Frenetic Laziness: Malefic Artifice (4/6/23)

[jaxom]

I needed a break from Scions and with the announcement of more Primaris coming down the pipe I figured I'd hold off on painting more power armour. I wanted something I could finish quickly because I don't want to get bogged down. A 1-2 day palette cleanser as it were. I've had some Nurgle kits about since Dark Imperium came out as I thought it might be fun to supplement the Death Guard in there.

 

This has to be the most satisfying unit I've painted in such a swift time. I assembled it and primed it yesterday and got the unit painted up today. No portions required more than three steps to do and a lot of the smaller steps that aren't on all the models I managed to keep down to two steps. The details are crisp enough that it's pretty easy not to stray onto areas you don't want painted.

 

White Primer Spray

 

Gryph-Charger Grey Contrast Paint

 

Athonian Camoshade wash

 

Light Drybrush of Pallid Wych Flesh

 

Those three steps take care of a huge portion of the model. Any sloppiness is easy to paint over or can be worked into blending up colours.

 

Pallid Wych Flesh on the toe nails, horns, exposed bone, and teeth

 

- The horns kind of get an edge highlight and kind of get a blend; I did it by eye.

 

Corax White on the eyes

 

Nuln Oil or Purple recess wash around tummy teeth.

 

Mechrite Red on the tongues and guts (followed by Baal Red wash and Evil Sunz Red hightlight between other steps)

 

Mechanicus Standard Grey on the swords

 

Heavy Drybrush Administratum Grey

http://i.imgur.com/tVynU8gm.jpg

 

Only a single highlight step for the guts and that's not really an edge hightlight.

 

 

Champion

 

The head bundle was done by heavily diluting a light green paint and putting it on the heads and once it was dry hitting the entire bundle with Guilliaman Flesh contrast paint. 

 

Guts and Gut Nurgling

 

Here's an example of the Mechrite Red - Baal Red Wash - Evil Sunz Highlight on the guts. The gut nurgling was Warpstone Green and a Thraka Green wash.

 

I've definitely caught the bug - pun intended and wallowed in like a filthy nurgling - and I look forward to doing another unit after my next Scion unit. 

 

 

Edited June 4, 2023 by jaxom

[BadgersinHills]

Plaguebearers look good. The saturated red viscera look good against the pale green! Going to pick out boils and pustules in other colours? 

[jaxom]

After reading your comment I had a looksie at the store images to get an idea of how the box pictures had the boils and pustules and the attached instagram pictures to see what other people did. I came away pleased with the boils (the bumpy bits) as they are paler than the skin. However, I did go back and do a purple glaze around any tears in the skin and a purple inking of the champion's pustules.

 

Here's a comparison shot with the banner bearer not having been glazed yet.

 

 

    

 

 

[BadgersinHills]

Looking good! :) :) 

[jaxom]

Super Heavy Gel (Gloss) was on clearance the last time I was at the art supply store. I decided to try it out on the Plaguebearer bases. The it's a glossy medium which cures transparent. I write "cures" because it's a bit softer than toothpaste in consistency and then hardens over about three days (stable after a few hours, but it takes time for the opacity to fade). You can shape it like really stiff whipped cream. I tossed in some purple ink to give it some colour and tried shaping it to make it look like the models were stomping around in a mucky-mucky.

 

  

 

  

[jaxom]

Nurgle seems to be my comfort food when it comes to modeling and painting. I made up another batch of ten, but my primer ran out part way through so I only painted five so far.

 

Not much changed in terms of painting plan since last time (gryph-charger grey on the right, then with the addition of athonian camoshade on the right).

 

 

The majority of the paint job really could be a two step process for people who just want to get models on the table ASAP. The pallid wych-flesh step adds an extra layer of highlights.

 

 

 

I'm trying out Liquitex Burnt Sienna acrylic in heavy gel medium to make the bases muddy (rather than purple ink).

 

 

  

 

  

 

I think I'll dry brush the bases once the gel sets. A problem I'm having is the sides of the bases. I cannot seem to get the liquitex to not leave streaks. I've done three thin coats and... well, see above. Any advice?

[jaxom]

I ended up black-ringing the bases. This is also with a dry brushing of the burnt sienna base color mixed with some orange.

 

 

 

 

 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on the Nurglings.

[jaxom]

Thank you!

 

I'm participating in the 12 months of hobby challenge this year and my vow for the month is a unit of three plague drones. Today I'm experimenting with two different ways for magnetizing the flight stands. First idea was to replace to top nub with a cylinder magnet and put an anchor in the body.

 

 

I was planning on setting the anchor with GS, but then realized this would leave me with bases with the stands protruding and that could be a hassle to store/transport. The drone bodies "eat" a bunch of the stand, so maybe glue the stand into them (after painting), and then magnet to the base.

 

[jaxom]

I've learned a few things.

 

1) Plague drones are a lot larger than the box picture makes them seem.

 

2) Plague drones are too unbalanced to magnetize with a flat base without putting in more effort than I want.

  

 

I'm just going to sub-assemble, paint, and put everything together. I'll worry about transport later.

[jaxom]

The quest for the minimum steps continues!

 

Plague drone flesh in three steps:

 

1) Guilliman Flesh contrast paint

2) Dry brush Ushabti Bone paint

3) Wash Athonian Camoshade wash

 

 

 

I've started on the eyes (Abaddon Black, Dark Reaper, need to do the Eshin Grey) and the carapace/wings. I'm using Grey Seer to make the carapace a bit warmer than the wings. I plan on hit each with Black Templar contrast paint then maybe doing some highlights.

 

 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Your ability to paint the rotting flesh of a Daemon of Nurgle, are most impressive.

[Givemead]

The drones are coming along very well. Have you got any ideas for the carapace and wings yet?

[jaxom]

My idea was to use Black Templar contrast paint and maybe some highlights. It did not go as planned. Black Templar had too much of a green tint initially. I hit the carapace with a second layer then dry brushed Administratum Grey on the wings and carapace. Here's how it came out:

 

 

 

 

I'm going to try a more traditional Abaddon Black - Eshin Grey - Administratum Grey on the claws.

[acrowsperch]

Wow, these look fantastic. I especially like the black carapace, pale tan flesh contrast.

[jaxom]

Thank you!

 

I've done the first coat of Abaddon Black on the talons and Black Templar on the other carapaces. I only had to do one layer on these two, just really glooped it one and starting pushing it around. It gave a nice mottled look.

 

[jaxom]

"Riders on the storm" something, something, not a huge fan of the Doors.

 

 

 

 

I'm planning on glooping up the metal portions when I base the drones... tentative idea with contrast medium, Warpstone Glow, and maybe heavy acrylic medium gel.

[jaxom]

I've been doing more Nurgle stuff as part of the 12 month hobby challenge, but nothing really new, hence this topic going without updates. Before I get to what I'm currently working on apparently I never put the finished gooped up metallics.

 

 

Anyway, I really like the Plague Drones, but I don't like basing them all that much. I had a thought about the last of three units wallowing in the muck and tried out something. I put the body directly on the base, messed around with arm positions, and then two vague ideas kind of happened at once. "Wallowing" got me thinking about elephants and this other thought was about base sizes and Beasts of Nurgles. A quick check and I decided that instead of converted Plague Drones this would end up as converted Beasts of Nurgle gamboling about in filth.

 

I'm currently in the compositional stage.

 

 

The one on the left was the initial one.

 

 

 

The other two will get claw limbs once I do the green-stuff work. The wires are scaffolds for GS tentacles. I'm going to try sculpting some form of eye(s) above the trunks.

 

 

 

 

[jaxom]

The finished products:

 

[jaxom]

The initial inspiration was of daemons possessing servitor constructs and suits of power armour (possibly using 40k Death Guard models, with the armour being armour and the tentacles painted a animating spirits). As it's for Horus Heresy, I don't want the possession to look over the top. The Daemon Brutes based on the delightful Ambot model. After some slightly irresponsible impulse purchasing, I had kits and so an exploratory modeling expedition to get a feel for what the kit can do was launched.

 

First up, put together the core of the torse.

 

There's an armour plate going over the back. Basic idea: sharp things bursting out of armor. Drill a hole, expand it roughly, test a sharp thing going through it.

 

 

 

Cool, it works. Second idea, making part of the chompy bits more spikey.

 

 

Third idea, replace some cabling with fleshy-bit.

 

 

 

Really not noticeable 95% of the time, not a good place to do anything.

 

There are two sets of legs, and they work on similar principles.

 

There's a square joint which determines the alignment of the torso to the legs. This could be clipped off and some green stuff or possibly a pin-join (because no one is going to looking up at the model from that direction) to give more alignment options. The legs are aligned by the sockets from the hip pieces to the pelvis piece. Clipping off the center nubs on the hips would give rotation options and you could drill new sockets where you wanted. The hoses would then have to be removed. The other thing this would through off is the feet. Each foot is just the forward and back toes aligned off the leg piece. There'd either be a need for filler at the joins or building up the base appropriately to accommodate any major change in the leg angles.

 

 

There are two arms, with the left (facing it) arm only having one should option. It's the shoulder that determines the arm alignment. The left one is more straightforward. 

 

 

A bit of pinning and filler, and you end up with a lot of options. The other side sits flush to the carapace.

 

 

 

It would take more work to change it's alignment, but it's the side with two options. The other things to take into account for converting the arms are the pauldrons and top plate.

 

 

The pauldron's aren't a huge issue, but the armor plate slots onto them. If the pauldron were too far off alignment, the rim which slots into the armor plate may not be there. I added another spikey bit to the arm, and here's Brute 1:

 

 

 

 

Edited March 20, 2023 by jaxom
Forgot a picture

[Boc]

That's looking pretty awesome so far. Any chance for a frontal pic?

Edited March 21, 2023 by Boc

[BadgersinHills]

That is really nice and a thoughtful conversion.

[jaxom]

11 hours ago, Boc said:

That's looking pretty awesome so far. Any chance for a frontal pic?

 

Sure!

 

Definitely shares the hunched over, curved back seen among Armigers, Knights, and Titans.

 

8 hours ago, BadgersinHills said:

That is really nice and a thoughtful conversion.

 

Thank you! I'm working on the second one; in which I'm going to have more rotation.

[Boc]

That looks awesome. Can't wait to see it painted!

[jaxom]

Second one, who's probably going to end up as the Brute Lord.

 

Pinning for the left (when facing the mini) arm.

 

 

I sawed off the top of the hip piece and flipped it upside down to make a more flat surface.

 

 

That got some pinning, too. You can also see the pointy things I added to his back.

 

 

I used Plaguebearer horns to make thumbs. He can now open doors, truly leadership potential!

 

 

The added rotation let me pose him like so:

 

 

Here's where I a hit a snag. Adding the gubbinz over his head really detracts from what you can see of his face. As an HQ, I don't want that. I can't just leave it so open, as it looks too empty. Any ideas?