Tag Archives: hobby

Hell Pit Abomination, Part 1

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Finally got the head for my Hellpit Abomination last night: I had to trade an armored dragon’s head for an unarmored one.
That accomplished, I quickly prepped and glued it last night.  This afternoon, I glued it onto the body.
The head is from the Hight Elf Dragon kit; the tongue is a spike from the Chaos Spawn kit.  The body belongs to a Stegadon and the arms are, quite clearly, from Rat Ogres.  The tail is a tentacle from the Lifeleech Otyugh I’d originally planned on using as my Abomination.
As you can tell, I’m going to need a great deal of greenstuff to make this work: to fill gaps and add hair.  I’ll also have to do a bit of sculpting: I’ll need to extend the rings of the tail up onto the model a bit, lengthen the claws to be wicked and ratty and sculpt some ears.

Painting Progress – 20091027

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I feel like I should call this post “Painting Progress, At Last!” as with the exception of the Warlock Engineer, I really haven’t done much painting in the past while.  I attribute the bulk of the blame for that to an unforgiving month at work.

I finally varnished the 12 Gutter Runners I started at the top of the month.  I suspect there’s a detail or two on there that could have seen more attention, but at this point, I’m glad to be done with them.

I also spent the weekend powering through some Skyre troops: repainting two Ratling Guns to match the color scheme I’m using for Skyre rats now (dark red and grey for clothes and a stronger iron and brass scheme for machines) as well as painting up another two Jezzails (which puts me at twelve total, for two groups of six, with ten of the current model).

I’ve also gotten started on my Hellpit Abomination.  Since Abomination conversions are kind of a big deal right now, I’m going to give mine its own post.

Kroot Hounds

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I’m trading off some stuff to help Chris build some neat Kroot Hounds and Fenrisian Wolves.   Talking about it made me think about my Kroot Hound conversions that I’ve started but never quite finished… and definitely never posted to this blog (since I did them probably over a year and a half ago).  So, here they are!

The bodies are skinks with their heads sawn off.  Kroot heads.  Dinky skink hands have been replaced with huge and menacing genestealer claws.  The end result are kooky and ferocious looking pygmy kroot.  Rar!

Skaven & D&D Minis

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Got my eBay orders in today; immediately cracked them open to start fiddling with them.
For starters, I ordered five Rat Swarms from the D&D Minis Unhallowed set.  I have several of the GW Rat Swarms (more than I can field in the current armybook; not sure about the new one), and they’re alright.  But the D&D Minis one looks crazy cool.  So, I snagged a few.  They’ll repaint easily, and if it ever comes to it I can always fall back on the GW ones.  Here’s the one I’ve pulled off its round base and glued onto a 40×40 (next to the GW one).

More significantly, I’ve got the Lifeleech Otyugh I mentioned earlier.  And… I’m not sure.  For some reason, I expected it to be bigger.  I mean, it’s big, but it’s not Large Target, “So big does it go on a 50×50 or a 50×100 base?” big.

Here it is, next to one of the Gutter Runners I’ve take too long to finish painting.

The other thing is, I’m thinking about using it to make another Rat Ogre-mounted Warlord.  I think I could pull the tentacles off (put one in the place of that third leg as a tail), replace the two feet with hands from a Rat Ogre and work in the legs from a Rat ogre.  I’d have to do a bit of sculpting to get a face on the thing, and there’d be a bunch of hair, but I’ve got to do that anyway.

Anyway, now I’m kicking this around.  If that’s where I go, I’m not sure what to use as my Hellpit Abomination.

Warlock Engineer

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I mostly finished this guy earlier in the week, but only put the finishing touches on him yesterday.  I generally like to wait to varnish painted minis before I take pictures of them, but it’s incredibly rainy in the nation’s capital right now, and I find varnishing doesn’t work out quite as well when I spray during the pouring rain.

I actually built him more than six months ago, and just never got around to painting him.  Now that there’s paint on him, I can spot enough things that don’t look quite right that I kinda want to build him again.  (The only thing that would make it tricky would be tracking down the electrical-looking things on his back.)

Anyway, his legs are from a Plague Monk (or a Packmaster; I forget).  The torso is a Space Marine chest, the left arm a Packmaster’s Things-Catcher with the ‘Catcher replaced with the blades from a Warlock Engineer, and the right arm is from the same Warlock Engineer.  The head’s a Clanrat’s.  The lenses of the goggles are the wax stamps from purity seals.  The mess on the back is a barrel from an Ogre Bull with electrical fence bits from MacCragge and some plasticard.  The cable is a pretty crappy greenstuff job.   He’s got a scroll because I’ll always have a Dispel Scroll (or two) on any given Warlock Engineer.

Warlord & Rat Ogre

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Impatient for the Otyugh to arrive in the mail (I mean, I only bought it today), I went ahead and converted up a model that I had an idea for that will probably actually work out pretty well in the new book.

Skaven can now take mounts.  Chieftains and others can ride on litters, on giant rats, and on rat ogres.  I had a chat with Joey on Tuesday about how one would go about modeling that last one; clanrat crotches and rat ogre shoulders don’t mix very well.  To me, the solution was immediate and obvious: a BabyBjörn.

Lots of little things went into this guy.  The weapon is from a Night Runner arm, stuck onto the end of a clanrat spear.  The head and feet are from a Packmaster; I needed feet that would hang down and the head just looks cooler than the clanrat heads.  It’s also a little out of proportion, which just fits in better with the whole baby carrier thing.  The torso and legs are clanrat legs.  Carrier is an Ogre Bull’s punch dagger hollowed out.  The torso and legs on both the rider and ridee are pinned and worked a little bit to get them more upright and not hunched-over.

I have a special shield I’m going to glue on, I think, after everything that’s already there’s had a chance to dry/cure.

Hellpit Abomination

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Quick!  Someone convince me that I shouldn’t try to use a Lifeleech Otyugh as the basis for a Hellpit Abomination conversion!

I picked up a Beast of Nurgle earlier this week, with this intent, but I’ve since decided that it’s probably not going to work out.  (Which is a shame, because I suspect I’m going to have a very, very hard time selling it off to someone else.)  I think I could accomplish the same result, or better, just by sculpting the whole thing from scratch.

EDIT: Too late!  This thing’s going to be badass.

20091013 Painting WIPs.

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Didn’t have much time for hobby-type stuff last week on account of work getting out of hand.  I was able to make up for it over the weekend, kicking it into gear with those Devastators I’d gotten started on a month and half ago.  (Kromac over there’s been where he is for over a year, now.)

Then, I decided to come to grips with my motivation to paint some Skaven.  I’ve got rat-fever, but I can’t wait for the new Clanrats to drop to get spun up on them again.  Instead, I started slapping paint on some Gutter Runners and then got distracted by the Warlock Engineer I’ve been meaning to paint for a long while.
All of these are WIP, of course.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

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This past weekend was my first free weekend in what seems like forever; I had high hopes of Getting Things Done.  And, although I didn’t get as much done as I’d have liked, I did get 95% done with my Screaming Bell conversion.

I’ve had the pieces for it for probably over six months, but I’ve held off on doing it because of frustration with the Skaven and diversion into War of the Ring.  Plus, I was never really sure how I was going to get some thin and small plastic hands to support a large and heavy metal bell.  I could have waited for the rumored new kit, which if it exists should have a plastic bell but…

The announcement of Dragon Wars, an annual Fantasy Tournament built around dragon fetishism and goofy but fun rules motivated me to pull the tub down and get to work.

The first problem I’d faced was what to do with the hands.  The dragon claws weren’t large enough to convincingly hold the bell.  After several months of deliberation, I realized I have a surplus of Rat Ogre arms.  Problem solved.

The grip isn’t perfect, but at least it’s convincing.

Getting the secured was the biggest challenge.  I finally gave up on supporting it from above and decided to support it from below.  I’ve got a thick paperclip coming up  nearly 3″ from the base and shoved into a wad of greenstuff and superglue in the top of the bell and secured with more greenstuff and superglue near the opening of the bell.

The paperclip runs another 3″ or so on the bottom of the base and is secured by… you guessed it: greenstuff and superglue.

A little bit of the pin is showing, but I don’t think it’ll be all that noticeable, especially when camouflaged with some aquarium rocks.

Skaven don’t truck with dragons, but the do have an endless horde of hideous and vile mutants to drive onto the field.  The main goal of the conversion was to transform it into a enormous wing’d rat beast.

So, I gave it gnawing, buck teeth, and filed down what was a forked tongue into a more normal, ratty tongue.

And then I started sculpting hair.  This is what made it take a weekend instead of an afternoon, since I had to wait for the greenstuff I’d just sculpted to cure before I could start on another section (lest I maul what I’d just completed with my clumsy fingers).

I orginally hadn’t planned on doing so much hair, but this is where I ended up.  I think it looks good.  Also, I put on a few buboes, since Skaven always have a few of those.

The only thing I’m not entirely sure I’m happy with is the tail.

It needs to look like a ratty tail.  The bottom of the tail is fine, in this regard.  The top’s another matter.  I don’t feel comfortable trying to file or buff the scales down (especially now that it’s all assembled, but even before), since the end result would just be something unnervingly smooth (or unnervingly smooth and with horrible texturing).  So, I’m leaving it.

The other thing that needs doing is the mount.  Originally, I’d planned to build a little platform over the saddle for the Grey Seer to stand on.  That plan is on hold, though, because there’s talk of a number of mount options in the new Skaven book: Giant Rat, Rat Ogre, litter, etc.  Also, the style of the Skaven is changing a little bit.  My hope is that there will be some new riding legs that I’ll be able to use to mount the Grey Seer on it’s back like a rider.

Of course, this presents me with a difficult decision: paint it now (and in time for Dragon Wars), or leave it unpainted and therefore more easily altered with whatever new bits there will be in November?

(Also, this post has convinced me that I need to buy/build a lightbox.  My current setup clearly isn’t holding up.)

Genestealer Color Scheme

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In between other things, I’ve trying out different color schemes, trying to settle on how I’m going to paint my Space Hulk genestealers.  I’ve got a very solid idea of how I’m going to paint the terminators already (heck, I’ve got the terminators from the last edition painted up, though I’m not sure I’d like to parade them around in public… in fact, I could field all of them as Deathwing Terminators, though the bases would cause me problems).  The ‘stealers have always given me problems.

About this time last year, I’d settled on a paint scheme for a Tyranid army that I’ve since abandoned, and really need to put on eBay (if you’re interested, let me know, I’ve got a great deal! :) ).
I’m actually very happy with the scheme: basecoat, highlights and then brushed with Minwax.  Dipping’s great for painting a huge number of space bugs, but Space Hulk has less than thirty.  Too much hassle, I think.
Plus, although I like the scheme, I’d like to make them darker, creepier, nastier.
I’ve thoroughly abused a spare genestealer I’ve had floating around (possibly/probably from the previous edition of Space Hulk), and have settled, I think, on a paint scheme.
The chitin on the leg is the scheme I’m going to use for chitin.  It’s P3 Cryx Bane Base highlighted with P3 Cryx Bane Highlight and washed with Devlan Mud thickened with some matte medium.
The flesh pretty much everywhere here is what I’ll be using for flesh.  It’s Dheneb Stone washed with Devlan Mud thickened with matte medium.
This’ll give me a nice, wicked and creepy color scheme.  Dark, dangerous and insectoid chitin and pulpy, gross flesh.
I still need to settle on how I’m painting the claws.  I’m thinking I might try Dheneb Stone washed with some sort of Badab Black.  Not sure, though.  They need to pop out and look dangerous.