I reckon if you replaced it with anything that could have had a previous use other than a flail head (a heavy rock, a machine part, even just some scrap metal) it would look a lot more like he had made it himself, which I figure would fit your theme. I may have misinterpreted what you're going for though, and that is, of course, just personal opinion, so feel free to totally ignore it He looks really really good anyway, and I wouldn't worry about it unless you like the idea ;D

Looking forward to your update!

re spotlights
Do you have any clear sprue?

Might I suggest trimming off the bottom strap thing on the hammer? Otherwise I think these new guys look badass.

And I vote for those shoulder lamps from panic too...

The Good Green wrote:Might I suggest trimming off the bottom strap thing on the hammer? Otherwise I think these new guys look badass.

Do you mean Acero's hammer? The one on his backpack? If so, I know what you mean, the hilt with the strap/clamp dangling in thin air. I just left it because I thought it might add some structure to the otherwise plain hammer. Now that you mentioned it I'm less sure about it.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:re spotlights: Do you have any clear sprue?

Yes I do, I'm not sure about using clear plastic on 28mm infantry though. Needs to be done very very well to not look out of place. Anyway what is your suggestion? I will consider it, despite my prejudices on the matter.

Viktor von Domm wrote:for headlamps why not use the thicker spots of sprue...the knots there? they are round and a bit long and have this curved structure... drill out the "barrel" part and then you have a small torchlight to put where apropriated...

Can't say I can really visualize what you are suggesting. What part of a sprue do you mean?

@Scarper

Thanks for the info on the chain, I'll have to buy myself some

You're welcome, mate.

And just to clarify, I love the flail as is - it's a nice, easy to make improvised weapon, and it does look awesome. I don't think the head part looks 'wrong' at the mo, it's just that I reckon if you replaced it with anything that could have had a previous use other than a flail head (a heavy rock, a machine part, even just some scrap metal) it would look a lot more like he had made it himself...

I know exactly what you mean, the whole model is consistent and the flail doesn't break that, but it's also not the peak of coolness or narrative depth. An improvised weapon would add to the insurgent theme. As I said, when a good alternative strikes me, I will change it.

...which I figure would fit your theme. I may have misinterpreted what you're going for though, and that is, of course, just personal opinion, so feel free to totally ignore it

I'm very interested in what you think I'm going for, please explain.

He looks really really good anyway, and I wouldn't worry about it unless you like the idea ;D

I do.

I've been thinking a lot about the elevator stand/diorama lately. I might actually start that soon, it will need to be a little side project though, already got to many things going on.

I'm off now to do some conversion work, hope to get something done for an update...

Baiyuan wrote:

Viktor von Domm wrote:for headlamps why not use the thicker spots of sprue...the knots there? they are round and a bit long and have this curved structure... drill out the "barrel" part and then you have a small torchlight to put where apropriated...

Can't say I can really visualize what you are suggesting. What part of a sprue do you mean?

I'm assuming he means these bits:



Amazing work so far!

S_P

exactly...

here is another pic, someone actually drilled them out:

Space_Potato wrote:
I'm assuming he means these bits:

Ok, that's what I thought, those lamps would be rather big then. Interesting idea for shoulder lamps, might try.

Amazing work so far!

Thanks mate.

Time for an Update!

Like I promised I wasn't lazy today, so I can now present to you the final version of the second Espantajo heavy, Espaldo (hunchback).

Again Espaldo was already done, but I decided to convert my own conversion. I originally build him some time last year when we started the gang and he was finished, but I didn't like him that much. It was a decent mini, but I didn't like the space between his torso and the shoulder pads and I also didn't like his plain chest, it didn't say "miner heavy".

Here is a pic of what he looked like initially (his hand is out of place of course, that was necessary during my conversion):

While I was generally satisfied with his looks, I wanted to improve the already mentioned weak spots. So, what is the most used bit to cover up your crappy conversion work and make it look more "jagga-naughty" at the same time? Correct, kroot armor.

Everybody does it, so why not me. Idea: kroot shoulder pads as... well shoulder pads. --> Looked stupid and out of place, plus I still needed to cover up the chest.

Logical next step, use rectangular kroot chest piece for... yeah right, for the chest. --> Looked stupid and out of place.

I didn't want to just slap pointless patches of armor on him, for me things need to make sense. I wouldn't run around with a random piece of metal on my chest, that really only covers less than half of it. I would want some real, linked armor!

So that's what I did, used 7 pieces of kroot armor and 15 0,4mm diameter wires to knit me a nice improvised carapace armor. Crude kroot carapace armor you could say.

This is how it started:

Looks like modern art, but it's just the centerpiece with the first 8 wires in it.

Next step was to shape the left and right belly plates, so that they fit under Espaldo's arms without taking him apart. After that was done I linked the guthide and added some vital protection to throat and crotch, you don't wanna get hit there, do you?

Everything linked together looked like this:

After this step it got tricky. I wanted to link the shoulder pads to the chestpiece and make everything look like Espaldo actually wore it, so there needed to be straps holding everything together behind his back. Still I didn't want to take him apart and I had to put the main piece on his chest before I linked the shoulders to it. It was basicly like putting a hyperactive kid on speed in it's best suit, except this kid was 28mm big.

The whole conversion took me almost half a day, but I'm very satisfied with the result. So feast your eyes on Espaldo, the hunchback, former heavy mining machine operator, now the strong (and heavily armored) arm of the "Libertad por la colmena!" (colmena=hive).

One last note before the merciless commenting begins (I hope) I know his legs look terrible. I tried to ignore it but the 1000w lamp made it just to clear in the pictures, the legs need to be replaced or repaired!

Ok everyone, as usual I hope you'll be enjoying what I came up with and you drop me line. Or if you don't enjoy it, please drop a couple of lines to justify why not. How dare you...

I'd say if the marine vents are too big then the sprues would be worse... because they are bigger or have I missed something?

Edit - I hate it when that happens...comment and then an update lol.

What you've done with the kroot plates is wicked...I thought you were crazy when I saw the mad art picture.

The back pack is done well...I'd say it looks like he has everything he needs in there. Where is the backpack from?

Peter

Wow. Now that's what I call cool. Or crazy. Either way works for me. Just... wow.

@PDH
You are absolutely right. I might try it just for having found a use for sprues, but I'm not going for shoulderlamps anyway. I'm looking for decent helmets and will sculpt some headlights on them.

@Everyone
Could use some help regarding the helmets: Does anyone have any idea where to get a good helmet from, that doesn't look to military or to medieval? Should be more along the lines of actual miner helmets oder fire brigade helmets.

Wow. Now that's what I call cool. Or crazy. Either way works for me. Just... wow.

Great to hear/read that, thank you, mate.

I already have the next update pending, so you can expect me to launch it, as soon as you are all done discussing Espaldo, the hunchback. Enjoy!

.

If you trim the sides off of the Britonian Men at Arms helmet and do a little green stuff magic you can have a fireman style helmet. Also Espaldo looks great, might steal that armor conversion for my Orlock heavy.

That is incredibly detailed, and look brilliantly improvised. I don't know how you had the foresight to know that it would fit so well! It's also unlike anything I've seen anyone else do with the Kroot sprue (which is saying a lot, considering how often it's used), so major originality points. Very minor issue is that the shotgun looks a little 'tacked on' to the backpack at the mo, but as always, that's just nitpicking, and could easily be fixed with a GS strap or something. The wiring, of course, makes the whole thing, and shows an attention to detail that goes beyond anyone you'll fight. I hope he survives long enough to make the effort worth it!

Scarper wrote:That is incredibly detailed, and look brilliantly improvised. I don't know how you had the foresight to know that it would fit so well! It's also unlike anything I've seen anyone else do with the Kroot sprue (which is saying a lot, considering how often it's used), so major originality points. Very minor issue is that the shotgun looks a little 'tacked on' to the backpack at the mo, but as always, that's just nitpicking, and could easily be fixed with a GS strap or something. The wiring, of course, makes the whole thing, and shows an attention to detail that goes beyond anyone you'll fight. I hope he survives long enough to make the effort worth it!

As usual: Thank you for your kind words and your productive critique.

About the foresight: There wasn't much of it, try and error all the way. I could picture the final result from the beginning, but the actual fitting was "put it on, take it of, make adjustment" rinse and repeat a hundret times.

About the shotgun: YES, please nitpick, because you are absolutely right... again. I will fix that, so far I was so focused on the rest of the mini, I didn't even recognize that the shottie is tacked onto a knife.

About survival: He will live long enough for two reasons: a) We are playing with a customized list for serious injuries, that results in a little less deaths. b) We are stacking ferocity talents on those gangers and Thore, the guy who plays them at the moment, has crazy dice luck when it comes to saving throws and serious injuries. (Last game: 3 serious injuries, 3 full recoveries and one of his juves made it through two 6+ saves)

Krieg Solder 117 wrote:Also Espaldo looks great, might steal that armor conversion for my Orlock heavy.

Thanks, and feel free to do so, but be warned and advised: I warn you, that it is rather time consuming and I advise you to use thinner wire. If I did it again I would use 0,2mm wire instead of 0,4mm.

The heavy looks brilliant, for the miner look I am tempted to suggest signboards and clubs fighting riot police cavalry like in the eighties British miners strikes. High Vis vests strike me as an obvious mining addition. Brilliant work and I can't wait to see your take on the Dog Handler!

great work as per , oh and i forgot to thank you for that chain idea, its also good for covering a messy seam ;-)

Llamahead wrote:The heavy looks brilliant, for the miner look I am tempted to suggest signboards and clubs fighting riot police cavalry like in the eighties British miners strikes. High Vis vests strike me as an obvious mining addition. Brilliant work and I can't wait to see your take on the Dog Handler!

Thank you for the compliment and for your interesting suggestions.

Signboards have a nice touch, but they would not be in line with what I'm imagining the gang to be. If you read the backround I revealed so far, you will recognize that they stole some equipment from their former punishers and are mostly improvising the rest of it. Signboards as improvised weapons have a flavor I'd appreciate, but they don't fit into my picture of the (under)hive let alone a mine and I wouldn't want the miners to look to much like a modern day thing.

High vis vests are already in the mix, the miner's overalls are (to be) painted in a quite flashing orange.

neil101 wrote:great work as per , oh and i forgot to thank you for that chain idea, its also good for covering a messy seam ;-)

You're welcome.

Me and Thore have been painting for some hours today and will be doing so tomorrow as well. Don't want to promise anything I can't live up to, but I think there is some chance I will finish one of the gangers tomorrow or at least this week. So maybe there will be the first fully painted model coming up soon.

Also I have bought some more elemental supplies for the board, so basic work might begin soon.

That armor on the Heavy looks fantastic! You'd think that adding more to the model would just kill it and make it much too bulky. But you managed to plate the guy up with wide wires and convex armor pads and he doesn't look any fatter for it.

Let's see some paint on these guys!

HF Izanagi wrote:That armor on the Heavy looks fantastic! You'd think that adding more to the model would just kill it and make it much too bulky. But you managed to plate the guy up with wide wires and convex armor pads and he doesn't look any fatter for it.

You make it sound like an acomplishment, thank you. I just ask myself three questions all the time: Does it make sense? Would I wear/do that? Does it look cool?
The last question overrides the other two occasionally, that's normally the case when I start making sounds when I look at the miniature, I usually take that as a good sign.

About my progress: Spent a couple of hours painting today and two of the four gangers we're currently painting are almost finished. It's taking me forever because it's been a while since my last finished paintjob (several years) and I can't help to try some of the new techniques I learned in the meanwhile.

I might continue tomorrow, depending on whether my fiance decides to paint with me or not. She means to, but you know women, they change their minds easily.

Anyway I'm intending to finish those gangers asap. Expect at least one of them before the weekend...

Good luck with the gangers mate

don´t we all make little shooting or slashing sounds when modeling our minis?...i truly fear the days when i start having my way with tanks...the constant booooomm might let us loose our apartment^^

I am liking the gunner's armour and diamond pickaxe. Though I can't help feeling the gun could do with some straps.

Viktor von Domm wrote:don´t we all make little shooting or slashing sounds when modeling our minis?...i truly fear the days when i start having my way with tanks...the constant booooomm might let us loose our apartment^^

Yes we do! The only thing that makes me feel ridiculous is when I have to test a pose or equipment layout, which normally means I climb on things with my biggest super soaker and try to look dynamic and heroic or sinister depends on the project.

terribletrygon wrote:I am liking the gunner's armour and diamond pickaxe. Though I can't help feeling the gun could do with some straps.

Thank you, I'll consider some straps, you are right Brakar's gun is huge, that's why I love it. I have to add some straps to his backpack too, so I might do this as well.

Yes we do! The only thing that makes me feel ridiculous is when I have to test a pose or equipment layout, which normally means I climb on things with my biggest super soaker and try to look dynamic and heroic or sinister depends on the project.

my kids would like that if i ever did that... probably would be rolling on the floor laughing their bums off to see their dad going to be a super hero^^

you go in character for sculpting... that has to be honored^^

I paint in the flat, but my workshop, where I do everything else, is set up in the attic, so luckily there is no chance of anybody seeing me. My daughter would "roll" too, but just her eyes.
Besides I find it necessary sometimes to go in character. If I can't do it, nobody can, that's mainly because of my astartes-like physique... *cough*

so big guys with muscles as big as big muscles know how to handle a brush... well thats a comforting thought^^

now back on topic^^


we need more pics^^

I'll take care of that! Until I can give you something new, feel free to comment on how awesome the other ones are.

Those other pics are awesome

Howdy folks and friends!
After being unable to do anything for a couple of days (really anything, not just hobbywise), because papa blessed me with his finest stomach flu, today I felt well enough to crawl up into the attic to do some conversion-magic.

Being frustrated about the precious time I lost on being sick I had to be extra productive today, so I worked on four projects at the same time:

Espaldo, the hunchback, received the final improvements that were suggested by Trygon and Scarper, e.g. straps for the heavy gun and straps for his backup weapon. "Straps" is actually inaccurate, since I went for chains, which felt more suitable to me. Espaldo finished.

Acero, the autogunning ganger I posted earlier, has had even more changes done to him. Even though I was totally satisfied with how he looked, he proofed to be the most viable candidate for the "give the miners helmets"-program I mentioned earlier. So I filed off most of his head and added a helmet, head lamp and a protective collar.

Blanco, the new lasgunning addition to the Scarecrows, which I already gave a sneak peek on, got some progress too. I did some greenstuffing on his shoulder and gun and glued his arms in position. He is still some steps away from completion, especially because I'm not sure yet what else to do to him. I'm considering giving him a helmet as well and will definitely give him some more equipment and gak.

Radius, the dual plasma pistol delaque and my momentary nemesis, received some greenstuff on his goggles and a strap around his upper body to hold his back pack in place. I also improved the fit of his scabbard and replaced the missing plasma cartridge from his backpack, that I had lost.
While doing so Radius showed me why he is my nemesis: I dropped that (new) damnable part again! My lightning reflexes prevented the part from actually falling to the ground this time, because I abruptly pressed my thighs together. Which of course resulted in a good and a bad thing: The part was well protected and hiding somewhere in the folds of my trousers and I gave my balls a nice and extraordinarily painful squeezing, that I had to maintain till I had recovered the part some ten seconds later.
Anyway, once I'll have sculted him a new neck and some straps connecting his scabbard to his belt and thigh he will be done and the best looking little bugger you'll ever encounter in the hive.

I'm sorry for not having any pictures spicing up my "wall of text"-update, but all the quick shots I made with my cellphone were terribly fuzzy and I didn't want to be accused of teasing again. So expect a bigger picture update tomorrow. So long, guys.

Ok, people! Like I promised, here comes an update with lots of new pictures.

This new batch contains pictures of three old friends, so no fresh faces yet.

To be honest with you, I'm already saving pictures of a fresh face for a rainy day, when have nothing else to show you. (That would be Cachimbo, a juve I've finished a while ago.)

And I'm planning on finally finishing my hate/love Radius tomorrow, so there would be another fresh face coming up.

Back to what I'm actually showing you today:

Acero with his new helmet, including headlight and protective collar. Only missing proper replacement tubes for his mask, decided to break the old ones off while re-re-reconverting him. Closeup looks terrible, he is not that ugly actually, there is some resin dust on him apparently.

Next one up is Espaldo with the promised addition of chains to hold both his weapons into place. Looks crude, but thats just the flavor he is supposed to have.

Last, but not exactly least, Silvestro and maybe the biggest update today. I gave him proper lamp for his backpack and a variety of nice looking tools for his belt. Might still add some GS to blend the naked arm into the clothed rest of him.