The Encrusty, a Nurgle warband of clay.

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**darkcloak**

Sometimes you gotta make lemonade when life gives you lemons. These Chaos Marines embody that ideal.

I traded off an unwanted army and got these guys in return. I can't say anything bad about the person I traded with, in fact he was a swell chap! When I showed him the condition of the CSMs he gladly gave me more Marines to make up for it. When I say these Marines were trash, I mean that they almost went in the bin. They were that bad. Glued together with some kind of hot glue, conversions so bad they looked like stress relief hobbyist style.

... They were bad.

Taking a chance I decided to try my hand at sculpting, using a little known clay called Darwi. In this thread you will see how this army went from total garbage to a slightly different kind of trash. I started out this thread with low expectations and no skill, and somewhere along the way, well... Let's just say I'm happy with my work!

I encourage hobbyists to step outside the box, as I have done, and to try new things. I fully expected an exercise in futility, and yet I think I may have scratched the surface of a different way of modelling and I sincerely hope others will give my ideas a try. I know I still have a lot to learn, but now I feel confident in my ability to do so, and I can't wait to see what others whose skills are already developed can do!

So read on fellow hobbyists, enjoy the pics, leave some comments and always always always have faith in your capacity for learning.

May your brushes never fishtail and may your paints always stay fresh! Hobby on my friends, hobby on!

Update: I keep saying project done, but in reality... I have 2 dreads to do yet and a Heldrake conversion featuring an old school Batman Forever Batwing model. So stay tuned!

**ToxicBox**

Looking good

Nurgle always has room for more trash marines

**Buttery Commissar**

I'm glad you gave them a second chance, this looks like a whole lot of fun. Get the tiny drill out next, perhaps?
Looking very interesting so far.

I hope you're enjoying doing it!

**darkcloak**

Its a load of fun actually!

I experimented with doing all the nicks and pock marks before the clay and it seemed more of a pain than doing it afterwards. The darwi seems strong enough once its cured, but it doesn't hold a fine detail very well.

We will see how it holds up to painting. I have used darwi on other things and it seems to work fine. I think it lends itself rather well to this sort of work though.

I keep looking at these spare bikes and wondering if I should go for it....

**darkcloak**

One squad down, two to go!

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All done!

Except for the Bike Lord, mwuhahahaha!

I figure feth it. Go for the cheesecake! Nurgle Lord on a bike with the Burning Brand! Maybe even a daemon weapon!

**darkcloak**

Derp, load photos first dude...

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The biker was going to be a MotF w/ conversion beamer but I have plenty of Marines.

The gun assembly pops right off so I'll probably try to keep that feature.

Later on I'll add a couple classic dreads and give em the same love.

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Neat thing too I just noticed...

7 man squads...

3 troops, 2 Dreads, 2 Chaos Lords... 7 units total...

7 repeated 3 times....

....CHAOSGODSWATCHOVERME!!!!!!!

Blargajabegibishumanagabagabagaba!

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Now to find 19 ccws to turn into plague bayonets...

**ToxicBox**

Nurgle approves. But maybe more decay on the bike

**darkcloak**

Lol!

Yeah that one is going to be fun.

I'm also toying with the idea of a Nurgle Sorc on a palanquin...

That could be interesting!

Spoiler:

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Okay!

The darwi is dry, but not quite cured. It takes about 48 hours to cure properly and now is the perfect time for knife work. At this stage the darwi is hard enough to hold a line, yet soft enough still that it is easily manipulated. You just have to remember that this isn't a super detailed clay, so you can't really do a lot of tiny stuff. A lot of the tiny details that do appear are natural occurrences that are formed when you are first sculpting the wet clay.

All these Marines were done in the same way and I'll explain it briefly.

Take a tiny amount of clay in your fingers. Get it nice and wet and work it a bit until there are no hard lumps. Then simply mush the clay onto the area, making sure to push it into the model firmly so it sticks. Don't worry if the blob lifts up a bit. Take your tool, I used a ballpoint stylus, and get it wet. Then begin poking the clay down, using small motions to smear the edges of the clay out. You want a nice bead of water on your stylus. What will happen is you'll get the clayvto break down a bit and you'll be left with a bit of sludge around the edges. This is perfect. Now go over top of the clay with your stylus and poke and swirl it a bit to get the raised texture. You can make pock marks and holes by gently wiggling your stylus into the clay. If the piece is big enough and you are super gentle, you can get the clay to crack a bit around the hole you've made by keeping your stylus a bit drier. A wet stylus will make a nice smooth hole. Experiment with both!

Also another tip I've found for working with darwi is to apply a thin superglue to the dried clay after you're happy with it. Darwi is porous and once dried will soak up the glue and gives a much tougher bond. Also certain thin superglue can be used for great effects. A bit of glue here and there will give the effect of sludge dripping down. Just apply the glue to a pock mark, let the model stand while the glue dries and you should end up with a big snotty string of dried glue.

At any rate the thin glue will get into all the books and crannies and really helps to hold the entire model together.

I'm off to work now, but when I get home... That biker is gonna get it!

**darkcloak**

Okay here goes the Bike.

I figure I'll do this step by, so please bear with me here as I fumble with my phone.

Step One!

Get ready to rumble. Translation, get your work area ready.

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Let's start with the Burning Brand of Skalathrax. We'll call it the Plague Petard of Poisonalia, just for fun! Screw those other Chaos Gods!

**darkcloak**

Now we take a little Darwi and work it a bit with some wet fingies

**Buttery Commissar**

Looking forward to seeing what comes out the other end.

**darkcloak**

Then wash your hands before you pick up your phone...

The residual clay on your fingers isn't wasted. Smear it on there!

Your little lump of clay...

**darkcloak**

Put a little bit of clay where you want to start....

It should be nice and wet.

**darkcloak**

Use your stylus to poke the clay into place and begin the texturing...

**darkcloak**

Now you can blow gently on the clay to get some of that water wicked away. Now you can see some of the details starting to show...

Here I've also made a couple holes with a wet stylus. This bit is too small to show you the cracking effect.

**darkcloak**

Let's try a bigger piece!

Same as before, wet the clay and press it to the model. Use your fingers to wet the clay again once its applied.

**darkcloak**

Here you can see the effects of the wet stylus on the clay. A nice sloppy hole that... Um well... Never mind. Suffice to say it looks gross.

The second pic is what happens when you use a dry stylus to work out a hole, note the clay cracking apart...

**darkcloak**

And here is the gun, ready to sit quietly on a shelf and dry...

Now to do the Bike itself!

**darkcloak**

And bam, bike complete.

Now just the biker. What's a good melee weapon for him? I'm thinking a lightning claw...

**darkcloak**

Thought I'd throw this in here just for kicks.

This isn't actually from a hobby knife, its work related. They should really charge extra for fingernail soufflé... But kids, be careful with knives!

**darkcloak**

What's that Visa?

**darkcloak**

Electronic use only?

**darkcloak**

The full Nurgle Lord on a bike, with Rotting Claw and Plague Petard of Poisonalia.

... And moo moo scissors...

**darkcloak**

Okay, tonight let's see how the darwi paints up.

This guy is probably my favourite so far. I'm starting with Vallejo white primer. Gonna brush it on because all those nooks and crannies look like they will be hard to cover with a spray.

**darkcloak**

Ten points to whoever can point out what I forgot to do before priming!

Lol... There he is anyways. Let's paint another while he dries.

**darkcloak**

7 primed and ready to dry!

**Viktor von Domm**

Basing? But that can be done after painting too...

Cool project, never was one for chaos, but I like the project because you really are one to make lemonade when life got you only lemons...

Cheers, vik

P.s. looking forward to see that clay get painted!

**darkcloak**

Hmm hadn't thought about basing yet... Probably pools of gunk or blood.

Anyways here is a couple with some wash. Now you can actually see what that clay looks like! Lol

That's waaagh flesh watered down, btw

**Viktor von Domm**

the wash helped to spot the details... good work!

if i may suggest a basing...try to cover the base in PVA and then add drops of superglue... don´´t touch everything till it´s all dry... the superglue creates some weird and alien looking structures in the PVA... perfect for nurgle!!!

**Buttery Commissar**

Great to see that nasty work starting to become visible!