Drop Troops Inbound:9/12 Ogryn Tummy

[hushrong]

Some neat ideas. I kinda like the top one. Doesn’t seem too chunky but it looks like you’ve got the eyes and the bottom portion is the beak. It’s more minimal but have you ever seen the Talons from Batman Court of Owls. They have a owl motif where they wear a black hooks with round goggles line with gold and a small ‘ beak’ in gold too. Maybe something to check out?

[jaxom]

Yes! That’s what I wanted to go for! The trouble I had was getting the beak right on the mask because of the tubing. I’ll play around with it some more; go back in with grey to slim it down.

[jaxom]

Tried some adjustments:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Majkhel]

These look good

[jaxom]

Excellence lit from the forge of faith burns hot enough to melt mountains - Inscription above the entry way to the training-fane of the Militarum Tempestus Arrakeen regiments, cognom: the Stoneburners.

 

  

 

And from more of a distance:

 

 

Between the Lightbringers and the Stoneburners I think pyromania has become a universal constant binding my personal/homebrew armies together.

Edited May 24, 2020 by jaxom

[jaxom]

Green Squad, "The Firebirds", 53rd Arrakeen "Stoneburners"

 

  

 

  

 

 

And all together

 

[hushrong]

Looking good! Definitely like the way you got the owl face to work on the helmets!

[Majkhel]

They came out great! Lots of character and depth with the paint-scheme and that burning&smoking icon :)

Good job!

[jaxom]

Thank you, both! 

 

I've decided to make some modifications to my original grenadier squad because a) the Secutarii heads really scream Mechanicus even with the conversion work , b) I now have appropriate heads, c) I want to add more special weapons, and d) it's less work than a new unit and I'm in a weird sort of zone where I am super-motivated, but feel like the motivation would slip is a single project started to take to long.

 

"Oh, Master Robin you've lost your [head] in battle!"

 

Two hotshot volleyguns with some slight conversion work

 

This has to be the head for the Sergeant; seriously, anything else is heresy.

 

The plan is green berets to compliment the fatigues.

[hushrong]

Nice work on the re-arm-ament. Haha. I’ll leave now.

 

Before that def keep the motivation up and churning out these dudes. They’re getting better and better!

[Freakshow668]

Love me a Dune reference, excellent work.

[jaxom]

Thank you!

 

It's kind of funny, I named the Colonel (Morsaurem), but I never named the regiment accompanying. In my head I refer to them as the Redjacks; a mix of redcoat and sewerjack. I imagined they came from a mining world with strong ties to the Mechanicus - hence the copious bionics and red - and they trained by acting like sewerjacks except in mine tunnels. And so, after (I think) three iterations, I give you all the final version of the Ushers ("See all of humanity's foes at their seat in hell before you take your own seat at the Emperor's side"), the last remaining squad of the 21st Tuonelan Redjacks.

 

 

 

 

 

The Scion arms don't stand out too much from the Skitarii arms which was nice.

 

Heh, just as ninth edition is announced and I actually have miniatures matching what I originally set out to do before they announced eighth edition. 

 

  

[jaxom]

This is going to be my last update for a bit as I start getting ready to move (and then move and then settle in). Apparently I have to have at least one conversion in almost every squad.

 

Secondary gunner for an Infantry Squad autocannon heavy weapon squad.

 

  

 

It's the Infantry Squad flamer bit with the hose and side parts removed, barrel replaced, and a las-pack added to the side. Kind of had me thinking of a BAR.

 

[Yosef Hausakluif]

John Browning would be proud; if he even knew what he was looking at! All joking aside cool las carbine conversion. Reminds me more of a Sten fun or even a another of Browning’s machine guns, then converted by the US marines in the WWII pacific campaign called the ‘stinger’. Cool stuff all’s round!

[hushrong]

I like the lasgun BAR and the one handed firing with a sling.

 

Have fun with the move as well!

[jaxom]

Thank you, all! 

[jaxom]

Ahahahahah! I can hobby again! I no longer have a dedicated hobby space so it's unpack-hobby-pack for the foreseeable future; a bit inconvenient, but it makes me think ahead and really plan out what I want to do with my hobby time. I decided to try out something a bit different from my previous paint scheme for my basic infantry squads. I wanted to tweak down the time on what are "blob" squads that may not be on the table for very long. I'll have full pictures once they're more done or all done, but here's the experimental part:

 

 

These are not subtle highlights when seen up close. It's a base of Macragge Blue, then a big swipe of Caledor Sky, then a smaller swipe of Hoeth Blue. I tried to be more precise in where the highlights were placed (the ol'zenithal thing) more so than I have in the past in order to compensate for the size. Here's the distance shot:

  

 

 

I'm going to wait on judging it needs something more until I have the squad assembled so I can see how they look as a unit.

[jaxom]

And here's the finished squad:

 

 

No flash:

 

 

Three generations/recipes for my Guardsman starting from 2010:

 

 

I've one more infantry squad on sprue, but I'm doing another Scion squad first. I started this whole debacle with the 30k Militia because it would give me a lot of room to experiment with painting and converting. The S.O.G., made up of thrown together elite units from many regiments, let's me do that more so than working on the Cadians.

Edited July 18, 2020 by jaxom

[jaxom]

Something more interesting. I decided to start on something I had some vague ideas about (in addition to working on a normal Scion squad).

 

Version 1:

 

I thought it was too much off a jet pack which is not what I was going for. Or at least less Rocketeer and more Mandalorian.

 

Version 2:

 

Much better.

 

Where's it all going? I wanted to make a squad that Harakoni Warhawk-esque; troops that clearly had the means to descend from the sky as drop troops. That and use some of the extra bits I had kept noticing while I had been working on previous Scion units including the really stripped down HS-lasgun design:

 

 

I like the idea that between the jet-arrest backwash and breaking legs or getting shot in the legs during rough descent that all the elite, veteran units (i.e. Scion equivalents) have had their legs replaced with bionics. I need to GS in visors for the helmets and bulk up the thighs (which would have gone under the Skitarii coats) with the padding. I vaguely remember there being a tutorial on how to GS the type of padding Elysian drop troops have somewhere on the B&C so I'll see if I can find it.

[jaxom]

I couldn't find the tutorial (maybe because it was from before 2006 or whenever the last old topics purge was?), but I had a vague idea it involved diagonals. First up was filling in some of the empty space in the lower back that gets real obvious when you have an entire squad wearing the voxcaster backpack. Most of it will be hidden by said backpack so I took the opportunity to experiment.

 

 

You can also see I filled in the helmets to make visors.

 

Here's my tutorial on creating padded/quilted areas:

 

Step 1: Make a small oblong shape out of GS and gently press it onto the area you want to cover. You don't want water between the plastic and the GS because it will make it more likely the GS will lift off during the other steps. Use a tool to flatten it and work out material from the center to the edges until you get the thickness/coverage you want. 

 

 

Step 2: Make sure the top of the GS has water on top of it. Surface tension should keep it together on the GS surface area. Gently press the edge of a scalpel or razor blade at a diagonal to make a shallow line in the GS. You don't want to cut through the GS, just make an impression. You may need to very gently wiggle the blade perpendicular to its direction (so the edge stays in place, but the blade creates a small arc) to widen the impression if it is too thin. Do this a few times in parallel. More lines means tighter padding, less lines means bigger padding.

 

 

Step 3: Repeat the process at an angle to the original lines. You want it oblique to create a diamond pattern.

 

 

 

 

[Majkhel]

Very nice ideas! Good to see you still happily experiment with your troops!

I'll gladly see where this route will take you :)

[hushrong]

Drop Tripp’s are coming along nicely! The packs look fantastic as does your greenstuff work on the extra padding!

[jaxom]

Today I learned that white and dark grey don't go together in roughly 40/60 proportions (or at least I don't like them in that proportion). I figured I would try out a Star Wars storm trooper scheme on the current Scion unit.

 

 

I base coated grey (the color on the bases) then dry brushed everything Administratum Grey, Grey Seer, Corax White. This gave the leggings a nice, almost zenithal look so I mixed from matte medium with black to make a glaze and applied two thin coats to the legs.

 

 

 

I like the individual results for each section, but the over scheme is meh to me. I may try out hitting the armor with Gryph-charger Grey to make the armor grey as well and go for a monochromatic colour pairing. Or maybe a grey-blue?

[jaxom]

By happy coincidence a recommended video this morning was Dana Howl's Glazing tutorial. I put down two layers of Kantor Blue glaze (2:1 matte medium to paint), then two layers of Gryph-Charger Grey (one on the first mini because his first glaze was too thick). I didn't take pictures after the first coat of contrast paint.

 

  

 

  

 

  

 

  

 

  

 

I could see this technique being the basis for a relatively quick Kappic Eagles colour scheme. Dry brush the greys and white, choose a lighter brown contrast paint for the pant legs (Aggaros Dunes or Skeleton Hordre) and then maybe Space Wolves Grey contrast paint for the armour.

[Majkhel]

That blue tint definitely livens things up