Going to GamesDay Nottingham on April 1st?

I know Ive completey forgotten about blogging for sometime, but thats because I have changed my situation again. Ive quit the merchant navy training scheme I was on (hated it) and moved down to London, where Ive taken a role recruitin for Global Pharmaceutical companies - much mroe my style! Ive been down here since November and enjoying it so far, but havent brought my Plastics down here yet. I work long hours which arent condusive to hobbby time, but I could possibly start fitting some things into the weekends.

ANYWAY, the reason Im posting this is that I have seen the exclusive 40k model from forgeworld and I am desperate to have a go at painting it - but I dont want to pay the £50 odd it will go on ebay for the day after gamesday!

SO, if any of my kind friends here in the blogging community are attending the GD and could possibly pick one up for me, I would be forever in their service, and of course cover costs + a little extra!

What do you guys all think of him? An absolute beauty of a model in my opinion! I NEED it in my Command squad!

059: Demolition Men

Clickable pics here...


Here is a 6 man Demolition Charge squad I made up last night. Theres a Serg with the Bionic arm/Power sword, two melta's that I used the flamer arms with, took a lot of cutting, dont remember it being such a hassle when I made my veterans with meltas. Finally there are three guardsmen carrying 'Demo Charges'. I used SpaceMarine Melta bombs, but I cut the handle away from the end, filed off one side, and turned it on its side so that they dont hang so low. The two gus with guns pointing in the air are sergent laspistol arms, with the pistol cut away and las-carbines in place. It just made sense to have it that way since most of the time they'll be carrying bombs. The third guy has the slung lasgun from the command set (from Bitzbox).
All of these guys are carrying plenty of grenades, because in my original concept I saw them as crazy guys who like to blow stuff up, and imagined them having grenades slung from just about every inch of strap they could find... unfortunately you cant stick grenades to their chests because the scale is so far out of whack.
Big THANK YOU goes out to Admiral Drax for helping me out with this project. I dont play, and dont have a current codex, but wanted the squad to be 'playable' incase I ever get round to learning the billion and one rules of the game. Drax was extremely helpful, emailing back and forth with possible load-outs and configurations. Check out his blog here

058: Veteran Squad Three

Lots of clickable pictures here...

Just got these guys built up, very happy with the poses. Used ForgeWorld shotgun upgrade pack and absolutely love the detail but HATED that the torso's didnt fit onto the gw legs properly, had to shave them down a little and accesorize in the right places to hide the joint.

FLAMERS - not built any before but I actually really like them. Dont like the 'heavier' flamer in the command box set, find it really tacky. One standard head, one from FW and one from the command set.

SHOTGUNS - These guys are mostly made up of the FW set.

STANDARD BEARER - I love them, I think they bring a bit of colour and character to an army, I decided to throw them into veteran squads for that very reason. Im sure theres no value to it in playing terms but its just for aesthetics! The flag is the Catachan command one, I simply cut off the bare shoulder and cut a shoulder pad to fit. And fit it did, very well if I say so myself. Love it. Head is from Catachan command too.

VOX - Didnt like these at all when I first got the army, hate the face masks the heads have in the standard set, but when the Catachan command set came out I loved this head so decided to get a few from BitzBox. Didnt have anymore shotguns either, so that was a reason to make a Vox caster. Really ke how he turned out. Had to use a body Id used when I first got the army - trying to rescue those old badly built models to save some money!

SERG - Really happy with this guy. Love that FW head and smaller plasma pistol. I like to give my Serg's a power Fist normally but I didnt have any press molds ready done and couldnt be bothered to make one up, so tried a few different arms and settled on this one. I think it works well with his walking pose, and it could be a counts-as power fist because Im sure this Serg would use his helmet to bash some skulls; "Who needs bionics!?"
Cant wait to paint these.
Also on the go at the minute is a Demo Charge squad of six, rebasing and repainting Ursarker Creed, same for the General, an rebasing and some changes on Jerran Kell. Then if I ever buy an airbrush kit I will paint my vehicles!

057: Easter Break part.IV

Got the leathers done on the squad and Autocannon teams, quite happy with it. Went for a brown a bit like Ricalopia's IG. Also I want to point out, since someone asked about it in the comments, that the idea to chop the tips of the Lasguns off was inspired by Apoca6. Both those guys have increadible IG armies so please go over and check them out!
Today I spent about an hour and a half painting just one guardsman's face and hands... That is ridiculous isnt it? It was my first face in a while so it took a while to get back into it - you just cant rush these things... here he is - a member of an Autocannon team (one of the cheap pre-built guardsmen).

Next, I felt liek I really needed to see something finished since it has all been taking me to long - so I finished the Serg. He already had some paint on his skin, so I left his hands and just re-painted his face. Took a while, had to get his eyes right! Both guys have stubble through the well known method of mixing a grey in with your final skin tone. Enjoy the pics, leave a comment and ask any questions you may have!

056: Easter Break pt.III

Just an update on what Im working on. As of Friday night this is how the guys are looking, just added a highlight to the armour. I used to use Catachan Green and Desert Yellow 1:1 mix but last night it just wasnt popping enough for me - the model was looking a little wishy-washy with beige and a yellowy green mixing too closely. So to make it pop a little I added 1 part Snot Green into the mix. Its really helped to give a good highlight. On more detailed models I would look to highlight through stages, but for standard guardsmen Im thinking this is enough.