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Hi there! This is a second attempt at a Harlequin blog. I told myself when I started this army, "No fancy conversions, this is strictly a painting project." So much for that.

Here's my scratch built Solitaire, still WIP, head is still blu-tac. Sorry for the poor quality photos, I'll try to get some better ones next time!



It is loosely based off and inspired by this image:



And a close up of the claw:



This is only my second attempt at sculpting a model from scratch. The first one was way too small, even though it was 28mm to eye level, it was no way "heroic scale" enough to fit in with 40k. This model is slightly bigger than most 40k models, but fits in closely enough. I think I've got the proportions down fairly well, now it's just a matter of getting the details right.

This is a pretty basic first post I know, but I'll be putting up more pictures of the rest of my Harlequins, an army list, and more details on t he Solitaire soon. In the mean time if you have any questions or comments I'll gladly welcome them.

Kudos on your sculpting project! You are more ambitious than I!

I think you have a really good start here! Might we have a scale pic? My only CC thus far would be the static pose. It certainly is true to your concept art, but doesn't mesh well with Harliquins. Have you thought about adding a bit of movement? Maybe even just repositioning the claw hand would help.

Anyways, keep up the good work!
Rawson

Thanks Rawson! Always good to have your feedback. You've got a good point on the static pose. At the moment the arms are easy to re-position, so maybe some kind of creepy "come hither" beckoning with the claw would look cool. I'm using a lot of the old metal harlequins, which are quite static, but I've made a lot of them more dynamic, so I'll post up some comparison shots to see if she meshes in well with the rest of the force.

In the mean time, here's a few other highlights on what I've been working on

The Manifestation of Cegorach (just noticed the little hole on his chest)


Shadowseers (the right one will have his face tidied up a bit)



Death Jester


Great Harlequin/ Avatar


Skyboards




Enjoy, and C&C welcome!

They all look sweet, the bases are cool as well.

Hey man nice work...I never touch metal minis myself but what you've got here so far shows real promise and they fit those DE boards perfectly!

The only one I don't like, if I'm being picky, is "The Manifestation of Cegorach"...I feel he's a little too simple ATM compared to the others, and I don't really like the head choice. Maybe with some more GS gems stones or other Eldar hallmarks on him, runes on his staff etc it'll glam him up some more but thats your call...

Over all looking great though, and paint will make 'em epic!

R

Thanks for the feedback guys!

Regarding the bases, I've always thought it a little strange seeing green grass in city streets, or snow in deserts, so I wanted to go with bases that could fit in anywhere. But the Harlequins live in the Webway, this strange, fractured labyrinth between the borders of reality and the warp. So I thought I'd represent that on their bases somehow and there it is! The spaces in between the plasticard will be black, to represent the true void, and the plasticard shards will be painted with stars and galaxies etc.

@Ghostflame, I see what you mean about the manifestation of Cegorach (working title btw, if you can think of something better I'd welcome it!) I'll see what I can do to give him some runes and gems, but I also want to try to keep him looking quite alien even to the Eldar. Thanks for your thoughts

master of asgard wrote:Thanks for your thoughts

No probs mate, still looks cool though!

When people obviously have some skill, like yourself, I tend to be quite harsh in my CC but its only coz your work is good enough not to have to pull any punches. I found this guy on the web...maybe a little OTT in fact but def an Eldar harlequin god!


R

Thanks Ghostflame, I'm definitely open to CC, if it makes me rethink something and come up with something even better, well, that's what it's all about! I did see that guy but I was a bit put off by the sheer amount of reworking that's been done to his torso, but I'll try to come up with a happy medium.

So, here is the scale shot as requested. As you can see, she's taller than the old metal Harlies by a long way (most things are) and taller than even a Space Marine, but shorter than Jain Zar who is an absolute monster of a model, especially considering she's probably about 20 years old by now!


I just wanted to put up this next picture to show what I'm going for with the bases. Every member of the troupe is slightly raised off the base by wire. The idea behind this is that from the tabletop, this won't be too noticeable, except that you may be able to slightly see under their feet (this is the intention). The idea is to enforce this idea that they're slightly out of phase with this reality, that they're almost floating above this shattered fabric of spacetime they live in. As you can see, a lot of the more static poses have been re-positioned so that they're no longer basically looking at the ground, almost like they're dancing or running.


More to come soon


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Aaaaand here's a bit of painting. Still WIP, I need to finish a few areas, gemstones, the base etc and smooth out the yellow on the cloak, but I'm pretty happy with the checks on his suit.




And here's a bit more work on the Solitaire. I tried making it look like she's beckoning someone with one finger but I didn't like it that much so I've bent the fingers back again. Still not sure exactly what to do with that. Also I've done her skirt thing.

One thing I did realise, now she has a head and hands, is that her feet need to be a bit bigger to fit in with the Heroic scale.

Love your work mate!

Curious how you plan on finishing those bases.

AvatarForm wrote:Love your work mate!

Curious how you plan on finishing those bases.

Thanks very much! As to the bases, here's a rough idea. This guy got soaked in paint stripper after this shot as I wasn't happy with the stars on his suit, but the base is pretty much how they're all going to be, except I'm thinking of making the space in between the shards black or very dark blue. Still not sure about the colour scheme for the bases tbh!

Looks very interesting, I'll definetly be back for any new updates!

Thanks! New updates will not be until Sunday night or Monday I'm afraid, as I'm away for the weekend. But stay tuned

I will keep my eye on this like these a lot!

Wow, these are amazing! The bases are really interesting, Im looking forward to seeing where you go with them.

I can't believe you stripped that model, that was some beautiful freehand, if your standards are that high these are going to be a real treat.

eidolonian wrote:I will keep my eye on this like these a lot!

smiler wrote:Wow, these are amazing! The bases are really interesting, Im looking forward to seeing where you go with them.

I can't believe you stripped that model, that was some beautiful freehand, if your standards are that high these are going to be a real treat.

Thanks very much guys! Actually looking at the pictures again, I'm slightly in disbelief that I stripped it as well! But still, I appreciate the support!

Here's a little update on the Solitaire. I've given her arms, as well as doing the first bit of her hood that goes over her chest:

Looking at this I think that there are a couple of problems with the proportions of the model. Unfortunately there's a wire armature in the middle which will be a nightmare to saw through, so I'm not going to do that, but I am going to make the hips amd legs a little bit wider and thicker to bring them better into line with the shoulders.

Ideas/ C&C welcome. Thanks for looking

Man, your sculpting look very good! I'm a big fan of these clothes!

Thanks very much Mr Merlin, I appreciate it. I've started on the head, and bulked out her hips a bit more. I'll post pics tomorrow when the sun's come up!

Alright, here we go. After botching her head, I made a new one, and done quite a bit of work on her. The GS is still curing, which is why her face may look a little weird, but I'll smooth out any bumpiness when it's fully dry. Check it out:





Considering this is my first ever fully sculpted face, I'm pretty pleased with how she's turned out. Once again here's the artwork I've been using as inspiration:


I've still got a few bits to do; her right hand, the gauntlets, and I'm debating whether to give her the tatty sleeves like she has in the picture or to leave her upper arms as they are.

Proportion-wise, there's angles from which she looks a bit off, but mostly I'm pretty happy with how she's turned out

Hope you enjoy, any C&C is welcomed!

The face looks really good, but I'm not too sure about the hood..... it seems a little rough-edged.... but then again thats how it look on your inspiration-pic.

So I'd say you did a very good job there, and I'm looking forward to seeing it when its done!

Ok, it's been a long time, but the agents of the Black Library are back! And this time they're here to stay. I've joined a gaming club, so I've got way more motivation to paint than I had previously, and also I've bought pretty much everything I need, so now it's all down to the painting!

So without further ado, here are some pics of what I've been working on. Firstly, some Harlequins (counts as Wyches) I've got 9 painted, 10th is wip. Not sure if the lighting was very good for these pictures, but hopefully it's good enough.





Those guys were mostly painted to a pretty much tabletop standard, because I have about 30 of them and I'd like to get them finished before my first grey hairs start appearing, but to reward myself for getting a (nearly) complete squad done, I took some time to paint up this guy:



I use him as a Haemonculus Ancient with a Hexrifle, and attach him to a squad of trueborn represented by OOP Death Jesters.There are a couple of areas I'm not totally happy with, such as the rough spot of purple on the middle of his cowl, and a couple of the checkers which need to be a bit more solid white, but overall I'm really pleased with this guy and think he really stands out on the table top.

Next are my 'Wardens of the Crossroads', counts as DE Warriors. These are one of the many defenses of the Black Library, guarding some of the twisting approaches and intersections of webway tunnels near the Craftworld. Again painted to a tabletop standard as I have 20 of these guys.




That's all for now, more on it's way. Thanks for reading folks, C&C most welcome, especially if you can give me any feedback on how to fix those annoying spots on the Death Jester.

Cheers!

Nice, you did a good job posing them and painting. It isn't easy to make those RT models look good

 Cave_Dweller wrote:
Nice, you did a good job posing them and painting. It isn't easy to make those RT models look good

Thanks very much. I still have nearly 40 more of the RT Harlequins left to paint, including 10 on Hellion skyboards and 6 Death Jesters, so I think I'm going to get quite a bit of practice in trying to make them look good!