More Orks and bonus random space people

 A while ago, I made some Bad Moon space orks. I promised to make some more. Well, here they are, along with a few other random space geezers.

This guy is some sort of mek. He's got an awesome hammer and an apron full of tools. I love the details on some of these sculpts.

This chap has a heavy weapon. The gun is actually a plastic bit from an otherwise ropey sprue of Mantic orks. I don't know why, but I seem to have two copies of the ork (but not his gun). I don't know what I'll do with the other one. I have a vague feeling that the ork himself is seriously old.

Third up is a metal Bad Moon ork with a ridiculous hat. I gave him checked trousers for no good reason. Perhaps he stole them off a chef. Given that this little warband is essentially a gang of pirates, perhaps he is the ship's cook.

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And here's a few bonus weirdos. This first chap is unusual because my friend Owen did most of the converting work on him about 30 years ago. The upper body and left arm are from a Krymech model (yes, it's that old), and the head and right arm are an old plastic Imperial Guard bits. I finished the conversion off by adding legs from a Bolt Action Russian soldier, and a walking stick made from a bit of plastic spear. My top tip here is to drill through the base from underneath and push the stick through from below. Otherwise it gets a bit fiddly. The letters on this chap's chestplate are supposed to say "SWAT", but it was very hard to pick them out, so they look more like either TWAT or SWOT, which isn't good.

Here's an unconverted Krymech trooper. He's rather spindly. He'd made quite a good model for someone in heavy armour that isn't based on a space marine.

And here's a weird person who might be a robot. This one of those conversions where the bits came from different places but felt as if they went together. The arms and legs were from Skitarri soldiers, the chest was from a Tau tank driver, and the head came from some kind of Age of Sigmar Sigmarine person. I think the great big topknot was originally from a chaos cultist of some sort.

Anyhow, I tried to paint this guy in a dramatic colour scheme, vaguely inspired by matadors (hence much red). I really like the fading effect on the hair: I'm now tempted to do this on an entire model.

And that's me done for now!

Medieval Dreadnought Conversion

 This week, I found some very old 40k vehicles that I made about 15 years ago. They weren't great to begin with, and they'd got battered after a trip to the attic, so I thought I'd have a go at rebuilding one of them. I wanted it to fit in with the rest of my marines, who have a jolly, knightly look.

This is a conversion of an old plastic dreadnought, using (mainly) the upper body of a dreadnought and the legs of a plastic sentinel. The sentinel legs were bulked out with two wheels and some plasticard. The kneepads came from an old plastic chaos knight, and the loincloth was an old plastic cloak. The exhausts were given some plastic chaos tank bits for bonus medievalism.

The right arm of the dreadnought is a standard twin lascannon. The right arm has a metal cannon part that I got in a job lot of bits years ago. I think it's from an ancient steam tank. The dreadnought got plates on his thighs, which came from a dreadnought shin guard which I sliced in half (I couldn't find two).

The shields on the front were bits of plasticard, sanded to shape and painted with heraldry. The head comes from an Imperial Knight, although I cut the lower half off. To begin with, I thought the head was too big and looked silly, but I've got used to it and frankly the whole thing is a bit silly. The little emblem on the top was once on a Bretonian knight's helmet. 

Let's call him Mordread. 

Vampire Ship

 Here's another project that I've been working on gradually. Since I've made some docks for my fantasy town, I thought it would be cool to have a ship docked at them. It would look nice, and would provide a bit more space for characters to fight. I bought a "Strigoi Schooner" from TT Combat: a kit made from laser-cut MDF.

I always think that the TT Combat terrain kits are good for basic shapes, but aren't very detailed. The pieces of detailing that are provided in the kits tend not to be all that good. As a result, I decided to leave off or replace some of the fancy bits. I also decided not to use the coffins that the ship is meant to be pulling, which looked a bit crude.

Once I'd assembled the basic model, I felt that the hull wasn't very smooth. It was made out of progressively narrower pieces of MDF, and looked too basic. Therefore, I got out the DAS clay and smoothed it over the hull. I filed the hull down with a piece of sandpaper, then gave it a coat of watered-down PVA glue. I find that this helps seal the clay and provides a smooth surface to paint. At this point, it looked like this:

Because the meeting of the clay and the MDF was a bit rough, I added a strip of thin plasticard to mark them apart.

Then it was time to add some details. The rear of the raised deck of the ship was a flat bit of wood, so I added some plasticard details.

The lower deck got some details from the bits box. I replaced the basic MDF door with a resin one that I got at an event and stuck a head from a Frostgrave demon over it, to look sinister. An old lamp was mounted it on a bit of plasticard and stuck onto the wall. I found an old resin ladder and trimmed it down to make some stairs up.

I thought it would be cool to make a sinister figurehead for this ship. This came from a plastic ghost model that I'd had for ages. I think it's from the Coven Throne Warhammer kit. It reminds me of the spirit/angel type creatures from Raiders of the Lost Ark. A bit of sprue stuck to her back helped to attach her to the prow of the boat. I added some "wings" that I think were originally bits of tattered cloth. I'm not sure where they came from.

I thought it would be cool to have a lookout on top of the mast. I found a "Vykros blood-born" model from the Warhammer Quest game, which would work perfectly. It was clinging to a ruined pillar. With a bit of trimming, the pillar looked like the top of a mast. 

Time to paint the rest of it. I went for a gothic purple, red and black colour scheme. It looks like the sort of ship that might carry a vampire, or at least somewhere you might buy an Alchemy T-shirt. I named the ship "Demeter" in homage to the ship that carries Dracula to England in the old novel.

And here it is, sliding into port on a sinister mission!

Three More Eldar

 Just a few random Eldar this week. It was quite nice to paint paint light blue armour once again.

First up, here's a Guardian with a missile launcher. He's a very old model, from the Rogue Trader era before the aspect warriors were invented and before Guardian armour was worked out exactly. He looks quite bulky and mean - you'd never suspect that Guardians were absolute rubbish in the game. I'm not sure why I painted part of his gun bright yellow, but I really like the model.

The second model is a slightly later Guardian model, from around the time of the first Eldar codex. Unusually for the Eldar, he's wearing some sort of coat or cloak. He didn't come with any arms - you're supposed to stick plastic arms onto his metal body - but I thought that he needed proper sleeves. So, I gave him a pair of arms from the Stargrave Scavengers set. I think the sleeves and the pistol make him look a bit like a private eye. Maybe he's the bodyguard of an ambassador.

The third model is a conversion. Her legs are from a plastic High Elf and her upper body is from an Eldar Guardian. Her head was from Statuesque Miniatures, and the arm with the falcon comes from a Privateer Press Scyrah model. 

I made a little display case for her out of a plastic box. I used DAS clay to sculpt the ground and added rocks and flowers. I think it looks quite cool. 

I've got lots of projects on the go at the moment!