Luna Wolves 14th Chapter - Platoon Command Squad

[Blissful Brushes]

I’ve ran out of green stuff. My roll was almost 15 years old so it has served me well but I’m using milliput until the new stuff arrives. I’ve never used it for anything more than basey stuff so this was a bit of an education, I think I’m getting the hang of it though I’m not a fan of it for details.

 

I have made some pretty good progress in my upscaled Catapractii. The out of the box models look very unimpressive against a primaris marine but I think I’ve got the weightiness of Cataphractii armour across.

 

I have 3 issues I need to resolve: 

- Helmet needs some real work, but I think I can sort that with GS.

- I have never been a fan of the leather, however it is hides a multitude of sins so I need some replacement, especially around the groin area.

 

I’ve turned the heavy flamer so it’s horizontal and added another tank to it. I think I’m going to add some bigger tanks to the back that connect so he looks a bit deeper and there’s something a bit like a reserve to draw from. 
 

Any suggestions or bits I’m missing appreciated. This is my first rodeo with Terminators!

 

Also, I’ve got another 14 of these and 5 Tartaros in bits and I think I may have to reconsider my life if I’m going to biggerise that many

[MoriyaSchism]

This is quite an ambitious project. I really like the look of the extra armour on the breacher. How did you manage to clean up the knees on the Assault Intercessors so well?  

[Blissful Brushes]

19 hours ago, MoriyaSchism said:

This is quite an ambitious project. I really like the look of the extra armour on the breacher. How did you manage to clean up the knees on the Assault Intercessors so well?  

 

Thanks! Perhaps a touch too ambitious! The knees are fairly simple, if a bit tedious: clip the top bits with clippers and file it smooth. Then as best you can cut into the top half where it joins the thigh to try and make it look like a separate armour piece, rather than blending into the thigh. It probably takes around 15 mins or so, you do need a decent blade though or chopping out the slivers will be a real pain and you’ll probably spend the evening holding your thumb over a sink.

Mr lightning claws is done, quite pleased with how he’s turned out on the whole but I do need to work out how to make power weapons look a bit better as these are a little bit plain.

I drew a line under this terminator. As a proof of concept he’s good I think. I’ve got another on the table who’s a bit tidier so far, but I’m pretty pleased how he’s turned out (he looks tidier in person) I gave up on the leather, so he gets a loin cloth instead, though health and safety probably have a thing I say about cloth and open flames! There’s a scale shot with a primaris scale sergeant, normally they’re near a head shorter so it’s in the ballpark I think.

 

 

With my plants packed up I’m still on the conversion train as it’s a lot tidier to have these parts and a bit of milliput than all my paints lying around. My Breacher is done, 1/36 so I think I’m going to buy some 3d shields rather than do this again. I’m not that pleased with it and it took me ages, wasn’t fun either which is kinda the point. This squad of 6 will all have shield/spears and be part of my drop pod company. Thematically I can’t think of much more scariness than 36 dudes with power weapons and shields dropping into your market square to secure a landing zone.

Last update is the vexilla bearer for my tactical squad. Pretty chuffed with how he turned out, I did a bit more to make him less obviously a primaris conversion than some of the earlier ones - removing the balls at the ankles, knees etc.

Edited October 4 by Blissful Brushes

[MoriyaSchism]

38 minutes ago, Blissful Brushes said:

 

Thanks! Perhaps a touch too ambitious! The knees are fairly simple, if a bit tedious: clip the top bits with clippers and file it smooth. Then as best you can cut into the top half where it joins the thigh to try and make it look like a separate armour piece, rather than blending into the thigh. It probably takes around 15 mins or so, you do need a decent blade though or chopping out the slivers will be a real pain and you’ll probably spend the evening holding your thumb over a sink.

Mr lightning claws is done, quite pleased with how he’s turned out on the whole but I do need to work out how to make power weapons look a bit better as these are a little bit plain.

I drew a line under this terminator. As a proof of concept he’s good I think. I’ve got another on the table who’s a bit tidier so far, but I’m pretty pleased how he’s turned out (he looks tidier in person) I gave up on the leather, so he gets a loin cloth instead, though health and safety probably have a thing I say about cloth and open flames! There’s a scale shot with a primaris scale sergeant, normally they’re near a head shorter so it’s in the ballpark I think.

 

 

With my plants packed up I’m still on the conversion train as it’s a lot tidier to have these parts and a bit of milliput than all my paints lying around. My Breacher is done, 1/36 so I think I’m going to buy some 3d shields rather than do this again. I’m not that pleased with it and it took me ages, wasn’t fun either which is kinda the point. This squad of 6 will all have shield/spears and be part of my drop pod company. Thematically I can’t think of much more scariness than 36 dudes with power weapons and shields dropping into your market square to secure a landing zone.

Last update is the vexilla bearer for my tactical squad. Pretty chuffed with how he turned out, I did a bit more to make him less obviously a primaris conversion than some of the earlier ones - removing the balls at the ankles, knees etc.

These are fantastic. The Mark IV is really good. Is that a Sanguinary Guard axe? If you have any of the Lieutenant or Captain models from the early phase of the Primaris laying around they might make good Mark IV models, they have arms with extended vambraces just like the Calth Betrayal at Calth Tactical Marines. The Terminator is really ambitious, I would have never dared to try that at my current skill level. I usually get Tortuga Terminator bodies and combine them with the Tartaros and Cataphractii bits I have in my box. The unused plastic Tartaros and Cataphractii bodies get used as spare parts for de-Nurgled Plague Marines returning to the Emperor's light. 

 

I'm in the process of converting 50 Primaris models into mostly modern Tactical Marines (Marks VI through VIII), so I know how you feel. Cleaning the legs is tedious, I've only done 15 so far and went through 4 knife blades while doing it. I find it a bit difficult to sculpt with just milliput and I ran out of green stuff to mix it with. I will probably retry sculpting again once I get more green stuff, pure milliput feels kind of flakey sometimes. I'm not entirely confident in my sculpting, most I've done with it is reshape the ankles on Primaris models and fill gaps on ex-Plague Marines. I was going to make one single Mark IV Marine as a Company Champion after I found a Mark IV style backpack in the Ravenwing Knights box so I thought of a way to do the legs without needing to use too much complicated sculpting. Have you considered including plasticard in your builds? 

 

I was thinking of doing something like this with plasticard

The plan is to take a Primaris leg or leg armour plate, smooth the knee flat and fill any gaps. Then I'd make a straight groove where the red line is with a line scriber or a knife.  The final step would be to glue in a piece of thin plasticard shaped like the Mark IV knee plate right above the groove. I think the trickiest part would be creating consistent looking knee plates for a ton of Mark IV models. 

[Blissful Brushes]

@MoriyaSchism You have a very good eye. It is indeed. I de-Blood Angeled it, thinned down the blade a little bit and gave it a better edge bevel as the OG is a bit too thick for my liking to be a cutting weapon. I think your knee solution might beat mine by a long shot. I've been sculpting them and I considered casting one I'm happy with and using that going forward, but those little mould blocks are in a box until we move on Friday. I think my debate has whether to make the kneepad profile like a knee joint, or have a profile more like a MkVI shin.

 

My latest offering is this trio:

 

 

The one on the left is now pretty well finished although I am contemplating swapping out the bolter for a plasma/flamer so he fits in a bit more with my supporting platoon for the breachers. Currently he's a veteran tactical marine but he doesn't look very veteran beyond a fancy bolter right now and I'm not entirely sure how to veteranise him pre-paint.

 

The sergeant is pretty much done too, I just need to give him a power sword or axe for the belt and I'm happy with him and pray that paint stripper doesn't kill milliput.

 

The fella on the right will be joining the spear breacher, he's in reinforced MkIV plate - the bits that aren't covered by the shield will be up-armoured a bit and his other shin will have the reinforcing studs (again they're in a box right now so he's just got a holey leg, poor fellow).

 

Edited October 8 by Blissful Brushes

[MoriyaSchism]

These are great. Mark IV has a really cool chest plate. Your variant reminds me of the old Death Company set. 

[Blissful Brushes]

I’ve made quite a lot of progress with these, no more paint though I’m afraid. That’s going to be a new year challenge when I get the whole built I think. 
 

but I’ve got the Platoon command squad mostly built now, only the apothecary remains to be done:

I’ve also got the 3rd Squad sergeant built too and am in the process of assembling his erstwhile companions.

 

Ive posted a more in depth topic on the HH sub forum for those who are interested in the chapter’s fluff that I’ve made up but for those who aren’t here’s the pretty (I think) pictures.

:)

 

Platoon Lieutenant 

 

Platoon Vexillarius

 

Weapons Specialist

 

Platoon Champion 

 

 

Sergeant Castro, 3rd Squad

Edited November 21 by Blissful Brushes
Formatting

[Firedrake Cordova]

They look great - the Milliput work is really nice

[kabaakaba]

Great sculpting. That's lot of work. Making all them so uniform. Envy your skill!

[Blissful Brushes]

Thanks :) If you break it up into stages it's not -that- hard for the most part, I've got quite a few guys on the go so I do them a little bit of a factory line. If you do them upside down and imagine it as shapes rather than armour pieces it becomes a bit easier as well, at least for me. It's a triangle that way, rather than XYZ and then when you start to give it details once the shape is in place that's when I start to think of it as armour etc.

 

I've got my command squad completed now with the addition of the Apothecary. I've also realised that I'm probably saving a huge amount of money by only buying intercessor-based squads rather than HQ options and trying to make them fancy myself. The Narthecium & backpack are courtesy of Kromlech for £6 I think, which beats the £27 or whatever it is for the GW apothecary. I've given him an apron/robe which I might try and do as a kind of brown leather, or alternatively the bluey/white of scrubs. Really I should have reposed his left leg too to make him kneeling a bit better but I forgot and had already done his torso by that point so he's now, perhaps ill advised, resting his tired knee on the corner of the pavement.

 

Veteran #1 of Squad 3 is also now complete, pretty straightforward power sword and bolt pistol on this one, not a lot to note about this one really but I'm quite happy with the pistol arm/head lining up well. Hopefully I'll have that squad up to strength (unpainted of course) by the end of the week, but who knows!

 

 

At some point I'm going to buy a proper camera too...

Edited Tuesday at 01:51 PM by Blissful Brushes

[Firedrake Cordova]

Whenever I've tried working with Milliput/GreenStuff for anything more advanced than casting, it's gone ... badly. It's definitely a "user issue", so I'm always impressed when I see work like yours above.  

 

I think the photos look fine.  One of the problems with "a proper camera" is that you'll probably run into depth-of-field issues - I did try to photograph one of my goblins with my 105mm macro lens, and the depth of field was basically meant their eyes were in focus but the end of their nose wasn't at f/16. Focus stacking solves that, but it's a faff.

 

 

[Valkia the Bloody]

Just wanted to say great work on the conversions and creating such interesting poses for the marines. 

I might have to steal some ideas. 

[Brother Ezra]

Love me some good Primaris-to-Heresy conversions! You've done some fantastic sculpting work here  

 

My personal favourite is Sergeant Castro - that hammer means business! Where'd you get the arms for him?

 

 

[Blissful Brushes]

19 hours ago, Firedrake Cordova said:

Whenever I've tried working with Milliput/GreenStuff for anything more advanced than casting, it's gone ... badly. It's definitely a "user issue", so I'm always impressed when I see work like yours above.  

 

I think the photos look fine.  One of the problems with "a proper camera" is that you'll probably run into depth-of-field issues - I did try to photograph one of my goblins with my 105mm macro lens, and the depth of field was basically meant their eyes were in focus but the end of their nose wasn't at f/16. Focus stacking solves that, but it's a faff.

 

 

I shall save my money then! Or at least limit it to knocking up a light box or something. I did want to make a baby board for photographing them with a bit of a backdrop but AI might be the easy low-budget alternative there. For milliput, damp tools are your friend and Vaseline for green stuff, milliput is better to sand/carve as well so if you’re a little bit out with your sculpt you can bring it back a bit easier than GS. 
 

16 hours ago, Valkia the Bloody said:

Just wanted to say great work on the conversions and creating such interesting poses for the marines. 

I might have to steal some ideas. 

 

Thank you, means a lot :) steal away! Be free with thy clippers and scalpel 

 

2 hours ago, Brother Ezra said:

Love me some good Primaris-to-Heresy conversions! You've done some fantastic sculpting work here  

 

My personal favourite is Sergeant Castro - that hammer means business! Where'd you get the arms for him?

 

 

Ta, he is very much up there for me too! I’m pretty sure they’re both from the assault Intercessor squad kit. His left arm is (I think) the downward knife hand and the right is one of the bolt pistol ones. I de-sprued all my left over arms from my last couple of boxes so it’s a big pile but the only kits I’ve had in the last few years are Calth and regular/assault Intercessors.

 

I will say it’s still a crime that they didn’t just primaris scale the whole range and be done with it rather than digging themselves deeper and deeper into this hole with 2 sets of semi-interchangeable ranges rather than one amazing one. Though I imagine this is something people have argued for the last 10 years! 

[Blissful Brushes]

Howdy all, 

 

Just a baby update today. I've got another veteran on the chopping board but I'm not sure if he's missing anything - tilt shield perhaps or some honour markings on the torso?

 

Also first attempt at 'casting' some basing stuff. I sculpted the block paving and used blue stuff to recast, it came out ok but think it needs integrating a bit better to the cork but I have some bits and bobs to do that.

 

Any thoughts on the veteran would be much appreciated :)