27/05/2014

RT Bestiary: Astral Hounds

Trying to get back to normal life up here. You know, RealLifeTM insists in challenging you in so many different ways.

Anycase, I have managed to paint a little. If you remember the Psychneuein I made using Akula's Space Wasps, you may recall I said I had purchased some other beasts. Here they are, the 'Croc Hound'
 
Skinny dog
 
 My intention was to make some Astral Hounds, those WH40K RT nightmarish beings. They are Warp entities, lurking from their alternate energy dimension over unprotected psykers. Following their victim's psychic aura, they materialise in the real universe, hunt their prey and drag the unfortunate psyker into the Warp, where they feed on his psychic energy, leaving nothing behind them but a misterious absence of the poor victim, never to be seen again...

My first approach to the minis was a total bluff. I thought of them as in an outlandish look, in purple and red, just in the moment of appearing into the material universe, so the back part would be painted in black with swirls of shining energy.
 

Total failure

That scheme simply didn't work. They were not showing at all what I intended. Sooo, back to tile one again. I didn't want to show them in their bare muscles, skinned. There are some other Dark Eldar beasts that already look like that. I then thought of a black&white approach. The RT manual describes them as dark animals, so I figured out a black beast with white belly:
 
The crossing between a dog and a shark
 
That begun to look more like what I was looking for. I used a mix of black and blue, and the lights were made by adding 'german feldgrey' by Vallejo (a grey/green colour) to that mix. I also thought of making burning eyes and mouth, like the Balrog, maybe in red, maybe in green. But I didn't want them to look too daemon-ish. I finally made only the bright eyes, using yellow:
 
Grandma, what big eyes you have!
 
 So the Hounds finally look like this:
 
Grrrrr... Woof, woof
 
A pack of three

 And a final scale comparison shot:

Oh, come on, me again?

That's it, new perils to make my RT games (or whatever) more interesting. I really need to design some scenarios...

6 comments:

  1. Genial esa combinación de colores! Y los ojos... le estás pillando muy bien el truco al resplandor y al efecto fulgurante!

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    1. ¡Muchas gracias! Ya sabes, ahi tienes opciones para tus propias mazmorras ;)

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  2. Thats a really nice paintjob on those Suber, great work. You did well to steer clear of the familiar Chaos Hound and Warp Beast looks.

    There isnt anything in the paint scheme that immediately suggests that they are supernatural/warp animals but thats a good thing I think. That way you can use them as Death Ferrets or some other extra terrestrial predator if required too.

    I have a few of these guys and space wasps due from Akula once he gets the next batch cast. I wasnt planning to use the dogs as Astral Hounds, but seeing as you have then I may do so now anyway, just to keep our combined RT Bestiary efforts thematically linked, just for a bit of fun.



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  3. Thanks, Paul! I guess you are right, I could give them a number of different uses. Astral Hound was my first choice, but there are some other interesting beasts there, hmmm, I may give it a second thought...
    Looking forward to see what you do to your minis! :)

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  4. Very nice, I love the colour.
    Dark, sleek and sinister :)

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    1. Thanks! That's what I tried, but I'm afraid I still have to improve the colour transitions on the skin. They look nice in the flesh, I really need to get them on the board!

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