+ inload: Dead Earth Miniatures' Piscean review +

+ A tin of Saharduins + 

+ Dead Earth Miniatures' Piscean review +

+ Who? What +

+ Dead Earth miniatures, run by ex-GW sculptor Stephen May (@stevepaintsandsculpts on Instagram), is an indie producer of exquisitely characterful miniatures, which you can buy here [+noosphericexloadlink embedded+]. The growing range is mainly Necromunda-adjacent, with figures that would be ideal for old-school Ratskins and Brats, amongst others. While it's clear May has a real love for the 40k universe, these figures would all also be perfectly at home in many other skirmish games. +

+ Long-time inloaders will know my fixation on fishy little aliens, so will be utterly unsurprised that I recently supported Dead Earth Miniature's 'The Piscean' Kickstarter, which featured the charming and slippery fellow pictured above. +

+++

+ Materials and constructions +

+ The figure arrived packaged in a bubble envelope as four separate sprues along with a 40mm base. The resin it's cast in is high quality, with a good balance of strength and flex. Given the sculptor's pedigreee, I'd be inclined to guess that if it's not the same stuff Forge World use, it's certainly something very similar.  +

+ There was little flash and no mould slippage on the copy I received, which is always a relief for short-run resin figures. Likewise there was no distortion or reshaping necessary, with the minor exception of one of the cables above – and given the very fine nature of these parts, I think that's virtually inevitable. +

+ Given the sinuous nature of the figure, it's unsurprising that it's had to be cut into a few pieces. These cut are well-judged, with joins largely hidden in naturalistic ways, such as the neck under a cable, and the sleeved arm joining at a shoulder strap. The parts have been well-cast, with little or no warping, so there are only very fine gaps – you can see one at the shoulder in my assembled version below, but as you can see the neck and foot joins are almost invisible. +

+ There were no instructions included, which can be tricky for non-human figures (it's not always obvious where alien anatomy goes!) but there are handy guide structures on the components meaning that they only fit together in one position. Construction is therefore straightforward, and aside from having to fish out a pair of tweezers to get the pipes on either side of the head, was very swift. One set of these pipes required running under hot water to bend into place, but that's well within the wheelhouse of anyone likely to be building them. +

+ The assembled Piscean, pictured alongside a couple of Knightmare Games Fishmen, and GW's original Saharduin +

+++

+ Painting +

+ Still WIP at the time of this review, I wanted to include a few notes on painting the figure – which is proving a treat. I couldn't resist working up the face a little more, and you can see character and detail apparent in the sculpt even at this stage. +

+ One of the lovely aspects of weird one-off aliens like this is the absolute freedom for colour schemes. There's no set expectation for them. I toyed with a brighter colour (as I'd used for the Knightmare Miniatures ones above), but since this sculpt is far more salamander-esque, I decided to go for a more muted, earthy tone. He's got a bit of a Star Wars feel at the moment, which is no bad thing – as noted above, while the Piscean would fit in nicely with the 40k universe, he'd be equally at home in other universes, like Gates of Antares. +

+ Having opted for green skin, I decided that battered brown-black leather would help set it off, so I'm using that for the straps, and a more neutral grey for the rest of the clthing/armour. This low-key scheme is at an early stage, and I'll be working it up before adding some contrasting markings to provide some eye-catching highlights and a flash of exotic colour. +

+++

+ The good, the bad, and the fishy +

+ Overall, I'm delighted with the figure. Partially that's down to my enthusiasm for retrohammer-flavoured fishmen models, but even objectively this was a real treat. The sculpting is top-notch, and as one might expect of an ex-FW sculptor, fits into the aesthetic of my largely GW collection really naturally. Happily, the production quality – often the weakpoint of indie studios – is also excellent. +

+ On the downside, I've heard a couple of comments from other backers that their model arrived broken, so hopefully for future projects Dead Earth Miniatures will consider using small cardboard boxes for packaging to help minimise damage on figure(s). +

+APPENDEDIT: I've just been informed by another backer that her model turned up in a bubblewrap envelope within a cardboard box, so looks like this issue has already been resolved – good show, DEM!+

+ The pricing – £22 Kickstarter, £24 retail – is in the same ball park as Forge World's kits, which I think is fair for a figure of this size and quality, even if it squeezed me out of going for the variants and options that formed part of the Kickstarter. I think Dead Earth Miniatures might have run out of time on getting pics of those options up before the Kickstarter finished, but have offered backers a freepost option, which I thought was a nice touch – and means that I may well pick up a variant if the bits catch my fancy. +

+ In summary, this is an extremely well-sculpted and thoughtfully designed figure that I'd have no hesitation in recommending. Quality-wise it's doing everything right, packed with interesting detail and a treat to the painter. I'd not have blinked if you'd told me it was an official Necromunda Hired Gun figure, and given the high quality of that range, that's a compliment. +

+ inload: Eldar Guardians +

+ Retrohammer army #2: Mike McVey's WD138 Alaitoc Eldar +

+ Well, here we go. A few false starts later, and we're off! Following up on my interpretation of the studio's Blood Angels 3rd Company from WD139 [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], I've started in earnest on the opposing force; the mysterious Eldar of Alaitoc. +

+ As with the Blood Angels, the underlying conceit here is to produce my interpretation of the studio Eldar Army from the 90s. This was late Rogue Trader; a few months before the release of Warhammer 40,000 second edition, so there are both similarities and differences – some subtle, some quite stark – between the period and modern armies. +

+ There's no great reason behind this beyond nostalgic fondness – I must have read and re-read these magazines dozens of times when I first got into the hobby. I suspect there's probably an equivalent for you; whether that's old WD magazines, an inspirational online blog, or perhaps, if you've just joined the hobby, whatever's coming out now! Embrace it. Enjoy it! +

+ I hope you'll enjoy following along with the process, and please do to chime in with your own ideas, questions and memories, either here or on the +Death of a Rubricist+ Facebook group. +

+++

+ Guardians +

+ Distinguished by sash colour, this is the first of the four Guardian squads in the original army +

+ The original army had four Guardian squads; two armed with lasguns, a close combat squad (a modern Storm Guardian squad), and a Guardian Battle squad. The latter were the only Guardians armed with shuriken catapults; I believe you could only have half your Guardians thus armed. +

+ The first squad – my testers – are one of the lasgun-armed ones. As with my Blood Angels, I've tried to balance capturing the nostalgic charm I have for the originals against the advantages of modern design and manufacturing methods. +

+ My WIP interpretation.  +

+ The balance has proven an interesting one when it comes to the Eldar, particularly the Aspect Warriors. Unlike the Space Marines, the Eldar aesthetic has remained very consistent, with changes really limited to getting slightly closer to Jes Goodwin's original designs – likely a consequence of materials and manufacturing methods allowing for finer details. +

+ The Guardians are a bit of an exception here; besides the Epic vehicles, I think they're the part of the Eldar army that has changed the most. +

+++

+ There's a lot I like about the old Guardians, but I do think that the new design is an improvement in almost every way. I thus had a bit of a decision to make in how far to alter things. There were a few options, including:

• Complete retro conversion; aiming to replicate things like the chainmail mesh undersuit, cone heads and so forth.
• Modern update, using modern bits – like the Corsair kit's long-range shuriken catapults – to account for period differences, like the variation in weaponry.

+ In the end I felt the former was a bit too beholden to the past, and the latter wouldn't be readily identifiable – it would look like any other modern Eldar army. I really like the modern Guardian designs, so I opted for a few critical changes: most obviously, weapons from the period. These are much smaller than the modern equivalents, and have more pleasing proportions to me. They're also a neat way to nod to the originals while retaining the appeal of the modern look. +

+ Note the melta gun. The modern version is almost identical; merely a hint larger and with cleaner, deeper details, but I opted to convert it to an old one anyway, for consistency with the others. +

+ More subtly, I trimmed away the cheek vents from the helms. It's not particularly obvious here, but it gives a taller, slimmer feel to the helm, helping to evoke the old 'conehead' look. Looking at the pictures here, I think I need to go back and tidy them up a bit more. +

+ One of the nice things about having a blog is that it encourages me to reflect on things and consider them as I go. While I like how they're looking already, I'm tempted to further convert them by trimming away the back vanes. These are a very distinctive part of the new design, but are conspicuously absent in the originals (instead, the Guardians had little vents that look a bit like a tea strainer). +

+ I consulted the PCRC on the matter, and will test the idea out on a spare plastic Guardian (one of the slightly older ones). It's a relatively simple change, and I think this additional detail will both evoke the older ones better and make the head more isolated, again enhancing the conehead look. +

+ The gunslinging squad leader! Armed with a shuriken pistol and laspistol, the squad leader will definitely have a banner. The originals (see above) had each squad leader bearing a pennant mounted on a pin drilled into their backs. Back banners are such an iconic part of the period, I just can't resist adding one on. I also opted to use a tasseled helm – not something from the period, but I don't want to be slavish. Besides, I thought he deserved a little flourish: rank should have its privileges! +

+++

+ Once I've sorted out the back vanes and banner, I'll tackle the next Guardian squad. You'll see that I've tried to match the poses, weaponry and genders of the figures as closely as possible for this squad, but I'm tempted to be a bit more freeform on the others, as it'll let me use the cool options and details from the modern kit. Retro is all very well, but it needs to be balanced and informed by reinterpretation. +

+ Catachan Sergeant 'Ripper' Jackson +

+ They make 'em tough on Catachan +

+ I finished painting Sergeant 'Ripper' Jackson and Colonel 'Definitely-not' Carl Weathers a few weeks back – and they've been here been sitting patiently (lying in ambush?) ready to go up on the blog. +

+ Both are absolutely wonderful models; just the right mix of comic-book exaggeration and fluid realism that I think sums up GW at their best. I collected the original Catachan Jungle Fighter models on release (long since gone on to a better place), but rather fell out of love with the range when the plastics replaced the superbly characterful metals. +

+ Time hasn't aged the infantry kit well (though even at the time it had a muted reception), but the command squad and heavy weapon teams are actually pretty good, in my opinion. The release of new characters gives me some hope that we will one day see a new Catachan range, but I'm not holding my breath. In the meantime, I'll pick up fantastic models like this, and hope that one day they'll have some soldiers to boss around. +

+ Since we saw the Catachan Colonel near-enough finished in an earlier inload [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], we'll concentrate on Jackson here. Painting camouflaged soldiers is a tricky balance. Make the camouflage too realistic and effective, and it'll do its job – leaving your model looking bland or boring. Adding too obvious a contrast can appear jarring. That can work – particularly where the camouflage is heraldic, as on (say) Executioners Space Marines  but here I've tried to strike a balance between a couple of eye-catching areas on contrast and a generally muted tone. +

+ Here, the bandana and light t-shirt frame the face and create patches of tonal and colour contrast with the jacket and skin. The flat area of cloth was given a sense of texture and age with the addition of a touch of yellow ochre (Iyanden Darksun). The same yellow was used for the bandana and also in the first layers of highlighting on the skin, creating a cohesive and warm palette. +

+ Insofar as anyone in the Imperium is a 'goodie', I've always thought the Catachans have a fairly appealing culture of community support, humour in the face of danger and an adventurous spirit. Bringing warmth into the palette by avoiding cold hues except where necessary (metallics, for example) or for intentional accents (green lenses for 'pop'), creates an attractive palette that invites further viewing. +

+ The camouflage patches – Zamesi Desert, Gretchin Green and uh... Battle Green? Or whatever the modern equivalent is – are added over a Halfords brown spray undercoat (from their Camouflage spray range). The pattern matches that used on the Colonel, providing uniformity that makes it clear Jackson's a soldier – even if her veteran status and Catachan demeanour afford her a little personalisation to her kit. +

+ The sword is nicknamed 'amiga' – a little nod to the likely inspiration of the hispanic infantrywoman Jenette Vasquez from Aliens, played by Jenette Goldstein. I very nearly went with an hispanic skintone, but enjoyed painting the warm dark skintone on the colonel (and Inquisitrix Barbari Kills) so much that I decided to use something similar here, too. Imperial Guard are a wonderful place to explore painting different skintones; and the goes doubly for Catachans, with so much muscle on display! +

+ If I find another for a reasonable price, I'll probably work up a conversion – perhaps an homage to Michael Perry and Mike McVey's 54mm Catachan that turned up in Golden Demon years back. +

+ The boltgun and chainsword received the same dull mid-green used in the camouflage patches, and I've highlighted these cleanly to add some harder lines that contrast with the softer blending used on her musculature. +

+ The bionic leg is treated exactly as a piece of military equipment, with the same dull mid-green. I really love the relatively low-tech look. It's a functional replacement for a warrior. + 

+ The dead tyranid on the base was painted red and blue to evoke the hivefleets of the rest of the PCRC, which mostly use these colours. I haven't tried to match any one specifically as they're all done in a lovely vivid, classic 'Eavy Metal style, which would clash with this muted look. To mute things, I added a spot of red to the blue, and a spot of blue to the red. +

+ Lovely sculpt, great model – I can only hope the God-Emperor sees fit to share more lovely Catachan sculpts with us soon! +

+ inload: Necrons, Eldar and Krell +

 + Elder races +

+ Dread species abound in the grim darkness of the far future; many of which pre-date (and predate upon...) humanity. With the Blood Angels polished off, it's time to have a look at some more xenos. Some will join the Alien Wars project, others will be coming into conflict with the Gatebreakers in the Endworlds. +

+ Necrontyr +

+ Primary antagonists of the Gatebreakers, the Necrons from the Indomitus boxed set will be serving as a subserviant group under K0rdhal's Urdimmu. My ones will be very straightforward – a typical zombie robot horde, to provide some contrast with K0rdhal's awesome conversions. +

+ Some of the unpainted Necrons are shown more clearly in an earlier inload [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], and I'm pleased to say that they're painting up both quickly and effectively. Starting from a black undercoat, the batch above was cranked out in an evening using the following process:

• Place small pools of black paint, dark brown paint, silver paint, pearlescent ink and sepia ink on your palette.
• Muddle the colours together in the centre, leaving some areas of the pure colour still available.
• Use a large brush to paint the figures semi-randomly. The idea is to create a varied underpainting, with some areas of brighter silver and duller browns and blacks.
• Once dry, layer with Agrax Earthshade (or other dark wash).
• Once dry, use a fine-tipped brush to selectively apply Stormhost silver (or other bright metallic) to the armour plates; emphasising the edges and leaving gaps and interesting shapes.

The scribbly, patchy effect that we're looking for.

+ This is a variation on my method for painting Iron Warriors [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], though the result is brighter and cleaner – which suits the more high-tech aliens. +

+ The effect will be further refined with touches of green, yellow and purple washes, as per Designation Samaritan [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], the Cryptek that's raising all of these warriors. After that, it's down to painting the purple that will – I hope – make everything pop. +

+++

+ Eldar +

+ Having built and painted an homage to the WD139 Blood Angels, it was all but inevitable that I'd end up creating the opposing force, wasn't it? I'm not anticipating these being ready anytime soon; but equally I'm hoping it won't be years and years before they're fit to grace the table. +

+ The modern Banshees are lovely models; and I hope to see the other Aspect Warriors receive updates in a timely manner. My prognostication/supposition-augurs suggest that Eldar infantry have been particularly slow to transition into plastic because of the distinctive background of the Aspects: offering alternative weapons etc. goes against the background principles of the units; and creating new units that share the same base body would dilute the supposed uniqueness of each aspect. +

+ The details above mean that Aspect Warrriors don't fit into GW's dual-build box structure. That's a problem, as I suspect the reason behind GW's decision to have most boxes building two distinct units (e.g. Ogryns and Bullgryns, Deathmarks and Immortals etc.) is twofold: minimising SKU codes and maximising shelf space; and helping to insure against a flop gaming release – if one unit is seen as uncompetitive, the other might still be worthwhile from a Match Play gamer's point of view. With the exception of the Dire Avengers, they're all specialist units, and therefore are unlikely to be taken multiple times in an army. All of these points weigh against the likely commercial success of a launch of an individual Aspect box. +

+ Part of me wonders if the Ynnari background is GW's way to sidestepping this issue. By making units like the Banshees available to two in-game armies – Craftworld and Ynnari, you're broadening the number of potential buyers – in the same way as having the same plastic kit serving multiple Space Marine forces, or allowing the Leman Russ tank to be taken by Genestealer cults. Having a 'year of the Eldar' or something, in which both Craftworld and Ynnari are released, would allow all the remaining aspects to be brought out in swift succession – but not so close together than they cannibalise each others' sales. +

+ To be clear, I don't have any insider knowledge on this – I just find it interesting to speculate, based on what GW have done in the past. It's not beyond the bounds of reason for an army to receive half a dozen kits at once – just look at the Sisters of Battle or orks – but I think GW are slightly more wary of the Eldar. They could easily go back to being hugely popular, but as-is, they strike me as in a uniquely awkward position in terms of the armies. + 

+++

+ Krell +

+ 40k, like a lot of sci-fi, has a lot of fairly similar protaganist species. With the exception of the Tyranids, almost all of the main factions are humanoid. Also known as the Enslavers, the Krell are the perfect example of a non-humanoid alien species that hasn't really been seen since Rogue Trader – and they're a species that, frankly, I think are pretty much the coolest thing since sliced bread. +

+ I created the Alien Wars project with the idea that it'd give me a space to play around with less familiar forces, like the Saharduin and the Fomn. The project stems from a simple concept: what would X model/faction look like if it were released today? +

+ The weird, warp-based, gribbly, mind-eating tentacle monsters have had some cool hints as to their continued existence in 40k – they appeared as the Psyren in a couple of short stories, and some concept sketches and conversions appeared in a Creature Feature article in White Dwarf. Had you asked me a few years back, I'd have said there's no chance of seeing GW re-release them; but we've now seen the release of models like the ambull and zoats. I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that we'll eventually see official GW models. +

+ For the moment, however, I'll be using the rather delightfully grotesque figures from Tagged Events [+noosphericexloadlink embedded+]. Drawing heavily on the White Dwarf concept sketches I mention above, I got these as part of a Kickstarter, and the quality of cast is lovely – judging by the box they arrived in, they were cast by the excellent Artel "W" [+noosphericexloadlink embedded+]. The design is slightly awkward, requiring quite a bit of hot water work (I'll try to get some shots when I build the remaining two), but I'm delighted with the results. +

+ The models are very fragile, and I'm very sceptical that the delicate tentacles would last any time at all in storage, let alone play. To help avoid (or at least minimise) damage, I've used wire to connect them to the bases to relieve the weight and pressure. I've also shifted them from the 40mm bases with which they were supplied to large 50mm bases. As well as helping to avoid overlapping the base edge, it also gives them a bit more table presence – fitting for these creepy invaders from being reality itself! +

+ As mentioned, I love the design. The only reservation I have is that there are no options, and the head on the portal/gate figure. I trimmed it off mine, and I think its loss is a substantial improvement. Other than that, it's classic 50s style B-movie monsters from space, and I'm really looking forward to painting them. +

+ inload: Blood Angels Support +

+ And then it was done + 

+ The Land Speeder is complete – and with that, the army as a whole is finished. Back in June 2017 [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+] I wrote:

+ I'm not going to be obsessive about the army composition. There'll doubtless be a few nods to old models (I'm particularly keen to have a go at updating the proto-Tycho Blood Angels Captain) and the paint scheme, but the force will be a more general homage to the Blood Angels of the time – so tying in bits from the tail end of Rogue Trader through 2nd edition; particularly the artwork. +

+ Well, it turned out to be rather more obsessive than I'd intended; becoming a straight-up duplicate of the army! It's been three years, but I've now got a complete, re-imagined version of the Blood Angels army that inspired me. +

+ In a future inload I'll post up the finished army. I had hoped to get some good pict-captures over the weekend, but alas it was not to be. Anyway, for the moment it's the Land Speeder's time for a bit of attention. +

+++

+ Land Speeder +

+ The crew and speeder itself are painted with slightly different techniques, so while the palette is common between them, the resulting hue is subtly different. The idea behind this is that the Astartes' own armour is treated differently from the vehicle pool. I've tried to emphasise the nature of the vehicle as a piece of equipment by adding little warning symbols below hatches and above the intakes, as you can see above. +

+ As with the Rhino [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], I used a stippling technique to build texture on the Speeder. This gives an appearance evocative of WWII-era cast-iron tanks; which strikes me as pleasingly anachronous. The Marines, meanwhile, have a smoother, finer finish. +

+ Close study of the inspiration shows that the left-hand figure had a yellow hand symbol painted on his pad, and a striped leg. I didn't realise it at the time, but this is presuamably marking him out as a techmarine. As with Brother Mirandola [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+], I changed the Rogue Trader-era hand symbol for the modern Opus Machina skull-in-cog. +

+ This was particularly interesting (well, in a very trainspottery way) to me because I'd wondered where all the techmarines were. The old army lists required multiple techmarines – one for each vehicle – but the painted army didn't seem to include them. Having one present on the Land Speeder makes things a lot more clear; they were mostly hidden within the vehicles, piloting them. +

+ That might also answer another question – why does the pilot have yellow shoulder pads? I had assumed that this was a simple aesthetic flourish, or perhaps a precursor to the later idea that most Land Speeders were attached from the 8th (Assault) Company, the colour of which is yellow. +

+ Looking back over the army list, it may be that this figure represents the Lieutenant – another figure that's present in the army list (a Lieutenant was compulsory during the later Rogue Trader period) but missing from the army as a physical model. +

+ That's confirmed by Andy Chambers' notes in the later battle report, where he writes that 'the Lieutenant acted as gunner on board the Land Speeder, accompanied by a single techmarine.' It's funny; I must have read that report dozens of times, but it had never clicked with me that the Speeder crew was always planned and painted up to be a Lieutenant and techmarine – it wasn't just a quick way to justify not having those models painted. I should have had more faith! +

+ I included the yellow tip on the multimelta. Not only is that a pretty iconic look for the period, but it added an important point of interest to an otherwise fairly simple model. +

+ The army badge (blue circle) is present on both crew and speeder, though it's much reduced – it was massive on the original. +

+ On the other side we can see further markings – a little bit of freehand helps to add interest to big black areas. The model is Forge World's own retrohammer reimagining of the original; and I'm pleased to see that they kept some of the large blank areas of the original. It's nice to have space and opportunity to play around with texture and freehand. +

+ A word here to say thank-you to Ilmarinen, who picked this up for me when it had a limited advanced release – sorry that it took me over two years to get it built and painted! +

+ The front. The techmarine's hazard-stripe greave has been reduced to a stripe in my interpretation, and he's got a Mark IV helm – just to help the model to blend in with the army. The Lieutenant is Mark VI accurate, just like the original. I enjoyed painting the yellow; even round the studs. +

+ As a little fun flourish, I painted the large scanner/screen in front of the techmarine with a detail of the battle report in WD141; simplifying things to red spots for the enemy Eldar and white for friendly forces. I should probably have added more contrast to the hills, as they're kinda lost – but then as it's just a bit of fun, it doesn't matter too much. +

+ Techmarine and quad-launcher +

+ Talking about the techmarine above reminded me that I hadn't posted a picture of the techmarine and his charge – so here you go:

+ When texturing the large 80mm base, I left a subtle space for the techmarine to slot on, which helps the two to be clearly associated. +

+ inload: Painting the Blood Angels Librarian +

+ He that is first shall be last +

+ Well, we're settling into quite the routine, aren't we? For those of us getting a bit fatigued with Space Marine characters, I can reassure you that this is the final character from my Blood Angels force. Only the Land Speeder remains. As with many projects like this, I end up limping over the finish line, enthusiasm drained – only for it to be reignited when I can set up the whole force and play a game with them. +

+++

+ Theoretical: the inspiration +

+ Unlike the other characters, where there's either been kick-ass artwork or a classic model to build up my enthusiasm, the Librarian suffered from a lack of inspiration. It was also one of the first models I created for the army; before I decided to get more involved with the conversions. As a result, it's a relatively simple conversion based on the librarian model from WD139. +

+ I'm not a huge fan of this model, but then I'm not that enthused by any of the period Librarian models. There are some nice details, however. It's interesting to see that while the Techmarine symbol changed, the Librarian logo has remained the original horned skull. +

+ Unlike a lot of the army, I don't think this one has aged well. The halved scheme, with blue top and red bottom, looks awkward, and the whole figure has a simultaneously cluttered and oddly sparse appearance; with the purity seal and loincloth(?) looking a bit stuck on. +

+ My conversion involved using the (then-)new Primaris Librarian and reposing the arms. I converted the chest to make it a Mark VI torso, and swapped the head for something a bit decorative. The idea was for the robes to partially obscure the red legs. +

+ With red and blue both being used, I kept the robes neutral to avoid the figure becoming too busy. When considering how to paint robes, I tend to look at whether they're practical or ornamental. Here, the Librarian has both inner and outer robes. I decided to paint the outer one as a weatherworn leather, building up the colour with repeated stippling and washes. The inner robes were painted in a contrasting lighter tone, intended to frame the armour and provide a bit of visual pop. I added some ritualistic details (some Enochian letters) around the hem, and suggested a red decorative hem on the inside. +

+ The leather effect is clear here. I may have sounded a bit negative about this figure above; but this is a lot of lovely subtle details on the base sculpt, such as the decorated reinforcement where the split cape joins and the pipework joining the psychic hood to the backpack. +

+ I replaced the modern backpack with a period one. You can also see the decorative shoulder pad I added on the left here. It's from one of Forge World's Emperor's Children kits – these two highly-decorative Legions have lots of pieces that work well with each other's kits. +

+ I added a trussed bird to the banner (it's from the late-lamented Bretonnian Men-at-Arms sprue) as a suitably outré addition. I painted it up as a light-coloured pigeon, or dove. Perhaps he uses it as some sort of sacrifice, perhaps some sort of communication. Who knows? The little shield on the kit proved a great place to add the Company markings. +

+ The horned skull shoulder pad is part of the standard kit. I added his apotropaic name on the scroll, and added an Enochian sigil to the forehead of the skull. +

+ The split scheme can be seen nicely here. I'm glad I went for a robed figure. It allowed me to keep the homage to the original, while partially hiding a device I'm not the fond of! The robes also give a nice 'Obi Wan Kenobi' feel, which I like. The banner, as with the other personalities in the army, is a replication of the original. +

+ I don't think the Librarian is my finest work, but I'm still broadly pleased with how he's come out. I guess I'm just not all that enthused by wizards at the best of times. Must be my inner dawi. With all that said, he's definitely growing on me. Even the red/blue split isn't looking so obnoxious as I remember! +

+ inload: Blood Angels Chaplain +

+ Chaplain Savonarola (Amaliel 7:13)+

Blessed is the mind too small to doubt.

+ Imperial aphorism +

+++

+ Theoretical +

+ Unlike most of this project, the inspiration for this Chaplain came not from the Games Workshop Studio army of WD139, but from the Dave Gallagher artwork that graced the cover of the Warhammer 40,000 Compendium (and which inspired my Captain Tycho conversion [+noosphericinloadlink embedded+]). One of the supporting elements in this painting is a curious silver-coloured Chaplain. +

+ It's a very distinctive look that I don't think has turned up elsewhere, but works really nicely. It's particularly suitable for the Blood Angels, I think, as it complements the golden armour of their heroes and champions and contrasts with the black armour of their Death Company. +

+ Appearing as it did at the back end of Rogue Trader, the image differs from the black-armoured Chaplain of the studio army and elsewhere; but it's such a striking look that I wanted to include it. +

+ Of course, this raised the question of whether to tackle it with non-metallic  metal (NMM) techniques – as in the original artwork – or with metallic paints. The former would have worked well alongside my Captain Tycho, where I used a NMM approach; while the latter would sit better alongside the rest of the army. +

+ Unable to decide, I split the difference and decided to experiment, using metallic paints alongside non-metallic paints to create a halfway house. +

+ Practical +

+ I was not at all confident that this would work, but gave it a go anyway – that's the only way I know to improve! When approaching a model like this, I find it helps to start with some safe elements – those bits you can do easily. Here, I painted the robe. Having something like this finished or blocked out is reassuring when the experimental areas go through the (almost inevitable) stage where they're a bit crap looking. +

+ I started the silver itself with a base of Fenris Grey (one of the old Foundation paints) mixed with Payne's grey acrylic ink. This gave a nice, deep, cool underpainting. +

+ I then overlaid this with a mix of Iron Warriors acrylic paint, and both Payne's Grey and White Pearl acrylic ink. The latter is material I bust out when I need to dilute metallics. It's effectively a clear carrier of metallic flakes, which means that it doesn't alter the hue of what you're working on. This allows you to thin metallic paints without losing the metallic effect; and also lets you give non-metallic paints a sheen. +

+ The effect is pretty clear here in this shot of a later stage. I've worked up through various metallic paints including Chainmail and Stormhost silver. All had White Pearl acrylic ink added, to ensure smooth transitions. However, even the lightest tint of GW's metallics are slightly grey, so for the final touches I took a photograph of the figure under a spotlight, then used a mix of Instar paint's Arctic White and White Pearl acrylic ink to copy the reflections. This let me create the forced highlights that you can see. +

+++

+ And so to the finished figure. He was turned around in an evening; and I'm pretty pleased with the result. I'll certainly call it a successful experiment. Omricon suggested the technique might suit Stormcast, too; which is a good idea. +

+ Figures painted completely with metallics can look a bit unfinished, so I made sure to include some other textures, such as the cloak lining, purity seals and weapons. +

+ The half-seen three-skull motif on the shoulder pad and torso is visible nicely here. It was applied with dilute Payne's grey ink. +

+ This close-up demonstrates how the metal and non-metal areas interest. +

+ Polishing this figure off (ho ho) means it's just the Librarian and Land Speeder left. +