'nids part 359 - #DreadTober High Rule Dude - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity it's the 30th of #DreadTober and I've been #PaintingWarhammer on my Tyranid High Rule Dude and here we go, with a final surge of effort I got this over the line.

It's turned out awesome even with a TO DO LIST of 32 parts I feel almost satisfied for my season with this alone.

There are some issues, I would have preferred the head to be a bit further raised. The magnets aren't as effective as usual, but I think that's because the ball joints are perhaps too big for the sockets.

Whatever issues I had with the painting have been resolved thanks to the subtle red/purple shading on the undersides of the arms and legs.

It adds just enough of an additional dimension to help add volume and variety to an otherwise 'samey' bone colour.

The reds have come out really well and despite my concerns about the green glow - I'm always concerned about glow effects.

I think it's turned out fantastic.

Just enough green to add some variety, with the red and yellow adrenal glands.

He's an absolute beast and weighs a fair bit too - as a chonky bit of resin!

I've not idea if I'll ever play him but it's such a cool model and I think my colour scheme adds just that extra bit of detail that perhaps the simplicity of the original sculpt lacked.

I love it, but there were certain elements that could have done with a bit of texture.

I'm no fan of the Forgeworld Hierodule, but it did add texture to the sculpt that the plastics are only just beginning to add [with the new Termagants].

Arguably it doesn't need it with my paint scheme and thankfully it manages to fill the wealth smooth of smooth surfaces.

I love these guns, no idea which is the better - Barbed or Scythed?

But nothing beats its mutant Strawberry squirt gun!

So, the High Rule Dude is complete [white background pics to follow] and I get a, Bloody Great Big Bloody Stamp of Bloody Approval but did I finish the Screamer Killers too, or were they a stretch goal too far? Come back tomorrow to find out!

'nids part 358 - #DreadTober High Rule Dude and Screamer Killers Flesh and Talons

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity it's the 24th of #DreadTober and I've been #PaintingWarhammer on my Tyranid High Rule Dude and I've been so busy I didn't have time to post this update last week.

My focus has been on highlighting all the red fleshy bits.

Then all the black talons, claws and spikes.

I got all the adrenal glands highlighted too as well as the eyes and teeth.

The rotting strawberry of doom.

The teeth have made such a huge difference and this is literally just VGC Stonewall Grey and then white. No shades, washes or wet blends! And yet I'm convinced it's somehow tied everything together.

All the chunky brushstrokes look like some comic-book style colouring.

The spikes too, it's all coming together now and I can't wait to put some gloss varnish on all those spikes.

I did the legs, but foolishly did not consult my Tyrannofex blogpost beforehand to give me the exact recipe of how to create the angry red effect. 

It's hardly different but it would have made a bit of sense given I actually noted how I did it. And also it was DreadTober2020 which has a nice continuity to it!

And the massive talons, I've done much lighter highlights on the red than usual. 

I'm not sure if I'll live to regret that or not, but it all matches on the model, even if it's not as consistent with some of my other big bugs.

The talons too are a bit clunky with the highlights but I just wanted to get it done at this point. I'm not sure about the veins on the shoulders, if I need to do anything to blend them in a bit...?

Regardless, there's still some shading to add in places, but I'll do that when the model is fully mounted and I can decide on how I'm going to shade it.

Now the guns mostly match the Hierophant, at least I consulted the blog for this.

That said, I'm not sure what I was thinking that the underslung pipe/strut should be green like it's delivering bio-plasma to the gun, when it fact it ends in a bayonet talon! Still I'll do it green.

And to the Screamer Killers - both got their highlights.

And I now fully understand why the legs don't work. Firstly, there are 6 armoured plates on the thigh and 4 on the shin, when usually it's 5 and 3.

Those additional plates fill up the space more, rather than show bits of the fleshy joints or weaker armour. It creates a solid armoured leg.

Which I suppose for the function of the creature makes evolutionary sense but it's diverging from the Tyranid design language in a way that looks plain odd.

From the side it's not too bad, as you can see the other colours from the scheme.

But from the front, and particularly how the angle of the knee bends back in such a way as to make the armoured plates look continuous from a tabletop perspective, well they just look like trousers.

While the new Norn Emissary, as a bigger creature still holds to the 5 and 3 rule. Has a slight taper to the plates too, so you can see the weaker armour at the sides and the knee bend is in such a way as you can see the top part of the shin. 

When I get the Norn done you'll see what I mean.

Anyway, this has all worked out pretty well. Green and blue plasma to do next and then some shading.

The heads have worked really well and once again the teeth just make it so comic-book.

As much as I'd love to do something more grimdark and downright scary I love how this is straight out of Ben 10 or some other kids cartoon.

It's still cool, even if it's toy-like. As I come to terms with what I'm capable of painting nowadays I'm just grateful it has come together despite it.

I mean even all the dark blue, thanks to the washes, has somehow worked out OK when pre-chitin highlights it looked really dodgy.

Nearly done, just the glow FX, shading, some details on the bases, varnish and TO DONE!

Can't wait to see them finished.

#BloodBowl #ArmiesOnParade Mega bowl or Death Bowl pitch - TO DONE!

Afternoon #WarHamFam and #WarhammerCommunity I've been working on my #ArmiesOnParade2023 board. This year is all about showcasing 4 of my Blood Bowl teams. The 'best of the rest' category is always quite small and I wanted to showcase it doesn't have to be 40k or 30k [and not a cynical attempt to reduce the odds]. Mega bowl is way of playing Blood Bowl  with 4 teams and I wanted a 7's pitch so that it would fit in a 2'x2' square. However, 7's pitches are 21 spaces long and you may note this is one square short... Nevermind, it's not like I'm going to limit it to seven players on the pitch either. Anyway, I created the grid, the 3x3 corners will be space for reserves and the inner square is the 'no-man's' land that teams start outside of.

Next up - tile spacers to create tangible squares. Superglued in place, although the glue was a little temperamental sometimes. It was quite the challenge to make sure the crosses were all aligned neatly while 'floating' on this cushion of superglue. Using a couple of scalpels to press it in place was the easiest way to do it. 

The whole thing got a PVA and sand covering, then primed with Halfords Red Oxide car primer, then I think matt black car spray. Lots of Burnt Umber brown, but the bottom quarter will be my Nurgle tar pit, so I mixed talcum powder with PVA to create an effect similar to my Gloss Black 3d Texture paint. The tile spacers were still a little too plasticky, so I added some Valejo Red Oxid texture paste on all of them. 

I started mixing in some Latte [cream] art acrylic into the Burnt Umber for highlights in each player square.

And yet more highlights, creating a much paler board than I had expected.

I added a bit of shading around each tile spacer and then picked each one out in white so they're clearly defined.

I then added the rest of the pitch markings, so now we can begin to understand the layout a bit more. Now, we know where Nurgle is going, but the Humans and Halflings are on grass, while the Orcs are barren earth, which is what we currently have. So who else goes where?

This is a Photoshop mock-up as I had always envisaged the grass splitting the pitch.

Halflings opposite the Humans.

But I suddenly wondered if dividing it diagonally might make more sense.

With 'good' on one side and bad encroaching from the other.

So I used the mock-ups to poll on a Blood Bowl group and they all suggested splitting the pitch was the better option. I'm not sure why but this is where we got to with the flocking, some small flowers in the Halfling reserve area [I swapped the human halfling sides] and gloss varnished the tar pit. The grass was much less green than my renderings but other than that it came out OK.

So, next was picking out the endzones, which was pretty straight forward and fun to do.

And lastly the BB double skull logo in the centre. In 7's 2 balls fit in 2 of the 4 centre squares [so actually if it had have been 21x21 squares it wouldn't have worked]. So the skull is a nice touch to help show where that is and harks back to the Astrogranite™ original. I printed an outline stencil, cut it out and stippled white. The a second stencil for the black outline, which I then tidied up freehand.

So that pretty much TO DONE! and as it was done quite a few months back now it actually gets the last GREAT Big RUSTY Stamp of Approval. 

So, as far as I'm concerned my AoP is now ready. The only thing I feel I could add is a backdrop, but I'm not sure I have the wherewithal at the moment to fit that in alongside my other hobby projects. We'll see after #DreadTober as our in-store parade is earmarked for 18th November...