After ordering on the 23rd of February it was posted from Nottingham, England on the 7th of March and arrived here in Victoria, Australia today on the 1st of April. No fooling!
Sprues, glorious sprues. Actually, it's a bit overwhelming at the moment.
Haven't had time to do anything more than unbox it at this stage. Yesterday my mum came and helped look after the little guy for several hours, so I got some more painting done on the old Dreadnought too.
Here's the body, two reddish gem things and all the heads now bronze and blue backed with some bones as well. Still not 100% happy with it yet, but getting close to gluing it all together for a better look.
Here are the legs. I tried to do the diamond bits like red gems, but I don't think I did a good job. They look okay, but not gemlike. Don't really know how to do that shape!
And did a quick fenris grey and boltgun coat on the close combat arm. Oh, and some lighter drybrushing on the back of the standard. Oh, and a bit of red and orange on the melta.
Next up I'm going to take the heavy flamer from the Terminators kit and try to cut it to fit the dreadnought in place of the bolter. Should be fun =)
And I guess now I'd better finalise my army list. I'll be putting together 500 points worth of stuff ASAP so we can finally play a game, then I'll have two 1750 lists, the one I'll be able to make cheaply and the one I'll eventually want =)
Anyway, a baby needs changing and feeding, so off I go!
Well, nothing really to report, just wanted to show off the new close combat arm for the dreadnought.
I'll do as much as I can more, but need some of the wolfy bits from the rest of the force to cover a few bits and pieces. A couple of skulls are in tricky places, or places that will be easily coverable with extra bits. Also, I'll be upgrading him to using flames instead of a bolter to keep the whole heat aspect together and need that from, I hope, the terminator box. Otherwise I may raid some of my brother's left over bits.
Anyway, here he is assembled.
My little boy didn't sleep much last night, so spent most of today coaxing him to sleep. As a result I've glued the new arm together, after taking off any skulls, and have drybrushed the banner in three different greys. Waste of time really, I think they were too similar to each other to really show any definition!
It's way too cold to spray paint today, and probably will be tomorrow too, so it might be a while before that other arm gets any attention.
Anyway, every day I cross my fingers for some space wolf arrivals!
Well, my brother emailed to say that the missing arm has turned up, express post, less than a week! Have I got my actual space wolves yet? Nope. Just as well I've had a uni assignment, baby and dreadnought to keep me occupied in the meantime! I just keep telling myself about the money I saved =)
Anyway, have done a little more since last time, but not a heck of a lot.
So here's the parts of the dreadnought I had. I've given them a bit of Fenris Grey and Boltgun Metal.
Next I washed it all with Badab Black, not super noticeable in the picture, but darkens things down and helps redefine the 3Dness of it.
Shadow Grey was applied more neatly this time (it's pretty much the same colour as Fenris Grey), and the metal redone in Chainmail. Some Dwarf Bronze has been added to some bits just to see if I like it. You can see the difference on the main body between where I've already applied the Shadow Grey and where it's still got the wash on.
Here is where I'm currently at with the bits and bobs. Still just playing it a little by ear at the moment as to what colours go where. Haven't done one of these before, and when you're only painting in little snippets it's pretty hard to stay too on track.
Here's the torso, as you can see it's WIP. Still deciding what to do about the rune bits on the top and bottom of the left and right plates. On the right of the picture was my attempt at going over them in silvery colour with the blue underneath. On the left I've covered it all in metallics and will wash down into the runes and see what that looks like. They're really really small and shallow so I'm not sure how well I will be able to get them defined.
Anyway, that's where it all stands at the moment!
As I mentioned previously, my wife and brother teamed up to get me a Space Wolves army. My wife bought the battleforce and a box of terminators, my brother the codex and a Forge World Space Wolves Dreadnought.
Well, that was more than a month ago! They were ordered from Britain due to things costing, literally, half as much over there as over here due to two factors.
1. The Australian dollar is doing really well.
2. We get completely screwed here (with PC games as well as... ) on prices.
Be that as it may, the postage seems to take forever. We ordered three weeks before my birthday, thinking that would be enough time. Well, the first part of my present, a dreadnought, arrived on Monday 21st (my birthday was the 15th). So sort of woohoo! It was missing the close combat arm, but they're going to send that priority post, be interesting to see how long it takes =)
So here he is (minus an arm) in full blu-tac glory, just for some scale I put him next to the marine and the drop pod.
I keep promising to fill you in on my army fluff and list, and will do so, as soon as I've had a read of the codex to make sure I'm not being too stupid about things. It arrived yesterday (24th) so I'll go grab it today =)
Anyhow, going to fit them in with my existing board, so that means ashy waste and lava, and the dreadnought base is big enough to have some fun!
So here's some cork stacked, with a half skull in the middle for a bubble.
And the legs on top. At this point I realise that I'm going to spend a lot of time making lava that won't be seen due to the dreadnought on top! Oh well, going to do it anyway!
Painted black, then drybrushed Codex Grey.
Middle bit coated with Astronomican Grey.
Fortress Grey drybrush on the cork, Skull White layer in the middle.
A little hint of Bleached Bone on the cork, Golden Yellow slathered on the bottom.
From a distance, you can see a couple of accidental paint splodges, but they are easily cleaned later.
While waiting for the yellow to dry I sprayed the dreadnought after cleaning off all the little bits.
I've never been a fan of the skulls that seem to adorn every spare surface on GW stuff. I'll be leaving wolf skulls alone, but will remove or cover all the others (if I can be bothered after the bazillionth one!) Anyway, here's a Fenris Grey coat.
Some Blood Red is stippled around and drybrushed on the internal rocks to give a bit of a glowy effect.
I'll keep working on it whenever I've got the chance, which depends entirely on the sleeping habits of my 8 week old baby. So yeah. Not entirely predictable would sum that up =) Yesterday he slept about four hours in the afternoon - hence the progress made!
Well, not only did I get some time over the weekend, I finished! I was closer to being done than I thought. I'm pretty happy with the result, but it could be a lot better. I learnt a lot for next time!
These have been neatened up and washed etc. Pretty simple really.
These have been neatened up a lot and then given some edge highlighting, which I'm not happy with. I thinned down the paint like people say to do, but it just kind of blobbed and flowed where I didn't want it to go sometimes. More practice maybe?
This is the gun with a bit of bronze added to the metals to pick out details. Probably won't see much of it when it's assembled! I glued the two gun halves together, but didn't glue it to the center bit. That way the gun can rotate a little up and down. Maybe it will make for some good photos during battle reports?
Harnesses all painted up, picked out detail bits in boltgun, washed, then a bit of chainmail to re-highlight. The blue straps have a single layer of highlighting.
With all the bits painted, it was time for assembly! The moment I'd been waiting for!
The bottom half all put together pretty easily... or so I thought (ominous music).
Remember how I'd not had the harness ends perfect? Well, note to self and everybody else who builds one of these - get that bit right!!! (Three exclamations are required here.)
The cylindrical bit that slots from the harness into the central console looked like it had gone in just fine. However... it really needs to go in all the way. Next time I'll be filing the edges down to really make sure it gets right in.
The reason for this is that the side vanes attach to the exterior side of the harness, and if they're even a mm further out than they should be, the vanes don't meet up properly up the top. That makes it hard to attach them to the central block at the top.
Now the next thing I'll be doing next time is gluing the square pieces to the central bit beforehand. I'd put the glue on, then tried to fit two vanes, a square bit and attach them all to the engine block. End result - a lot of frustration, words I don't usually utter, stripped paint and a complete hash up of everything. I couldn't hold it all steady long enough, and even then it was clear things weren't lining up properly.
So I took it down, you know what a mess plastic glue makes. I then worked hard at getting the harnesses in as close to the center as possible. Most of them moved in another couple of mm. Then I glued all the square bits onto the engine, dry fitting a vane between them to make sure they were vertical. You see, they almost act as slots for the vanes to slide into, as well as providing more gluing surface.
Then I went back to attaching one vane into position and waiting for it to set, holding the engine block in position until it was nicely stuck. Next I went around and glued all the rest of them in, letting the glue set a little each time so it wasn't completely bonded, but was strong enough to hold.
Once they were all in place I could slide and jiggle a little to best try and balance everything. Because the harnesses weren't quite right, the whole thing is just slightly off. There are some gaps showing here and there. Because of my failed attempts, some glue has ripped paint off in a few spots too. Also, the doors will sort of close if you hold them really tight, but not really.
It may be a case of not even noticing the flaws from a distance, especially if you don't know where to look, but I'll always be just that little bit disappointed.
Anyway - here it is!
Keen eyes may note that I also didn't file the edges of the vanes smooth, there's a mold line running along them. *sigh* My next one will be much better for what I've learned during this one!
It's quite a project! Perhaps I should have gone with tanks like 99% of the community, but they're just not what I had in mind for my army.
Next time I'll talk more about the future of my army...
Am getting much closer to completion now, I think if you had a dedicated day you could probably do it in a day, certainly if you were just doing a single layer of paint you could.
Here's my blu-tac version of the top central section. Well worth doing a quick blu-tac mock up to see how it all works I think! For starters, there were central sprue bits in some of the sections that needed removing. You don't have to be super neat, just need enough clipped off to allow the central shaft to fit through.
The top few pieces all glue together, and the bottom two glue together separately. What this does is leave the bottom two pieces free to rotate, then you can glue the bottom of the central shaft to the bottom two bits to keep it all together.
You don't have to leave it to rotate, but it'll be cooler to mount the gun so that you can swivel it to face what it shoots at.
I started doing the harness bits too, one word of caution. When you test attach things, be careful when you take it back apart. They are very thin and fragile, I had two of these breakages while doing this. Fortunately they're right in a spot where they're unlikely to be seen anyway, so I just glued it back together. Still, though, be gentle here!
And here you can see I'm testing out how all the bits join together, trying to work out in which order to glue them all together for minimum fuss. I think I'll glue the harness sections to the central bit, then glue it in, then attach one of the big side bits, then attach the top center bit to it, then work around the top, gluing in each big side bit one at a time. Hopefully I'll be able to get them all in place before the glue really sets so that I can wiggle it around into place. I'm not really thinking that I'm going to be too successful, it looks very fidgety!
Here are the outsides of the finished doors. I've done all the little panelly bits in metallics. And I've just realised looking at the picture that I haven't done the badab black in the central indentation bits to darken them up! Oh, and I'll probably do a bit of Chainmail edging of the metallics too.
Here's the center spindle bit WIP, two light coats of Fenris on it at the moment, but it's all glued together now (and yes, the bottom, well, top in this picture, swivels just fine!)
All the harness bits are glued. However, I didn't hold them together for long enough and when I checked them this morning, the cylindrical bits have separated a bit, also I didn't clean them up enough. All of this means that I'm going to have a rotten time trying to get that part of the assembly together =( Still, this won't be the only drop pod I do, so I've at least learnt something for next time!
Here's what I'd done with the central part of the harnesses before gluing it together. Just a Fenris coat, then some Boltgun on the metal bits, a wash over the metal bits and recesses and a further couple of highlights on selected parts which you'll never see when it's all together anyway! =)
Lastly for today, WIP of the bits that stick onto the central top spindle.
If I can get a few more hours in over the weekend I may even finish it up by next week some time =)
I know it's almost been a week, but I haven't got a lot more done on the Space Wolf Drop Pod since last time. I've done a little detail work and glued a piece or two though and it's slowly but surely coming together.
Did a small amount of colour on the underside (not that you'll ever see it!) Just more Fenris on the main part and some boltgun metal on the metallics, followed by a bit of a Badab wash.
I also did the central plinth bit. It's five pieces that all dovetail together quite nicely. I put it together with some blu-tac first so that I knew how it worked, then glued it together fairly quickly so that I could massage it into shape before any one bit was finished. One the whole thing is assembled you won't really see it, but it has lots of neat little detail bits on it that I couldn't resist painting. Here it is with some undercoated bits...
I also glued together the door parts. Here's the bits I've painted just put together without glue or anything, just to see what it looks like =)
The keen eyed among you may notice an unpainted bit around the bottom edge of the hazard stripes. I didn't realise that bit would show, so I'll have to go touch that up a bit. Here's a close-up of the central plinth, probably too close so that you see the messy bits, which look much better from a bit of a distance.
Oh, and it's my birthday and I got a lamp from my mum and dad, so now when the miniatures my wife and brother got me finally arrive I'll at least have some light to paint them by!
Cool and sci-fi-ish huh =) It's an energy saver, but a longish one with a reflective backing so that you get a really huge amount of light out of it. Even better, it's not hot like my old halogen one, which sometimes dried the paint while still on the brush!
Anyway, my son is sleeping sometimes for a couple of hours in the afternoon, so if I can get the household chores and uni study out of the way I should be able to get a few hours of painting in a week and hopefully you'll see some more progress!
Now come on postal service and dish me up some Space Wolves!
Well, sorry for the long time between posts, but this baby doesn't seem to understand my hobby yet =)
My wife has been taking him for daily walks, so I squeeze a little time in here and there (most often for napping rather than painting!)
So here's some of what I've been doing...
Firstly I finished off one drop pod door, then got the rest of them out and have been working on them.
I can't remember what I was up to last time, I think just black spray? Anyway, I clipped these out but forgot to trim the little bits off from where they were attached to the sprues. Rookie mistake, I know! Anyway, you can probably see the nubbly bits poking out in places.
The blue part is Fenris Grey foundation, fairly well watered. I used a 1cm wide flat brush and applied it in a diagonal fashion one way, let it dry a little, then went back in the opposite diagonal. It seems to cover very well. Then I tried to highlight it with a shadow grey/space wolf grey mix. One more heavily on the shadow grey side, one towards the space wolf grey side of things. I'm not planning on going as light as pure space wolf grey, I think it's too bright for my liking (although it would make things a bazillion times easier - I hate mixing paints!)
The other side of the doors are boltgun metal for the metal part, two layers of Iyunden Darksun foundation, a layer of Golden Yellow, then two layers of Bad Moon Yellow, yes, it seriously takes that many layers for my yellow paints to cover it well. I don't know if it's because they're old, or just that I'm impatient. I have a really hard time making yellow cover things without showing brushlines or being too thin to work well.
The black lines are just Chaos Black. Then it's a Badab black wash over the metal bits.
As you can see, I've decided to paint bits first, then assemble. With interior stuff I reckon it's gotta be easier this way.
So here are the doors almost finished. Some neatening up to do yet, but pretty much there.
Here's the platform that sits inside the pod. So far all I've done is a drybrush boltgun metal over the mesh, then a Fenris undercoat.
I've also assembled the undercarriage, had to glue on the little turbine things. Glue's still a tad wet, so no paint on it yet.
And you can see in the above shots that I've clipped out the harnessy bits. I'm just putting them together with blu-tac to see how it all works before I decide the order in which I'll apply paint. I think I'll actually paint the harnesses separately, then assemble the middle column, then paint it, then attach them all together.
I'll try to take WIP shots of that when I get up to it. There's one small trick in that one harness is supposed to be like a commander's one, and has an extra little loop of pipe and attaches next to a little monitor and keyboard on the central column. As I said, I'll WIP it when I get to it!
I've clipped them all out and trimmed the nubs off them, but will have to do a little more trimming to get them to fit snugly together it seems. Still, I'm impressed by the jigsaw nature of the bits that clip into other bits, very clever - though fidgety!
So that's the work in progress so far of my Space Wolves Drop Pod. Birthday is next week, so at some stage I'll actually have some Space Wolves to put together =) Looking forward to putting them all together, though I think it will be a long term project!
Well, as predicted, I haven't spent more than a couple of hours painting in the last week.
Here's the reason why...
But I have done at least something. My brother had a space marine drop pod that he had been going to use but never got around to. Since he's going to use Imperial Guard (http://pauls40k.blogspot.com/) he very kindly gave me his drop pod. He's making great progress on his assembling and painting.
Anyway, I sprayed it black...
Fantastic progress huh =)
I have also converted a regular old marine and given him a lick of paint and a wash, but no highlights yet. When I get the Space Wolves Battleforce I'll add some wolfy bits to him. Basically I cut his hand off, cut the fingers and thumb off and reglued them with some greenstuff around a long dagger/short sword. I want all my Grey Hunters to have a modeled close combat weapon.
As you can see, minimal progress as yet, really just want to try out the colour scheme. Fenris Grey with Shadow Grey on top. They seem so similar in colour that I might skip the Shadow Grey step. This could be due to the lighting though. My lamp blew last week, nearly electrocuting me in the process. Thanks to the guy who invented the fuse box!
The planet the Space Wolves are from, Fenris, is in an elliptical orbit. Most of the time it is frozen oceans. Sometimes though, at the close part of the orbit, you get massive tectonic and volcanic activity. To reflect this, and tie them in with my board and basing scheme, I've been toying with designs. Here's a prototype shoulderpad.
The wolf head needs some work. Sort of fire and ice I'm going for there, a splash of colour amidst the dark blue/grey of the actual marine and grey of the table. I was thinking of a different snowflake for each troop too, but they are so small to paint!
Anyway, not much progress, but some =)
Let me know what you think.
