Blood Ravens 1st Company Razorback COMPLETED

Taxi! 

So, barring a few touch-ups that I'd missed until reviewing these photos, the BattleTaxi for my Sternguard is finished. Given the status of the Sternguard as a 1st Company squad, and role as ranged fire support, a Lascannon-armed Razorback seems like a natural transport option for them, and as a first company vehicle I took the opportunity to "bling" it out a bit with extra scrollwork and badges, to reflect the status of the troops that it carries. I've also got a completed Rhino Chassis already (my Predator) so there was less time fretting over which colours worked in which combinations.

Anyway, more pictures under the cut.

Blood Ravens Librarian - COMPLETED

Well I was supposed to be finishing off the Sterguard Taxi this weekend, given that I had a free couple of hours. But....I got distracted. By this guy:

Yep, It's a Librarian in Terminator Armour. This has got to be one of the classic Games Workshop sculpts, and by a reasonable margin the most fiddly figure I've ever worked on. I mean, he's got fiddly bits on his fiddly bits, and every time I looked around thinking "hey, he's about done!" I found another bloody scroll, skull, purity seal or something that still wasn't done. I'm sure just putting these pictures up I'll spot something I've missed.

Anyway, despite this he was amazing fun to work and totally absorbing to the exclusion of all else.

He's painted up to be an HQ fig for my Blood Ravens, so the shoulders are bone and I've given him a red kneecap for the Chapter Badge. I've also tried to "grey" down the blue a little to make him more in line with blue-grey look of Jonah Orion's armour in the Dawn of War series, and less like an on-loan Ultramarine. He's still definitely blue, just a little less Smurf-ey.

More pictures after the cut.

WIP: We're Painting the Ravens Red

So, I've started work on the "taxi" for my Sternguard, and I though I'd do some shots showing how I'm currently building up the main armour colours. I like this technique as I'm not a big fan of the overly "chipped" look to weather vehicles (or rather, I think it's not always appropriate for Marine vehicles, which are old, but generally revered and well looked after) and this gives a worn and faded look to the paint work. Anyway, here goes.

Loots!

So, in the post-xmas shopping rush I may have got a tad...obsessive.

Now that's the sort of expansion for my Blood Ravens force I was looking for.

So far the only use for the above as been to raid the sprues for "bling" for my Sternguard's Razorback. I figure whilst i'm not a fan of covering Marines in a lot of tat, 1st Company vehicles (and troops) should be the exception. Its hard to tell from the picture because at the moment it's a blob of black, but I had fun tarting it up and hopefully it'll look like a fit for the Sternguard when it's finished.

And the tank i got for xmas. I've some notes on a "fluff" background for my IG unit now, which I am confident I can bore my readers with at a later date!

More Different to Start the Year...

So, I thought I'd start the year by finishing off the Sorylian cruisers I've had lying around whilst I was painting up the Sternguard. I also thought I'd try and "get clever" with the pictures, using a stronger source to give the effect of...well, a stronger space-bound source like a star. It's not a total pictorial triumph but as my bloody camera got stolen a couple of days ago these are the only pictures I'd uploaded.

Painting Table Update: Plans Afoot!

So, this time last year I was still dabbling with by Assault on Black Reach chaps and I feel I've moved on a lot, painting wise, in the last year. I've settled on a couple of core armies and themes, my standards have improved, and I've even got a little bit adventurous here and there. I've also read a colossal amount of helpful guides on the internet and even set this blog up to both seek help and to offer what little advice I can back out again.

So, with the end of the year upon us, whats is next?

Well currently I'm finishing up on the pair of Sorylian Cruisers (for Firestorm Armada) that I got a while back, and they're nearly done. Hopefully I'll get some time this weekend.

After that my Sternguard's Taxi - a Razorback - is assembled but needs starting on next. I also got a Leman Russ for xmas (yay!) so I need to decide on what I'm building it as, build it, and then paint that up in a variant of the Urban Camo I've used for my existing Guardsmen.

After that I'm a bit more divided. I've got some cash to spend (from selling some old Lego sets on Ebay) and my original plan was to spend it on some more Tau. But consistent rumours seem to place new (and probably better) Tau boxes out in the middle of the year, and I'd be inclined to wait for them. And I'm also still very taken with painting Blood Ravens, with a vague, yet growing ambition to paint up a force representative of all units that appear in Dawn of War.

So at the very least I'm going to pick up a Librarian and possibly some Terminators to escort him around. After that, I guess we'll see.

Blood Raven Sternguard - COMPLETED

So the rest of my Sternguard are complete, and the full squad is assembled. To mark the occasion I've build myself an improvised lightbox and taken some pictures using that - they're not all perfect and there is the odd focus problem i didn't have before, but the general presentation is a lot better! So, here they are:

More individual pictures after the jump.