Nurgle Blight Drones join the Contagion!

 Four Blight Drones join the Siwa Contagion salvage project.  I've retained Ryan P's original as the group leader with very few adjustments.  He really did a smashing job on that model!

Although taking my cues from Ryan's original I did deviate a bit.  The main deviation was to color the optic lenses blue so that I could easily tell them apart from the original model's green lenses.  I plan to use the original model as the 'command' drone.  I also did a bit more shading on the metallic carapace with the final finish not being quite as brassy in the top layers.  The green patina is also a bit darker than the original.

 As for modifications to the original Blight Drone... I added some point source lighting to the primary weapon cluster, did some highlights to a couple of tubes and pistons, and adjusted the tints on the base to match the rest of the army.

 The bases were a lot of fun.  I used some bits from the Citadel basing kit and some brass pipe from an assortment, all tied together with green stuff ooze and some Citadel water effects to create large pools of ichor.  I've seen some improvement with these pools over the earlier efforts... mostly in the cloudy sediments flowing from the pipes.  In future I'll try layering more paint during the water effect build up to get a more 3D effect for the cloud... and I'll probably try that particular effect on a lipped or bordered base so I can get the water effect to be a lot deeper.

 A lot of blank space remains that is just asking for flat art and heraldry which I am likely to add in between battles.  I'd like to commemorate the actions and accomplishments of the group.

 Since these are meant to be playing pieces I opted to leave off the multitudinous additional hoses that come with the kit.  These models spend a lot of time lying on their sides, or in foam cases, and the tubes just make them too fragile.  The main gun cluster already has one barrel that is particularly prone to breaking upon any impact... however small.

 Four is such an unfortunate number for these.  A squadron is 1-3 and the Apocalypse formation requires a minimum of 9 (three squadrons of three).  I could run them as two squadrons of two each I suppose but that seems a bit silly.

  I should probably add two, or five, more Blight Drones just to make the lists work so I'll keep my eyes open for a deal someplace.

In the last two shots you can clearly see the command drone with its bolder brass and green lenses.

Next up:  Forge World Great Unclean One and more work on the Bones IMEF Marines.

Forge World Plague Drone Engines and Raging Heroes Brunhilde Mounted WiPs

 Continuing the Contagion salvage project with a set of four Plague Drone Engines from Forge World.  Three of them were acquired as bare resin but one was a nearly completed model by one of our local painting fiends Ryan P.

This model actually was the one that fired me up to purchase the salvage project pile in the first place.  I've always liked the feel of it and Ryan did a bang up job on it.  I was fortunate enough to get him to drop by and go over some of the techniques and approaches he used on this and I was able to chat with him about some of my ideas for finishing it up and integrating it into the rest of the Contagion.

 I really love the necrotic flesh and the purulent weeping sores.  Armed with Ryan's recipe I'll try to replicate that flesh this week.  I'll also largely replicate the bronze with its great green corrosion but will modify the carapace scheme to have some of the blight marks found on the other models in this collection.  My plan is to paint up the other four into a final state and then do some adjustments to this model to tie it in with them while preserving as much of Ryan's work as possible.

 Most of the unfinished business on this model is weapon and cable highlights and some point source lighting for the plasma chambers of the weapons.  I'll also likely add some Siwa Contagion Heraldry bits.

 Moving back to Mordheim I cracked open a couple of mounted Brunhilde minis from Raging Heroes.  These are challenging to paint mostly because they beg for extra attention!  I've been tinkering with these for a couple of weeks between other projects but will buckle down and make a determined assault on them this week.

 One of the few downsides to this kit is that there is only one, very dynamic, pose for the horse itself.  This prevents me from building a whole elite front line unit from this kit so I'll make do with two rearing command figures.  You can see the rider's legs are molded as part of the horse... its a beautiful piece of design.

Just as I did with the Konigsmarck sisters I've done a rough cobble base while deciding where to go with the Mordheim theme.  

Figures as striking as these really impact the speed at which I can work.  Painting in musculature and managing sharp lettering really slow this old bulk painter down.  I'm loving every minute of it though!

There is still a lot to be done on these before finishing the bases.  Gold/yellow shading and highlighting, heraldry details, scrollwork, lettering, and the leather girding straps are all unfinished.

As is often the case with the Raging Heroes offerings the models come with a couple of different heads.  In this case I'll use the princess head in the "sword and board" configuration as a commander and the plate helmed head as a standard bearer. 

Its going to be a busy week!

Imperial Guard Nose Art Inspiration and Blowing Bubbles for Papa Nurgle

 Today features the work of guest painter Eric O.  He's building a winter themed IG army that uses WWII style aircraft nose art on his tanks!  He used reference photos to capture the feel and the execution is a very convincing simulation of crew supplied art.

 In true fanboy fashion I'm planning to swipe this feature and include it in the Heresy Suppression Force (HSF)!  Of course I'll have to make some adjustments given that the HSF is a female based force...  I'll probably go for a more propagandtastic approach using old recruiting posters for reference but this is where the basic idea comes from.

I like the snow saturated camo  nets and the faux airbrush winter stripe scheme.  He says he made some rough shapes out of card board and held them about 6" away from the model while spraying the stripes.  This yielded great fuzzy edges to the stripes.  I'll be stealing that technique as well since I'm kind of air brush phobic...>.>

The great addition of external crew sets these up to look like they rolled right out of an Eastern Front newsreel.  All in all a really good looking, consistently themed, armored group.  I'll have to keep the various elements of this in mind as the HSF starts getting into gear.

I had to show a few of the infantry just to enjoy the theme.  Here we have a Commissar Yarrik painted in good old soviet style and notice the Anti Vehicle Rifle conversion.  That is really evocative and shows how much impact a very simple conversion can have. There is also some fine freehand work on the sleeves and capes.

 Several more views of the Armored Group I like the snow effects on "Aces High" and the use of the Spade symbol.

Thanks to Eric for allowing me to grab some shots of his work to share.


Now on to more Nurgly Goo...

 A Forge World Sorcerer was in the pile of "to be salvaged" stuff.  It was missing the blade of its Force halberd so I rooted around in the bits bins and came up with a spare Ogre Kingdoms Cleaver to replace it.  I prefer the low tech blade since  its the magic rather than tech.

 While I was painting the Sorcerer and the Rhinos I realized that I'd been describing the brown areas as rust red but I'm really thinking about them as visible evidence of corruption rather than as areas of actual corrosion.  Kind of like a malignant patch on the skin. 




These two got named "Over Easy" and "Pan Fried" but in retrospect maybe "Pain Fried" would have been better!  In any case I think of these things as fragile eggs with a precious and deadly cargo!

Next up Land Raiders, which are a salvage paint job similar to that last couple posts and Terminators but they require a bit of work in the old green stuff and are unpainted and  so will take a shade longer to turn out.

Following that I'm thinking of doing the Konigsmark sisters and the three Brunhildes (from Raging Heroes) to use in a Mordheim game.  We'll see though... best laid plans and all....  there will still remain more Nurgle and that may preempt the sisters for a few more weeks.