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Anyone have advice for converting truescale CSMs using the "old" sprues?

I have a sizable surplus sitting around that I'd like to convert to renegades. From what I can tell, most modellers extend the thighs and the torso region to increase the height, usually about 1 - 2mm.

Would love to get some thoughts on the following:

1) Where do you make the cuts? I have seen truescale tutorials with people cutting at the joints and in the middle of the thighs. I realize this probably doesn't matter much, but I'd like to hear if one approach works better.

2) Does it make sense to mess with the arms? I think they are in the right scale for longer legs.

3) Is there a best way to reposition the feet? I just did this for a couple HQ models and, while the feet kept their shape, there was a big gap beneath the greaves.

4) And how about those greaves? I get the feeling the shin needs to be extended as much as the thigh.

Why bother cutting. Just get some termie legs. That way you only have to adjust the belt and fill in the leg segments

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Why bother cutting. Just get some termie legs. That way you only have to adjust the belt and fill in the leg segments

As it happens, I have some Termie legs and thought about that. They just look too heavy compared to the arms and torso.

Cataphractii legs work really well.

Yeah cataphractii legs are ace but so hard to get hold of now. Normal chaos termie legs worked fine for me a while ago.

I've truescaled some stuff using terminator legs before, but it involved basically rebuilding the entire torso from greenstuff in order to get the proportions right.

I think really it's more trouble than it's worth if you're planning making more than like 5 of them. My advice would be to buy some Intercessors/ Reivers and kitbash. Their scaling is really perfect and they are excellent sculpts with some nice posing (which a lot of termie legs struggle with, imo). The old CSM arms will still work, as will the heads, weapons and backbacks. With some minor modifcation you should be able to use the front half of the chaos torsos, too.

Compared to using termie legs, the only extra parts you'll be 'wasting' are the back halves of the torso, and you will make your life 1000% easier, and get a much better result, imo.

Doing Truescale by cutting up standard marines is a HUGE pain and unless you're willing to spend a good 2-3 hours per model you should steer way clear of that idea.

my two cents :]

...and actual answers to your questions in case you decide to go for it:

 Elbows wrote:
Cataphractii legs work really well.

Spoiler:

Work well? The Cataphractii legs looks significantly oversized on power armoured CSM.

Wouldn't it be easier to mess around with primarus stuff to get the scale?

also realistically how big are true scale marines supposed to be?

You could also just get some of the new chaos legs. They are upscaled to match the new primaris, being only a touch shorter than them in size.

 Desubot wrote:
Wouldn't it be easier to mess around with primarus stuff to get the scale?

also realistically how big are true scale marines supposed to be?

Truescale is about getting realistic proportion far more than messing with overall size.

 sing your life wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
Wouldn't it be easier to mess around with primarus stuff to get the scale?

also realistically how big are true scale marines supposed to be?

Truescale is about getting realistic proportion far more than messing with overall size.

Finding proper proportion is the most challenging part of converting old CSM to the new scale.

I've started converting old CSMs to the new scale, going to post pics for a how-to article once I get the process down.

The real difference in height between the new and the old is about 3mm, but part of this has to do with the position of the legs. The old CSM legs are slightly crouched, the new CSM legs are straight and upright. The greaves - the armor around the shins - are not quite proportional to the height of the legs, when you separate the lower leg from the thigh it looks short.

There's also issues with the chest piece. When you adjust the legs and put a torso on the top, it looks a little shorter and not quite as wide compared to the new models. One of the things about the new CSMs is they all have tabards / chainmail between the legs, which hides any issues around the pelvis. So it's not like there's a direct comparison between the models, you have to adjust for how you think they are supposed to look.

What I've been doing is as follows:

- Remove the feet from the legs using a sharp metal pointer.

- Cut the legs at the knee using clippers. This loses some detail on the back of the joint, but the right cut keeps the front looking fine.

- Saw the greaves in half horizontally. There's a natural cut area on most of them, which prevents you from losing detail.

- Repose the legs using steel wire, keeping about 1mm distance between the top and bottom of the greaves.

- Stuff some putty into the greaves and smooth it over. Stuff some putty into the foot area if needed.

- Let the putty cure, then re-do the back of the joints using putty and an x-acto knife.

This gets you to the point where you have straight legs. If you were to just put a torso on the top, the height difference is about 1.5mm. This doesn't really stand out unless you are comparing two models side-by-side, it's fine for tabletop quality. The easy solution would be to stuff some putty into the bottom of the torso and maybe add a tabard to hide some of the details.

The thing that does stand out is the lack of armor trim / detail compared with the new models. There's just a lot more spikes and pointy bits in comparison. I've been sculpting some in with putty and an x-acto knife. The ridges on the new CSM models are all less than 1mm from the surface, so you have to really smooth out the putty first and cut away to make it convincing.

The one thing I haven't been able to work out is rivets in the armor. I tried slicing up some thin polystyrene rods but they look too Orky when applied, the size is off. Not sure how to add rivets but maybe someone can give me some pointers.

As far as the torso goes, I'm working on a technique to make them wider. I've been sliding them down the middle vertically, but this causes a loss of detail on the front of the armor that I'm not comfortable with. I also tried bulking them out on the sides by adding a tiny amount of putty, but this made the arms stick out a little at the shoulder. I don't think there's a way around cutting the torso if you want to exactly match the dimensions of the new sculpts.

 Desubot wrote:
Wouldn't it be easier to mess around with primarus stuff to get the scale?

also realistically how big are true scale marines supposed to be?

Not really. Primaris marines are head taller than regular marines in fluff(they are custodian sized). Ergo primaris sized marines would be OFF scale.