As addictive as lego building...

Just in case you're all wondering what's happened, here's a clue:

http://www.hirstarts.com/ruinfld/ruinfld.html

Image from the Hirst Arts website and much nicer than mine!

Arriving a week or so after my birthday were bags of blocks from my wonderful wife! Since then I've been sanding, gluing and am just about ready to start painting. It's my first go with Hirst Arts blocks, so probably won't be as amazing as the ones you see on the internet. Actually, I KNOW it won't be as I've not managed to do it particularly cleanly and straight.

Still, it's so much fun that I'm looking forward to making a lot of these, budget allowing. Slow work though, in this weather and with all the other paraphernalia of life. 

I'll post some pics when it's all done =)

** EDIT: Just dropped it when I was spray painting it. SMASH. So now it's back to gluing again - **sigh**

Awoooo

Here's my second Mark of the Wulfen guy...

As with the other I've chosen to have him dual wielding guns as in close combat he goes berserk and I couldn't really model that. I figure he runs forward shooting then launches into a raging melee.

From front on...

From the other side...

And from the back...

That's it for today, another troop done, four to go in the squad...

Feel it hot, hot, hot...

So, over the last couple of days I've polished off the Melta armed Grey Hunter...

He has a melta gun in one hand and a sword in the other. The sword had runes etched into it, so I thought I'd try and do some shiny rune type things in it.

And from this side you see the red and yellow canister on the side of the meltagun in keeping with the other such guns in my force.

Quite happy with how the sword turned out, it's not quite so shiny really.

I quite like the pose too, I tried to make it look as though he were balancing the weight of the two weapons.

And here's my army as it stands (well, all the painted parts except the drop pod, which is at my brother's house at the moment).

Hoist the Banner

Yay! Another guy done!

My banner bearer for pack 2 of grey hunters, nothing particularly fancy here. I'm really pleased with the eyes, though the resolution isn't good enough in this shot, I'll try taking a better one tomorrow maybe. I think sometimes these milk bottle camera shots are great for visibility in terms of light in our dark house, but not so good for getting the angles you'd usually see when playing.

In keeping with the rest of pack 2 he has a bolt pistol instead of a boltgun.

I'm pleased with the shading on the back of the banner too, also the gem thingy on the backpack.

The pack markings are really hard to do, they seem like simple two red triangles on a black background, but due to the curvature of the shoulderpad, it's quite hard to paint them in such a way that they look like triangles from different angles.

Anyway, now Pack 2 has a leader, power weapon, banner bearer and a normal trooper. Lots more guys, but those are the tricky ones out of the way (except maybe the wulfen guy, perhaps I'll do him next).

Power Spear

I know I'm on a roll! One of our inconsiderate neighbours (actually a block away) had a VERY noisy dog barking for an hour and a half last night. In an effort to not get aggro I popped downstairs and did some more painting instead of sleeping =)

This is the power weapon grey hunter from my second pack, I decided to do the spear as a power spear. 

Same old shoulderpad...

Back shows a slightly different backpack for some interest...

The second pack has horizontal stripes rather than vertical ones.

And here's a close-up of the spear so you can see it in all the blobby goodness. Looks better at a distance huh! It's just my standard blue colours, midnight blue background, regal blue with a 10/0 brush, enchanted blue over the top of that, ice blue with a 20/0 brush very slightly on top of that (trying to keep inside the older lines) then some white at intersections and on the "bolts" on the spear where the lightning originates from. For those of you who haven't tried this effect before, why not give it a go, remember that it's from a distance that is most important, doesn't matter if it's a bit blobby up close!

Because he's just a trooper I haven't done as neat a job as on Loki (http://simbattleboard.blogspot.com.au/search/label/Loki).

Working on the banner bearer now, but the munchkin is now awake so it may be a few days before he's done =)

**edit, just noticed that I haven't done the writing on his purity seal on his leg! oops! 

Rok Kjel Wolfguard

Here's the leader of my second Grey Hunter squad, name of Rok Kjel. He's a Wolfguard like Etako with a powerfist and a storm bolter. He's got the pack marking for the second squad on his knee.

My favorite part are the crosshairs on his bionic eye targeting thing, a yellow cross on the red orb. It was tiny and fiddly and you can barely see it, but I like it as a bit of fun =) 

Here's the side with the standard wolf on lava insignia...

And the back, nothing particularly exciting.

You can see the Wolf Guard pack marking on his shoulder pad, though the wolf fur pelt thing covers most of it. I did the shell casings in a bronzy kind of colour just because I thought it looked cool. 

And from the top ou can sort of make out his name on the scroll, though it's a bit tricky from this angle, it looked right in the camera window!

And you can sort of make out the lava on the base of Skodi from this angle, but not really =)

Sorry I didn't touch-up the photos this time so there's a range of funny shades and brightnesses going on here. Usually I edit the picture a little to de-blue it and sharpen it a bit when I use the milk-bottle lamp to make it look more like it does under normal conditions.

Wolf Lord Skodi

Well, this took FOREVER. I spent hours and hours on this one single mini! I figured I should, given that this is my Wolf Lord, name of Skodi.

In terminator armour and dual claws he should stand out nicely with a big wolf pelt and red-lined cape. I've taken pictures up close, but the paint job looks really nice from a bit further away and naked eye instead of camera under lights!

Here's the front view that a tyranid might see a second before it is sliced and diced...

Here's the side view showing a little of the freehand work and the purity seals.

As I've used on many of my minis there is some celtic type freehand here too. It looks a bit messy and chunky here (or maybe that's just my over-reaction) but looks okay in normal circumstances! 

And the other side shows the shoulder pad you are used to now and a little lightning freehand on the hip armour to match the claws. Oh, and there's a lava-pit underneath that you can't really see from the low angles I've used here. I'll try and take some higher angle shots another time.

I'll take a group shot at some point, but I'm really happy with how he turned out and hope that he looks good at the front of my army!