Knight Paladin WIP - Adventures with the Airbrush

The various armor panels of the Knight paladin went into the paint booth last week.  After too much deliberation (I can seldom make up my mind on the best scheme...), I opted for a split white/green paint scheme.  This will be a scheme that departs from the palettes of my existing Imperial armies and should help the Paladin stand out in my collection. This is also a new challenge as I have not painted white in any amount, esp. not on armor and the split scheme allowed me to toy with masking and airbrushing. So first the white...

 

Please pardon the crazy image look.  I have been doing ALOT of black base coating so the spray booth is black and the white LEDs cast an odd color in these shots. I used my new Iwata Eclipse airbrush with Vallejo game air colors.  I started with a coat of 72.734 Bonewhite laid right over the black base coat, leaving the back of the panels black and avoiding the trim within reason.  I will brush paint the trim back to black later to prep for brass or gold.  I am using a strip of stiff cardboard with double-sided tape to hold the various small pieces in place for spraying - a great pro tip! I used to hold the pieces which led to all sorts of shenanigans, even with latex gloves on.

Next, a layer of 72.701 Dead White went on, sprayed from the center out, avoiding the edges next to trim to leave some shadow. I plan to use washes or glazes to tint the armor later to blend all the colors and add depth, some age, and details to the panels.  This will happen after the trim is base coated to tie everything together.

 

Above, the greens have been added.  I first flat coated the white and let it dry.  Then I masked off the areas that would remain white and laid down a coat of 72.728 Dark Green followed by highlights of

72.729 Sick Green. As with the Dead White above, I sprayed from the center out avoiding the edges against the trim. One this dried, I removed the tape.  

I was immediately reminded of how important careful taping is.  Some green bled under the white in spots and will have to be cleaned up by brush.  Not what I had hoped for, but hopefully recoverable.  Overall, I was very pleased with how this came out. here's a shot of the painted pieces in their current on the gaming table.

I used the airbrush to carefully base the armor shields on the weapons at the same time I was basing the larger pieces.  Also, some base coat metals have been dry brushed on the main skeleton using Vallejo model color 70.865 oily steel over 70.863 gun metal. This is just a start and more metals will be added to build up some contrast and interest around the large sections of metal skeleton.

That's the progress so far.  Stay tuned for follow up articles as more progress is made.  Comments are welcome, particularly if there are questions or suggestions for more or less detail in these posts.

Cheers, and Happy Gaming!

What's on the hobby desk today?

Greetings.

Wanted to drop a quick post this week with a collection of on-going projects I have on my desk.  First up is the Imperial Knight Paladin with all of its parts based flat black...

 

 Next up are the assembled and primed models from the Execution Force boxed game.  The assassins will be welcomed into my overall Imperial force.  Not sure what will happen with the Chaos forces, other than to collect dust waiting for a game of Execution Force to happen. The Lord model is pretty awesome though and will be a fun painting challenge. Expect some follow up posts this year as I move to painting some or all of these models.

Next up is the 30th Anniversary Space Marine.  I've been in the game since second edition and really enjoyed the release of this model, and the Codex Apocrypha that returns a wealth of prior material to print.

In hindsight, I should have built this as a Mentor Legion marine for flavor and use with my Imperial forces.  I chose instead to build him as a Dark Angel marine to fit with my existing Dark Angels.  The original backpack and shoulder pads are replaced here with corresponding Dark Angels pieces from the bits box. Next up, this model will get a primer coat of green. He'll probably get mounted on a custom base as well, so expect another post on this little guy soon. Not sure if I want to deviate too far form the rest of my Dark Angels which use a very plain gravel base.

Also in the pipeline is a build of the city fight terrain included in the Imperial Knights: Renegade box set. This will either be used to make one new building, or possibly two smaller pieces for variety to round out that terrain set. I have a lot of left over walls, doors and debris, but no floor sections.  I will have to see what I can build with these added sprues.

That's it for now; a good amount of open project work and plenty more on the shelf if I hit a wall on completing these pieces.  I also have two contemptor dreadnoughts and a predator built and based for my 30k Dark Angels 1st legion collection.  So they could get some paint at any point now that I've played a little with the color scheme.

Good luck with your own projects and as always, 

Happy Gaming!

Freeblade Imperial Knight Paladin

Greetings!

Today I'm sharing a couple work-in-progress shots of my second knight titan. Like my previous Imperial Knight Errant, this will also be a free blade knight.  I haven't decided on a final name or back story but this knight will not follow in the inquisitorial footsteps of the Errant.

I like posing Imperial Knights on custom bases.  They are great fun to build and allow for a lot of creativity and imagination to flow freely.  For this knight, I imagined a city ruin base to go along with my latest terrain project. The base include some Death Korps of Kreig infantry bits, including a trooper's arm pinned under the rubble, still clutching a lasrifle. A section of ribbed hose made from green stuff and a resin skull round out some random elements of interest.

 

Here was an opportunity to  use some of the off-cuts from the the city fight terrain buildings.  A few choice pieces were sprinkled about here, with the main pieces serving to raise the left advancing leg of the knight to set his pose at a slight angle, rather than repeating the flat stable pose of the prior Knight Errant. I was not interested in cutting the legs on this knight to make the pose more dynamic.  I have three more to build over time so perhaps I'll try a custom leg pose in the future.

For the pose, I went with a menacing firing stance with the Knight clearly sighting a target for a lethal battle cannon barrage. This stance will clearly show the Knight Paladin int he role of fire support, where the upraised chain sword of the Knight Errant I built presents an aggressive close assault stance. I will admit that he doesn't look all that imposing stripped of most of the armor plating.  This has been left off to allow for easier airbrushing of the components and clear painting of the knight's skeleton which would otherwise be hidden.  The carapace armor is not glued on and is simply dry fit for these photos.

Here is the knight positioned on the base. The right foot is firmly placed in the rubble, crushing a pipe under the knight's obvious bulk, the left foot crashing into the crumbled permacrete of the ruins. The parts have all been based, and an Icarus pattern twin-linked autocannon added as a carapace weapon.  All carapace weapons for my knights will be magnetized to allow for easy customization for future games.

Up next will be a post of the in-progress painting for this guy.  Not sure where I'm going there yet, but the current plan is for green armor with Ivory accents. I've been using the Freeblade iOS game to play with the paint scheme - to the extent that the game allows for custom painting.  It's a great way to test some color schemes and see what they would look like on a knight!

Cheers and Happy Gaming!

WIP: Terrain Project: Cities of Death

Greetings.

In an attempt to freshen my terrain collection and do some justice to the great game mats I picked up recently from gamemat.eu, I have dusted off my old box of Cities of Death buildings.  The set was from GW and is now long out of print.  Here are some work in progress buildings:

These are various angles of three buildings: an Administratum, Manufactorum, and Ministorum ruin. Below is a set of progress pictures of a second Administratum building which can be placed standalone or connected ot the back of the larger ruin to form one big building.  This piece was a test model to prove out some techniques I have not use before.

The ruin is based on a 1/4" sheet of plywood for stability and to prevent any warping or damage over years of play and rough storage. This approach has served me well with the existing foam-board city terrain I have used for many years. A two part epoxy was used to cement the completed plastic terrain to the plywood, along with an old GW moonscape crater.  Next I used super glue to attach various off-cuts from the plastic Cities of Death terrain followed by a mixed size of rocks sourced from Woodland Scenics talus. Finally I used Vallejo Black Lava to tie the elements together and add a general layer of grit to the piece indicative of the remains in a war zone. This final step really helps blend an wear the polished look of the plastic model.  I should also note that I liberally hacked away at portions of the plastic ruins with my flush cutters to add extra damage and variety to the otherwise limited pieces available in the plastic kit.

Here is the ruin with a coat of black primer.  I use a spray paint from Army Painter, but any good black primer should do.  may folks use automotive primer for its durability...

Now I jump ahead to the finished piece.  I used an airbrush to lay down various browns and greys to the ruin.  Then set about with a dry brush to highlight and detail the piece.  Finally i broke out the GW technical paints to add some corrosion and rust effects.  This was my first time using these and I am very happy with the results.

Inquisitor Russ stalks the ruins in search of heretics to expose to the Light of the Emperor...

I hope to bring you more updates of the remaining pieces completed now that the test model is done.  I love the look.  These will sit nicely on my new mats and add a great new setting for future battles once they are complete...  Waiting in the wings is a power generator (pieces sourced from Secret Weapon Miniatures) and various promethium pipeline sections!

Cheers and Happy gaming!

The First Legion: A Test Model

Greeting Gamers.

As I get back up and running in my new hobby space, I have shown the light of hobby back on my Dark Angels.  Along with some hobby effort going into my 40K army, I have been champing at the bit to go after a 30K force.  Not for the game so much, but for the pure joy of finally modelling the First Legion without endless scratch building and compromise. A combination of the Betrayal at Calth boxed game and the recently released Forge World First Legion upgrades have made for some promising fun! These will be true representations of forces from the pre-Heresy First Legion!

Below is a test build and paint scheme for a 30K First Legion marine.  This model will become part of a 5-man heavy support squad.  I wanted something very different for bases compared with the balance of my 40k armies which use primarily sandy/earthy schemes.  So I invested in "steel plating" resin bases from Secret Weapon Miniatures. I think these make for a good theme for this 30K force as I imagine them campaigning within orbital defense stations, within the bowels of great warships, within the great forges of the Mechanicum, etc..

 

I started by mounting the model on a old cork stopper and basing it with Army Painter black primer. I've always based my miniatures before priming and would hold the bases, or the models, while painting.  Sometimes this resulted in some paint being worn off during painting but for the most part I was just transferring a lot of oils from by skin to the model during painting. Not to mention fussing with not getting model paint on the bases and base paint on the model. So I'm trying to improve in that aspect with this project.  I don't need or really expect to play with this force, so there is no rush to get them table-ready.

I reached this stopping point and flat-coated the model to seal the paint job.  It'll stay in this state while I plan and apply transfers, then consider how I want to complete the highlighting and weathering.  I stuck close to the Forge World imagery from book six of their Horus Heresy hardback series and from their website.

A Squad of 30k Dark Angels painted by Forge World

To me this is now the modern canon for what First Legion marines looked like. I will get some better shots of the completed model.  These pictures are quite washed and I didn't realize that while taking them late last night. I'll leave you with a few more images of the test model.

Comments are welcome. Hopefully I'll have some completed pics to put up here soon.
 

The test model has been painted entirely with Vallejo model and game color paints. I love the dropper bottles (I have need moving certain GW paints to these types of bottles, especially the Lahmian Medium) and the colors and coverage.

A predator tank and three Contemptor Dreadnoughts waiting the wings for my to practice a scheme for the vehicles of this force.  One day, these may be joined by Rhino transports, a 30K mark of Land Raider and possibly an additional support tank or two (Sicaran anyone?).

Until next post, Happy Gaming!