First Vindicator ready

Last week I spent most of my Warhammer-time trying to get my competition entry ready.
I had a Space Marine Vindicator that was assembled but not painted, so I painted it Kantor Blue, gave it a heavy wash, and then used a sponge to add chipping paint, rust and some battle damage.
What I learned right away was that there is a lot of difference in the kind of sponge you use. I used one from an old Blister pack on my white masterclass, but this time I used a makeup sponge that was a lot finer. This meant more paint on the same spots and not that chipped result.
I also learned that you need darker wash on darker sufaces, so next time I will go directly to the darkest wash to avoid getting to many layers of wash on the model.

I had to make a base to put it on, and I worked with cork for my first time. I got a picture frame, took out the glass and replaced it with a cork sheet. Then I build the base up on that.
The Idea was to make a grimy battlefield where the Vindicator would fit in, and that worked quite well. I would have liked to make a battlefield with a lot more debris, so it would look like the Vindicator had blown up a wall or driven straight through one, but I only used two ruined top wall sections in the end. I also glued down a few iron girderes and a drainage pipe. The pipe was half of an industrial chimney, and with the help of some technical paint I managed to make it look like poison was coming out of the pipe. That part of the table was perhaps the one I was most satisfied with.

Just like last time I didn't get to the top three in the competition, but there were nine very nice entries, and I can see why the top three got their places.

This time though, I took the pictures before delivering the entry...

Here is the base seen from the top. You can clearly see the different height levels on the cork, and that is something I will work on for future bases. At the top of the picture you see the two wall sections.

My favorite part of the base, the pipe with toxic waste flowing out. This is something I will try to use on other bases as well, it leaves a nice contrast point for the brown base.

The Vindicator making its way through the breech. Notice that the plow blade has the same dirt as the base.

The Vindicator seen from the side.

Just a pic taken with flash to show that the interior is painted up as well. Here you really see the dirt on the chassis of the Vindicator.

Picture taken from a little more distance without the flash.

Here is a detail of the front plowblade. I think this picture gives a good impression that the Vindicator has worked its way up the slope. You can also see the rust on the blade, and it does not look like something you want to see attacking you...

And finally, a pic of the diorama from the top.

First building painted and washed

Since I was on the roll with the pictures, I felt it was about time to show this building as well.
It is mostly done with parts from the Manfactorum set, but since I mix up building parts a lot I can't be 100% sure. This pic is taken top-down, just to show the wash effect on the walkway.

Here is a picture of the front of the building, showing a little detail as well.

 This pic is in here just to show how the other wall looks like.

And finally a pic of the back or inside of the building, just to show that it is painted there as well...

Ork Burna-Bommer completed

Here are some pics of the Ork Burna-Bommer. I still have to do the final cleanup and add some washes to it, and I will use the same technique on some parts of the "landing-gear" as I used on the Landraider redeemer.
First we have a detail of the front of the plane, showing off the huge air intake in the front.

Detail of the side of the nose, also showing the cockpit and gunners hatch where I painted the clear glass canopies while they were still on the sprue in order to paint as steady as possible.

Side view showing the fuel tank on the wing, and also showing a little bit of armament. Under each wing there are one burna bomb (the one with the white tip) and three rokkits.

Detail of the engine. This will be a bit more gritty after the washing is done, as it looks way to clean for an ork vehicle at the moment. I won't mess it up too much, but add a thin wash of Nuln oil.

Detail of the back finns, where the tail rudder and the finn have gotten some yellow details. If I ever make a yellow plane, I will reverse the colors so these panels are painted red on that plane.

The Grot gunner is sweeping the air, looking for hostile flyers to shoot at... Alto this is a nice shot of the fuel system, with both copper and Leadbelcher paints.

I had to zoom out a lot to get a pic with the hole plane in it, but I felt that it should be a part of the presentation. The building corner on the base is the start of what I hope will be a nicely decorated base.

Inquisitorial Landraider Redeemer done

This is the Landraider that I painted up at the white paint masterclass at Games Workshop.
Before I went there I had to assemble it, so I started with painting up the interior. Lots of panels, and quite a visible engine...

The idea at the masterclass was to paint the vehile white then make it grimy and look like it had been on the battlefiel for a long time. The entire tank was based white, painted Mechanicus Standard Gray and then sprayed white at an angle, and then heavily washed and then sponged with white to create paint chipping, and brown and black to create rust and dirt.

Here are some closeups of different angles.First up is the front. The doors open, and reveal the painted interior. And on top of the doors are the twin linked assault cannon to lay down suppressing fire as the troops disembarks the vehicle. The Front gate looks like it has hit the ground hard on several occasions.

The Flamestorm cannons have been painted to look like the metal's been really hot.

The same effect has been painted on the exhaust pipes, but here I used a little more purple wash.

 And the parting shot is from the top...

Nobody expects the Inquisition...

This last week has given my forces a new tank. On saturday I attended a workshop on painting white and how to add weathering like rust and grime to your tanks. We had to bring a white tank, and since I don't use white in my armies (except for the helmets of my veterans and a few details) I decided to make a vehicle for one of my Inquisitors.
The choice fell on a Landraider Redeemer that I felt was the perfect choise for the Inquisiton.
The Landraider is a tank that can take almost any beating, and the Redeemer version has huge flamers on the sides that will clean a battlefiled of most enemies.
I started the assembly Thursday night with getting the hull together and painting the interior, then the rest of the tank was assembled on Friday.
I discovered that the tank was a little bit crooked when I was ready to assemble the roof, as it didn't fit as snug as I expected. It seems like the top of the side walls was a little bit tighter than the bottom. So next time I assemble a Landraider of any sort I will place the top on without gluing it when I assemble the bottom part, so make sure everything fits perfect.
I don't think it's easy to see the problem when you look at the assembled tank, but I surely noticed it when assembling it and glueing the top on...

Saturday was spent painting the tank up and getting it to look like it had been in the field for a long time, with dirt (might add some earth down toward the tracks in the future), rust and paint chipping. Then I've spent a little time on Sunday and yesterday to paint up some of the things I didn't have time to paint at the workshop (weapons and small metal details mostly).
Yesterday I also gave most of the metal a brown wash (Agrax Earthshade), but I know I forgot to take a few small details, so they will be done in the next sitting.

While waiting for the different layers to dry on Saturday, I also did most of the work on the Inquisitor I had started to paint earlier. I will have him/her (decided to have one female and two male Inquisitors, not decided who's who of the two with witch hunter outfits and a braid yet) ready in one more sitting, just have to paint some tubing. Then it will be a cleanup and a wash before basing.

Since I decided to make the Landraider an Inquisitorial vehicle, I decided I needed to have some solid troops to follow the Inquisitor in to battle, so I brought home a box of Grey Knights (five minis).
I have no plan to start a Grey Knight army as I have more than enough with the four 40K armies I have already, but the models look really cool and will be Inqusitorial Marines of a chapter yet to be named... Not entirely sure about the color scheme yet, but I'm thinking blue and gold (sounds a little bit familiar...)...

On Saturday March 28th Games Workshop Oslo has a painting competition where the item painted should be a tank. I have the Landraider to field if my original plan fails, but I hope to field a Vindicator painted up with the same techniques I learned Saturday. It was already assembled, and now it is painted and washed. Next sitting I will start to add the chipping paint and the rust to it. The Idea is to place it on a base built with a picture frame and cork, but not attach it, so that I can take it off for gaming and have a base I can use for photos of other vehicles as well.

The ork flyer is still not 100% complete, but there is not much left. I have decided to use the techniques I learned on saturday on parts of the underside of the plane, for the parts that will look like they are in contact with the ground on takeoff or landing. Then I will add some rust and oil streaks to it, and see if I can give it a gentle wash all over.

When it comes to scenery, I have stated to paint the base of my first forest (not the haunted one, but the regular one), and I have decided how I want it to look. I will paint it up as I wait for other projects to dry.
I have also detailed and washed my first building, so the final step for the building is a gentle drybrush. This will hopefully be done some time this week.

I hope to take some pictures of the finished Landraider and make a post of it in a few days time, depending on how fast the wash that I will have to apply on the final metal bits dry. If it dries fast, I can take the pictures today, if not I will have to wait until tomorrow with that.

I also plan to make a small tutorial with the Vindicator if it works out the way I hope and plan for...
If it works out, I will use this method for all my vehicles, both Ork, Space Marine and Astra Militarum (the amount of chipping, rust and dirt will be different from project to project though).

Flyer is comming along, almost done

My Ork Bommer is almost done now. All that remains is finishing the tower for the Grot gunner, and gluing the bombs on to the plane. Then there is the usual cleanup, washing and perhaps a drybrush of some sort (metal to make it look a little rough maybe).
I managed to paint and glue on the canopy for the pilot yesterday. Painting clear plastic can be a real pain in the butt. Usually you can paint over with another color if you get some paint where it's not supposed to be, but with clear plastic you are stuck with paint on places where it's not supposed to be. Same with glue, if you get glue stains on the clear plastic it will not stay clear any longer.
So I was very happy when the canopy was painted without spilling and glued on with just one tiny stain on the side window. It looked a whole lot better than all those model airplanes I had pinned to my roof in my youth... I looked through the canopy and saw a nicely painted instrument panel, an Ork pilot looking good in his chair, and then it hit me... I had forgotten to paint his teeth!
I will not remove the canopy to paint them, because it will never look that good being reattached. So I guess the pilot is sucking so hard on his lips that the shape of the teeth are showing through. At least I've learned not to make that mistake again, and I will make really sure the teeth are painted on the Grot gunner before the gunner canopy is glued on.
When it comes to the gunner I will have to do a few dry fits, as it seems to be a real tight fit getting the Grot arms glued on while the guns gets attached to the plane at the same time. And then everything is connected through the firing mechanism of the gun that is attached to the Grot hands in the sprue. So everything must fit perfectly. Then I still need to glue the Grot head on to the neck after that. Looks like it will be a tight squeeze if done in the right order, but done wrong it will just be a tragedy...

I also painted the arms of my abhuman auxiliary command squad, and glued the flamer and the lasgun troopers together. It was a little pain getting the flamer pieces to fit perfectly together, but I got there after some fiddling. This will probably improve in the future, as I plan to have flamers in many of my squads. I think the look I have given the flamers now is better than the flamers I've painted earlier, so I will see if I should try and repaint some old flamers, or if I shall just say that they have older equipment. I think both solutions will work ok as there are so many different forgeworlds delivering equipment to the Astra Militarum that some differences are to be expected.
When I glued the trooper with both hands on his lasrifle together, those pieces fitted together perfectly on the first attempt. I was a little uncertain about that fit, as there are so many different arms to choose from. I did a dry fit, but it's not always easy to see if you have covered every angle, so I am very happy with the way this turned out.
All that is missing to finish this command squad, is the painting of the standard, and gluing the arm holding it onto the trooper.
Hopefully I will be able to use my converted Ogryn as the standard bearer, but then I will find another unit for his human counterpart.

First flyer is on the way

The Mrs was working late from home today, so since I had the day off I thought I might spend it at Games Workshop. So I gathered my tools, a box with paints and glue and a box containing an Ork Bommer and went to Oslo. The ork Bommer can be painted up both as a fighter plane (Dakkajet) and two bomber versions (Burna-Bommer and Blitza-Bommer), and after a lot of consideration I decided to go for the Burna-Bommer. The main reason for this was that that it's the one with the most rokkits, so it just looks cooler. I have more Bommers on my shelf, so I will probably build and paint the other versions at a later time.
Speed is important to a plane, so I decided to go for a red color scheme, with yellow details. The metal parts are part copper and part Leadbelcher, and the bombs and rokkits will be painted as I did on the weapons of the Meganobz.
I have no idea how these Bommers take off or land, as there are no landing gear. Maybe if I get an idea in the future, I can try and build a take-off site as Ork scenery. I suppose they have to be shot up like we do in the real world with kids rubber band planes, or dropped from a height (but then how do thy get them up that high to drop them in the first place?).

All three plane versions have a big metal girder underneath so I assume that they use this to land on and  and something that looks like an anchor as a brake to stop when they are back on the ground. So I will try and paint these parts as they have had their paint scraped off.
I have decided to build all my Ork planes with canopies, as I think that looks best, and I will paint the metal holding the glass together with copper and try real hard not to get any copper paint or plastic glue on the parts that remain as clear glass.

The Ork Bommer is supplied with a sturdy base, and a pole that looks like it is supposed to be glued on to the base.
One of the other hobbyists that were in the store yesterday was painting up a Space Marine Stormtalon Gunship, and he had made a hole in the base and placed the pole all the way through and then glued it in place. I plan on doing the same thing as it looks more solid than just placing the pole on top of the base, but also securing the pole with greenstuff on top of the base, as I plan to make a nice base for the flyer. I haven't thought up any details yet, but it is quite a big base, and since the plane is high in the air I can add some sort of a diorama on it to make the model look good in the display case while still functionable as a game piece.

I planned to bring my Imperial Guard heavy weapon squad home with me yesterday and post some pis of it here, but the store manager asked if they could have it on display until the next competition, and naturally I agreed to that. It's not like I need them any time soon, so it's sort of cool to have them on display where other people might see them too.
So the pictures will have to wait until the next competition who is three weeks away. I'm not sure if I will participate myself, as the theme is "tank" and I don't really have anything yet that I think can stand any chance. But I will participate in later competitions for sure.

Another week, another project

I never got around to basing and washing my chaos space marines, so they didn't go to the competition with me. Instead I brought an Imperial guard heavy weapon squad (yes, I know it's Astra Militarum now, but Imperial Guard just sound so much better...).
They are the first completely finished heavy weapon team for my army, and I will post pictures of them next week when I get them back from the Games Workshop store. They wished to have the entries in the store for a week, so I'll post pics next weekend.

Today I've been working more on my Tempestus Scions, fixing backpacks and the vox caster, and painting some details. Next sitting with them I think I will be ready to glue the backpacks and the vox operator's arm on.

I did the basic work on one of my buildings today. I made up my own brush-technique that I call wet-brushing. It's very similar to drybrushing, but with a brush full of paint. This sets the standard for all my buildings for the future, but since I use a lot of paint I will try to learn drybrushing and see if I get the same kind of result. The building is painted Mechanicus Standard Gray, and the door and pipe as well as some smaller details will be bronze. It is not finished yet, just a work in progress...

The walkways are painted in the same way with metal (Leadbelcher), same color as I will use on the ducts and the small pipes on the top of the building.

The final project of the day is two new heavy weapon squads. These are Catachans  and will serve with 2nd Platoon.
I have painted their pants, the metals and the plants. If you look closely you will see that the trees have a lighter color on their leaves than the meat eating flowers.
I like the Catachans, and look forward to finish these units. I haven't decided on the color on their scarves yet, but the rest of the colors are going to be my standard army colors.
I have not assembled these units, so I will not take credit or blame for the way they are set up. They were bougt used on Ebay and are probably painted up, tripped and re-primed. I like some of the things that are done with them, but there are also some things I would have done different. We'll get back to that once the units are done and ready for a better presentation...