Some scenery for the 'Book of the Astronomican' campaign

The title says it all, no mistery left. I'm talking about the 'Chapter Approved. First Book of the Astronomican' campaign set released in 1988.

 

Short-haired Space Wolves. Never seen ever since

The campaign is set between Space Wolves and Orks, the Space Marines raiding on three power stations prior to the final assault on the Ork stronghold. They should destroy the power plants in order to shut down the Castle's defences. The campaign requires some buildings, so I came up with these. For the first scenario, the 'temple' (an oooold generator on which the primitive inhabitants built a temple) I made up this structure using foamboard:

 

Orks provided for scale purposes. No Ork was harmed during the works

 

It was fun, but I was terrified about plain walls. My intention was to provide some texture, to make it even the slightest resemblance to the illustration on the book. This is the slow step by step:

 

Grav-elevator. Fun to use

 

Some extra details were needed. Weathering, grass, dirt...

 

So this was the main buliding. Close enough to the original, at least for my purposes.

 

But then I had to face another issue, the big Ork statue in front of the temple. The campaign info tells us that the original statue was built by the primitive dwellers of the area, but when Orks invaded the planet, they desecrated everything and replaced the original head for a new one, resembling their own gods.

Using the illustration above as a guide, I begun to raise the statue to these amalgamated strange gods! 

 

I used a hollow structure and sculpted on it, using DAS putty. I used green stuff for the face and some other details

So this is the boy!

 

Oi! I'm kinda Buddhist Ork. You didn't expect that, did you?

 Once assembled, the temple looks like this:



Believe me, it's really big

 

Next day... Some more cheap scratchbuild scenery!

New minis, old school

I'm talking about the two limited edition minis Games Workshop released last year, the 25th anniversary Crimson Fist Space Marine and the Games Day Blood Angels Space Marine.

In case you are not into this and you need any introduction, the first edition of Warhammer 40,000 (usually known as 'Rogue Trader' or simply 'RT') had this cover back in 1987:

 

This was 1987

 

The Space Marine with the Ork head became quite iconic pretty soon. Last year, GW released this special edition mini:

 

I've been posing for 25 years

 

 You might notice something strange if you look close. It's the head. The mini came beheaded in its blister. After some time trying to get a solution from GW through a friend, I got no response, so it was easier for me replacing it with a head of my own. I used a Mk6 helmet and used some green stuff on it for the nose cone.

 

Poetic justice. I had a severed head in my hand, but didn't have one of my own...

 
Before I speak of this incident, let me show you the other limited edition mini I was talking about. The 2nd Edition of WH40K was released in 1993, the game having  this cover:

 

 'Grim Darkness'?

 

And this mini being released last year for the 'Games Day' event:

 

I've been posing for a while too

 

Fortunately I got all the pieces this time. That's something. Then I just had to face the problem of the annoying bubbles...

 

There's green stuff in places you couldn't imagine

 If you are familiar with the so called 'Finecast' resin GW has been using on their models for a while, you already know what I'm talking about. I had heard about the problem, but had never experienced it. These two are the only 'finecast' models I've ever purchased. The last will they be.
Talking about it would be the usual GW bashing you can read elsewhere on tne internet. I'll just say that my own experience working with this resin is not quite satisfactory. I will politely say no more.

But I don't want to end this post with a bitter taste, sooo... Bonus mini! :)

You might rememeber this illustration by mighty Jes Goodwin, depicting Leman Russ, Primarch of the Space Wolves: 

 

Pretty old piece of art

 
I got the mini on eBay some time ago for a reasonable price. Unfortunately without the wolves (Freki and Geri).

 

I feel lonely. Like a lone wolf... Lone wolf, you get it? Ha ha... What do you mean by 'not funny'?

Ahhh... Good old reliable metal... Hopefully someday I can find the wolves. I promise to put Russ a cloak and banner then.

But having this mini, who would like to buy the Forge World Primarchs? Meh! This is more than enough!

Survivors et al.

Couldn't find any other way to describe them, as they are not truly related to any other project. They are also for the same friend who I told you about the other day, the one of the 'Secrets of Third Reich' stuff. Different minis today... hope you enjoy these eclectic posts!

First of all, these hazmat guys

 

Sarge, I have a problem... I think I just farted

 

A close-up shot of the laptop guy:

 

Oh, man, another Windows crashdown...

 

I had previously painted another hazmat unit, but in green instead of yellow. Didn't take pics of that, I only keep this one with two other soldiers (in ACU pattern uniform):

 

I'm the same guy, I just changed my clothes

 

I also painted these two scientists, the 'regular' one, who I'll call Bob:

 

Don't be fooled by my disguise, I still want to kill Bart Simpson

And the Z one:

 

Man, I had a rough night

 

Of course we have these popular guys:

Oooops, light overexposure

(Had a problem with those, trying to get a balance between cartoonish style and a dark gloomy aspect. I finally rejected that and simply went for the cartoon bright colours)

Finally I'll show you this little ass-kicker. You know.

 

The mini actually looks tougher than the guy in the movie

 

What a bunch of different minis they are. Well, this is part of the charm. I'm moving back to other projects, so you can expect some old school Warhammer again. Soon ;)

Painting some weird things

Not that the minis are weird per se. They just belong to the 'Secrets of Third Reich' range, so they are Weird War stuff. They are for a friend, but I saw the occasion to paint them as I was painting historical WW2. You see, time counts for me! I use every minute for good! My workbench usually looks like an entropy vortex, with tons of totally unrelated minis here and there. 'Now that I'm painting this, I could paint this other one, as I'm using these colours... oooh, and then this other one... hey, and these!'
Unfortunately I'm not familiar with the game or its fluff, so I just painted them in good faith. Hope you still like them!

First of all, a German vampire: 

 

No, you know, the pic is dark on purpose. For the character, yeah. That's it. Bad pic on purpose

 

Then a werewolf in uniform:

 

Chewbacca, is that you?

 

Another werewolf and his mistress (sorry, I can't tell you their story; I'm afraid I can only say this is a kinky girl and her dog. Again classic mandatory stuff in weird war):

 

You think the previous guy was a werewolf? This is a werewolf!

 

Experiments! Weird war is not yet complete without experiments, of course:

 

Shivering, brrrr....

 

It would have been cool adding some water effects, but all my experiments and attempts ended badly, so I just left them as they are.

 

Grandma, what big eyes you have. All the better to see you with...

Ssss, my preciousss, shouldn't have eaten that ssspicy burrito, I'm sh*tting my guts out

 

Brits also have a couple of guys here; the first one is this Battle Chaplain

 

A holy water gun would have been cool too

And misterious 'Dr. Lazarus':

 

Trust me, I'm a doctor

 

Looks like a darker, more sinister Dr. Who, with that gun and the big hat. I painted him accordingly in dull dark colours and a pinstriped suit.

I'm also painting another totally unrelated set of minis for this same friend. I'm just finishing up all the bunch, so I hope I can show them just after the weekend!

StormUFO painted

A break after these two weeks of WWII.

I've painted the Stormthing... Well, it needs a name, cannot be the StormUFO. Let's see, GW has copyright on 'Thunderhawk', 'Stormbird', 'Stormraven', 'Stormtalon', 'Stormeagle'...) For this new vehicle I'll let you choose between 'Stormflamingo' or 'Stormplatypus'.

I know, platypus is not a bird, but who cares, it has a duck bill, it's enough for me.

It's being part of a Pre-Heresy World Eaters army. In case you don't know what the hell I'm talking about, I'll just say that World Eaters Space Marines went rogue during the galactic civil war known as 'the Horus Heresy' and supported the rebellion against the Emperor. Their colours were white and blue, but they repainted all their armours in red during the war (they were so stained in their enemies' blood that it was easier to repaint the armours). They begun to worship the dark god of war and blood and sing things like 'skulls for the thone of skulls'. Nice guys, you know.

At this stage they are still in the ranks of the goodies, so they wear in white and blue and have some Imperial badges.

After replacing the upper cannon and first paint layers, it begun to look this way:

 

A flying brick!

 

Then it was just a matter of adding some blue here and there and all kind of other details. So, ta-daaa:

Finished!

Total aerodynamic design

Though not being for me, it still has my usual hallmark :P, that means lots of signs and inscriptions in Gothic (kinda Latin, which is the official language in the Imperium; you know, more WH40K fluff) 

 

'Aeris Ductus'. Classical 'Air intake' sign

Small and almost illegible 'Cave Pedes' under the door (just a 'Watch your step' sign)

 

 Not much else to show. Here you have a couple of rear views:

Blurry pic

Rear markings

A final pic on its flyer base:

Maybe it's not a good idea to do this on a window...

 

Another project come to fruition! Hooray!

Next day I'll show you some other things I'm painting at the time, not WH40K related. See ya!