This week, I dug out some old Space Marine scouts and repainted them.
The plastic scouts must be one of the earliest kits where the sculpting is more complex, but there are only one or two ways of assembling the miniatures. They're certainly not brilliant models: the heads in the kit are all jawline, and it's very hard to line up the models so that they're looking down the scopes of their own rifles. I definitely wasn't going to use the intended heads.
Given that my other marines are meant to look heroic and knightly, it was hard to know how to incorporate these guys. I decided to paint them a little like grimy peasants, more Grimdark Robin Hood than Tom Clancy's Black Spec Deniable Ghost Wet Recon Ops. I found two suitably beardy heads (probably either Chaos warriors or Empire flagellants) and managed to squash them into place (only just, though). The third head was left over from some Skitarri soldiers, and had a hood and very large lenses for eyes. Again, lining it up with the gun was hard, and I ended up trimming away some of the scope just to get it in place.
All three plastic models had some gaps filled with green stuff, and one got a sculpted hood.
I went with more muted colours for these guys than the usual marines, and introduced dark green to stress the outlaw bowman look. I added a little shield on each soldier's gun, with the colours I use on the standard marines' shoulder pads, and gave a couple of them a freehand tree symbol on their left shoulder pad. It was meant to look a bit like the symbol of Gondor in The Lord of the Rings but looks more like a spider. Oh well.
Eventually, I tried to strike a balance between giving the models full on heraldry (after all, they're meant to be camouflaged) and making them too dull to look at. They're probably a bit too bright, but after all the Blood Angels have bright red scouts.
The last two were old metal miniatures that I had stripped. I didn't convert them at all. They were at once chunky and slightly fiddly to paint, but I quite enjoyed it.
To be honest, I painted these guys partly because they were there. But I think they came out okay and the minor alterations I made have improved the models a bit.
Great work on the scouts! Really like the colors. I have quite a few in my marine army, and I've stuck with the metal ones as those plastics always seemed odd looking. You've done a fantastic job in making them look more interesting though!
ReplyDeleteSide note: If you feel like you need more, look for space wolves scouts in metal. They came with beards and stuff already.
Cheers! The plastics are odd-looking, but it's largely the fault of the weird heads. You've just got to find other heads that fit... I remember the wolf scouts being better models. They seem hard to get hold of though. Thanks for the tip!
DeleteHey, these look super cool. I really like the head swap and I have to say the Skitarius head looks awesome on the model. I have the metal ones, but never got these plastic minis. You did a great job on all of them!
ReplyDeleteThanks! I've always found head swaps to be an easy and effective way of converting, as it's where the eye automatically goes. I used the Skitarri head only because I couldn't find a human hooded head, but it seems to have worked out alright! So long as you've got lots of spare heads, the plastic models are ok!
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