The 24th of July was the first proper post I ever did on the Cerastus, five months late and this baby is complete. It's one of the benefits of having a blog in that you can look back at those WiPs and remind yourself of the effort put in to reach this stage.
It's certainly worth projecting that feeling forwards on your next project, reminding yourself that in two or three months whatever enterprise it may be will complete and shiny alongside this effort. Of course that's me I know a few people who can crack these sorts of things out in a week or so but it's great to have one of those big project feelings, like I got with my Tyranid fortifications.
Just in case you're wondering I don't ever envisage going much bigger than a Knight, I'm not one of these Warlord fans, although I do like the Chaos Reaver and Warhounds but I think I'd rather have these guys. You can put a marin nect to them and they look suitably impressive and don't take up the whole of my shed.
Anyway, there's not a huge amount to say about this that hasn't already been said, there are still some decisions I could make regarding weathering powders, extra purity seals and banners but I want to progress some other projects first.
And as an exercise in decals, well although I think I could have achieved something similar, perhaps been more comfortable doing so I also think the need to damage the pristine decals was an easier decision to make because they were perfect - so I got another experience in the process a twofer.
I think this manages to capture the dynamic pose pretty well.
The eyes work too.
You can just see the scratched chest pieces and hardly any of that pipe work underneath, but I know it's there!
The OSL worked really well here, I managed to find another darker orange in my stash of paints to help add some more tones.
The view from the back, very metallic, similar to my Dreadnought in that the front is liveried up but the back view is all metal.
Close ups on the plasma reactors, more win.
And views of the feet and how the shin guards look when in place.
Couldn;t really get the lighting right in these, too much orange reflections.
Yep, that's not working ;)
Nevermind, you've seen it before.
He really has been in the wars, I should probably have scruffed the brass in places too.
The back vent wasn't the greatest, I think Ishould have done it bronze too, the glow effect doesn't really work on top of a similar colour but I think I salvaged it, just.
I'm really happy with the centre of the shield. I add the gloss varnish as it helps accentuate the glow effect. When you move around light catches on it so you can never quite tell if it's the painted reflection or the actual reflection.
Not sure it's how anyone else does lighting, or if it's 'accurate' but I think it's an interesting effect.
I was pleased with the end-result for the lance, although I have just looked at some of the WiP pics and I do wish I'd been able to capture both the glow effect and the patina underneath but it was a bit of a salvage job after it went south a touch.
And here we go the Big Green Stamp of Approval