Father Mapple's Blood Suns Chapter Work Log

[Crusader Bob]

I'm amazed by your bravery.

I couldn't paint white if my life depended on it, you make a Raven white.

Looking extremely good

[Xenith]

I couldn't paint white if my life depended on it, you make a Raven white.

Push yourself a little. Ceramite white takes (almost) all the pain from painting white. 2-3 thin coats instead of 15, over a black basecoat.

[Father Mapple]

Also I am using an airbrush, so it applies much more evenly and just as thick as I want it to. The coverage is not a problem because the layer is dry by the time I get to one end to do another pass on the area I'm working on. But I do the details and cleanup with white and regular brushes, and it's not as bad as people think. You could do it. I did the death company with infantry and the Dreadnought with just a brush, as well as the chaplain.

[Father Mapple]

Update time, again! Still working on the Chaplains. I'd love to get some feedback on Astaroth, mainly. But first, the finished Elite Chaplain.

 

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5510/9894784365_c5183ff0a2_b.jpg

 

And the second shot.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7336/9894921933_e37cd44e80_b.jpg

 

NOW! Astaroth. I had a slight change of heart. White is still a strong color on him, but as Chief-Chaplain of my BA Successors, I wanted him to stand out from the white and black death company, the white and red priests, and the white and trim chaplains - so I base coated him the burgundy, then went over carefully with white on the ridges, taking a sinew/tendon type of look instead of lighter red muscle fiber. Maybe bones? I like the effect, even if I can't describe it. 

Also, since this is artificer armour, I am making the solid pieces the same copper color I'm doing a lot of the other bling on other models. The wings will be the burgundy color with some highlights of crimson, and the hair will be matte black with some grayish highlights. The face will be just flesh colored. The scrolls will be washed with Agrax Earthshade. Does this all sound like a good idea? From tabletop, the red seems to stand out a lot more strongly. 

 

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7367/9894791225_78f03672a7_b.jpg

 

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3698/9894795775_1c5469497a_b.jpg

 

Thanks for the thoughts and feedback!

[marine7312000]

I like Astaroth however I think the white highlights are a little too thick. And I love the idea of the other Chaplan in white.

[Calnus]

I'd wash the red areas with red again.  Your current white highlights make astorath look pink :(  Really nice job on the wings though, the grey and copper colors look great together.

[Father Mapple]

I was really hoping this weekend I was going to spend all day Saturday finishing up the Stormraven, and Sunday, tonight, doing Lemartes. 

But then the Apocalypse came.

As in, I played a great game of Apocalypse that took up all of yesterday, with 4 people to a side, and 4000 points per player, for a total of 32,000 points on the board. I'll be posting the link to the photo gallery soon. My buddy was making a video of it, like a battle report, and so I'll post links to that too if he finishes it.

So, disappointed I won't finish the models today (yardwork, a sibling's birthday, other things will be distracting me. Pshhh!)

But very excited about the game yesterday, and it was a ton of fun.

[marine7312000]

We forgive you.  A little delay is quite understandable with a game that size.

[Father Mapple]

Ok, so... pictures! They're in chronological order, so if you just keep pressing the right button from the picture I linked, you'll see the fight unfold in a weird kind of silent slide show. 

 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thefathermapple/10000478574/in/set-72157636028309546/

 

Also, my buddy did a video battle report of the entire thing. The video report logs in at 25 minutes! But some of that is his commentary since we sort of forgot to video the end of the final turn.

 

 

Let me know what you think, and if you liked the video, let my buddy know.

Edited October 3, 2013 by Father Mapple

[Father Mapple]

Well, I'm not sure if I'm out of the Blood Angel painting challenge yet. Even with the progress I'm about to post, I have 7 death company (and we know how long it took me to do 5!), Lemartes, and I need to finish up the Stormraven.

 

BUT! I will finish. I will finish the models pledged here, even, since I want to use them all for my 2500 final list and sideboard for swapping out things. So, without further ado, Astorath the Grim and an Elite Chaplain/Reclusiarch.

 

Astorath the Grim 1

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3759/10504768533_e41f19da5f_b.jpg

 

Close up. I went back and forth on the face a lot. Finally got something approaching the other bare headed Mephiston, Sanguinary Priests I already had with this. One pupil is bigger than the other though!

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5475/10504568765_a3eb0c6455_b.jpg

 

I kept finding detail on this model. I didn't even know there was a blood angels insignia on this big skull shoulder until I washed it. 

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3775/10504610804_646222f261_b.jpg

 

Rear shot to show the jump pack.

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5483/10504797263_79e041d879_b.jpg

 

Other side. I love the multiple little skull shoulder. My army is almost in proper 40k ratio for skulls now, in just this one miniature.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3772/10504802563_6732630e8c_b.jpg

 

And when it gets right down to it... here's tabletop view, the view that matters most to me. 

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5531/10504787333_8f0f873d70_b.jpg

 

Elite Chaplain 1

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2819/10504777333_29aefa02a8_b.jpg

 

The company markings for Death Company in my chapter represent a black hole - the void in a marine's life when they can no further serve the Emperor or Sanguinius. So I tried to paint a black hole...

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5535/10504782103_9aefd9a04a_b.jpg

 

But if I didn't succeed at painting a black hole, I sure as hell free-handed this blood drop!

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7338/10504591854_f5901b1ae5_b.jpg

 

Looking forward to any feedback. Thanks!

[Memento Of Prospero]

Keep on trucking brother! Using Washes would probable make quick shading easier for you, if you want to try it out!

[Office temp]

The white is a tad chalky, but to be sure white is a hard color to do

[Father Mapple]

Well, I passed my lawyer licensing exam! Just got results tonight. So now that I can be a honest-to-goodness, working lawyer/solicitor, I don't know if that means more or less hobby time in the next few months. BUT! It needed to be mentioned before things get hectic and this thing disappears from lack of free time.

In an attempt to make sure progress DOESN'T stop, I have pictures I need to post of my nearly-completed Stormraven. It looks snazzy in white and black, got the gunmetal, some rudimentary weathering. Need to figure out what to do with the canopies, and need to put some freehand blood suns on it somewhere. Will post for ideas and comment soon!

[Father Mapple]

An article I wrote for a Texas centric 40k blog. Hope you all enjoy! I'll post it on my WIP rather than in a new topic to avoid any claims of showboating... lol. And besides, the advice is a bit generic, even if all the examples are of my Blood Angels. http://texas40k.com/benefits-to-playing-an-old-codex/

[Father Mapple]

It's been a few days. I moved into a new apartment, been working at a new practice, and slowly getting some hobby done. Also, some pictures of previously promised hobby progress. FIRST! The stormraven. 

 

Some entire ship shots.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7428/12426480774_e4812f6fa1_b.jpg

 

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2856/12426015785_a0396c5a66_b.jpg

 

Close up of front.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7321/12426153343_88a172151f_b.jpg

 

Top of Right Wing

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3754/12426490304_ea7c0cd4e7_b.jpg

 

Top of Left Wing and door details

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7334/12426013475_00df8f3d8b_b.jpg

 

Hurricane Bolters are magnetized.

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2810/12426506614_ca6648d316_b.jpg

 

 

It's been a pleasure to paint. Just need to matte spray it. Eventually I'll bore out the barrels of everything too. 

 

Next, I based the Death Company, Reclusiarch, Astorath, and Lemartes. I've been putting sea shells on the bases of the vehicles that have them, and also on the characters. It started when a buddy gave me a painted Dante model, which I based with a sea shell, to make it look like he's leaping over it. Now I'm slowly changing the backstory of my chapter to make it an semi-arid water world, where the continents are smaller, and change every so many years due to tectonics. Etc.

 

Here's Astorath jumping the shell. 

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3672/12426519224_734cbba779_b.jpg

 

From the side:

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7419/12426205533_36ec045287_b.jpg

 

The Reclusiarch. I put his shell behind him.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3685/12426190883_4d34e54763_b.jpg

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7300/12426510494_2d4abdd79f_b.jpg

 

Lemartes got his basic white coat over the black primer with an air brush. Also, a shell!

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7379/12426513204_564fea7516_b.jpg

 

Then lastly, here's my progress so far on the 8 Death Company and a objective marker I made for a tournament happening in 3 weeks. 

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7320/12426474564_dac736f109_b.jpg

 

One guy didn't get primed and brushed, so I'm going to try and get a break in the weather sometime in the next 3 weeks to get him at least as far along as the others. Slow going. Even these older metal sculpts have lots of more detail than the bare tacticals, so adding the new Death Company bits just adds more detail to pick over. 

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5544/12426060735_d5ee901e72_b.jpg

 

Forgot to mention, every model in this series of pictures, except the Stormraven, are pewter bodies at least. So, the Sternguard turned Death Co., the regular Death Co, Astorath, Reclusiarch, Lemmy, etc. 

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5499/12426063525_3d25325692_b.jpg

 

Then the objective marker for the tournament, by itself.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7365/12426944854_438035b606_b.jpg

 

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3764/12426467875_bb7c8f1224_b.jpg

 

Finally, some hobby promises and commitments. I'm working on this guy for the rest of February, and assembling a Christmas Present slowly. They're both for some Zone Mortalis games our group is doing, and for the new Hobby Progress Challenge 2014 which I am ALREADY BEHIND IN, but it's all good fun!

 

Captain Dardanos, wielding dual chainfists, counts-as lightning claw/chainfist as a Blood Angels captain. He's a filed down metal calgar. I still need to fill in the ultimas on his loin cloth, but that's a small green stuff filler. Liquid stuff is going inbetween the shoulder joints too. I filed down Calgar's bolter barrels to make the chainfists fit, but I might be retro-actively adding some Sanguinary Guard wrist mounted bolters by grafting them to the outside. I don't know if I'll ever truly use him as a Calgar counts as, but I do love that picture of Flesh Tearers Chapter Master Amit on the Flesh of Cretacia book. 

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5525/12427035344_1452e02397_b.jpg

 

The Ultima on this fist is not quite filed down, but mostly is. 

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2887/12426545945_c3b477b4b1_b.jpg
 

I'm thinking the Sanguinary Guard arm mounted bolter might fit on the topside of the fists, opposite the chain blades.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7364/12426700883_230d203f5b_b.jpg

 

 

As always, feedback welcomed! Hope this super long post makes up for the lack of posts for 2 months. I'll be posting about the game my cousin and I played in another thread soon. 

 

[Father Mapple]

Things have been busy! Just not too much hobby wise.

 

I went to the Railhead Rumble, a tournament in Dallas, Texas, with an all Death Company force the first weekend of March. That was, as expected, a lot of fun, but I didn't capture very many objectives. Did table a couple of people though!

 

Last weekend, I used that all Death Company force, as well as some additional models, and played a 10 person, 30,000pts Apocalypse game. Our side lost by 1 victory point, but it was good fun. A Reclusiarch and Eldrad were fighting as the world exploded, more or less, for a very cinematic finish. Except that part where a Stompa then stepped on the Reclusiarch. I think he died doing what he loved, though.

 

I have finished assembling the Contemptor Furioso and put my BA iconography on it. He'll be a Contemptor Furioso, supposedly having fought on Terra. He needs priming.

 

 

 

 

 

The captain is coming along nicely. He's nearly basecoated. I only get to work on him in 30 minute intervals, at most, so it's taking a lot of days. I think you get the overall effect I'm going for, with the red, black, linen/bone, white, and copper colors. Trying to resist the temptation to make him too busy with too many colors. Need to finish basecoating the crux, and the main belt pieces. Also, the chain blade casing. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just need more time, as always. My work is heating up, and wife is now publicly pregnant, so time is needing to translate more into money than hobby. The baby is due in September, so if I don't finish my planned hobby progress by then, I am sure I won't. Self-Employed small businessmen can't take paternity leave, usually. But it is still my primary stress reliever, so perhaps more hobby time with more stress? lol We'll see. 

 

Comments always welcome!

[Corvus_Danseur]

Love the raven colour scheme in particular a few posts up! And good luck with all the new stuff about to pop into your life :).

[Father Mapple]

Here's the shots of the Captain, finished as I promised. Eventually I'll add some brass etch or a good flesh tearers style symbol to the bare black fist, but in the meantime, I need to be done with him. Furioso, ho!

 

 

 

 

The bright daylight washes out the actual shading and blending I did on the cape. Oh well.

 

[marine7312000]

A simply outstanding conversion. How did you find putting the contemptor together?

[ElectricPaladin]

So, my quick and dirty recipe for white is:

 

1. Prime Chaos Black
2. Basecoat Celestia Gray
3. Wash Nuln Oil
4. Drybrush White Scar White (I might have the name wrong... I mean the white that's a layer)
5. Edge Highlight Ceremite White (I mean the one that's a base)

So far, it's worked for me.

 

Now, the only alteration that I would propose to your color scheme is that if you're going to do a Blood Angels successor with white, you need to do extensive blood splatter all over anything that could reasonably be splattered with blood. I recommend mixing a little Khorne Red with some Dryad Bark Brown and a little tiny amount of water, loading up your brush with it, and then blowing it all over the model with puffs of air from your very own lungs. If you want to get really ambitious, you can then go back after you apply the dullcoat and touch up some of the redder areas with Tamiya Clear Red - a translucent red glaze. It will give the bloodiest parts of your models a slightly thick, sticky, areterial look, as though some of the blood was fresh!

[Father Mapple]

@marine7312000 Thanks! I wanted the ability to make a Terminator Captain that would be worth taking. A lightning claw/chainfist wielding guy is pretty brutal in CC in Zone Mortalis since nothing is safe! Except anything at range 13"....

The Contemptor is an easy kit to build as long as you keep dry fitting things the way you want them to go. I would do little dry assemblies of an arm to make sure I got the parts in the right order, then hold it up to the model, then glue each piece as I saw it. The cleanup is more intense than any plastic kit, but with a bit of time and thinking, you see how well they made the model to make it pose-able. 

 

@ElectricPaladin - I do something similar with the craft paints I use. I only use GW washes and their layer white - scars I think? But I do 1. Black prime 2. Linen/beige 3. Platinum type of White over most of the area 4. Wash 5. layer White Scar on some area. I don't edge highlight unless the white is over an entire area.

 

And to be fair, using an airbrush, I just pick the color I want, lay down a coat, wait a bit, coat again, done besides wash and layer cleanup. 

 

I like the idea of the blood spatter, but my guys aren't that crazy. Yet. You've got a good technique for it.

[marine7312000]

I bought a contemptor that was already assembled with the exception of the arms. I'll be painting it for the ETL most likely. On a side subject, can you recommend a decent airbrush?

[Father Mapple]

I use the Badger 360 since I use it for base cating from a siphon feed pot/bottle and also do details in the gravity feed cup... but the cup is tiny. That's my one complaint. You can rig it to be bigger, but otherwise I have no complaints. The brush comes with a .75mm needle, which makes a big spray from an inch away, but you can buy a .3 or .2 for less than $10 on Amazon and that will make the line/spray width substantially smaller with the right PSI pressure.  

 

I also have the tiny badger compressor, the Badger Air-Brush Co. TC910 Aspire Pro Compressor, that is practically made for miniatures painting. It's got all the features built into it, like moisture trap, pressure gauge, a small tank, auto-shut off, adjustable PSI, and connectors. 

 

The compressor is the most expensive but I got it on a deal for $160, where normally it's about $300. The Badger 360 should be around $100-120, but you only will ever need the 1 brush for both types of spraying as long as you take care of it! Buy some cleaning brushes as well. If you clean it every time you use it, you'll only ever need water and not some kind of solvent/spirits.

[marine7312000]

Thanks for the info brother.

[Father Mapple]

Well, I am so.... slow.... but here is some progress, regardless! This is the Contemptor my buddy got me for Christmas. It was in pieces in an earlier picture. I did the red with the airbrush and then added all the other bling and colors to make him worthy of a chapter full of artisans like the Blood Angels are. Done in my DIY chapter's Blood Suns colors, which is suspiciously like a Flesh Tearer, but black from shin down on both legs as well. 

 

The copper helmet shows him to be a veteran even amongst dreadnoughts. I'll finish the sea shell he's about to righteously smash when I do the basing. The highlights almost don't seem to come out unless I have a flash on, but the normal lights in my apartment are kinda dim. I'd hate to think how much time I spent edge highlighting it to only be seen under stark desk lamps.... ugh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments and criticism welcome!