I've had a squad of airbrush coated assault marines sitting in a box almost since last Christmas. These guys have been given a big nudge along by taking part in the Bolter & Chainsword vow for 2017. The little bit of external (self-induced) pressure has been good to focus on getting them done...
It has been a little while since posting - lots of travel for work and the limited hobby time has been spent cleaning up and assembling all the Chaos troops from the Dark Imperium box (even if single piece poxwalkers are soooo much quicker than my regular ~11 piece blood angels). Put those ~40 odd death guard minis aside and focus on red paint again.
Shading, armour joints and the jump pack straps done. For the astute watcher of space marine parts, there is a mixture of assault marine and vanguard veteran pieces in here, along with a couple of Blood Angel tactical/upgrade shoulders.
Recess washing the helmets (seraphim sepia) adds a surprising amount of depth quickly. If in a hurry (eg, imperial guard armies) you would be quite happy with that effect on a mass group without much more effort.
On the other hand... it's also less forgiving than the agrax earthshade is on red armour - slight moment of carelessness with the squad corporal and the washes ran together on his forehead. You probably wouldn't notice that on red, but it's pretty clear on yellow.
Bit more care on the rest of them :-)
I didn't take very many pics of the red armour progress (very similar to prior tactical squads). Can see from a couple of shots though how much easier it was to get paint access by leaving (some) weapons unattached, as well as not gluing the legs to the base yet (they are sitting on paperclip pins I usually do).
First 5 with highlights done, including on the jump packs. I've kept to using panzer aces new wood with *very* small final edge highlights on the red. It's probably a little too subtle for tabletop gaming, but up close or under light it gives a bit of sharp definition to panels.
Adding extra details on top - black knees for squad markings and then onto purity seals, etc.
The squad 'corporal' (keeping with tradition of having a subtly different marine on 2nd combat squad), in this case with higher base (from the assault kit) and more detailed vanguard pieces like gold pistol and legs.
And the squad sergeant (minus one arm which was still just black at this stage). The legs are from the death company set, and the extra height bits from the assault kit. The back of the base also has a magnet built in that can be used to stick a meltabomb to the mini. Not sure which units will be able to carry them when the new codex comes out, but you never know - maybe I can make some removable 'veteran' markers or some other bling.
Switching back to final details on the helmets. It's the first time I have ever used beakie helmets as they seemed fitting for streamlining guys flying through the air. They will get matched with the older armour marines (studded shoulders) on assembly.
They actually look a little creepy when all looking up at you like that... I had a go at adding two white dots to the mouth of the sergeant as vampire teeth. It's not brilliant but at a distance you could almost get the vampire vibe.
The 'standard' packs I still have to work on but the jump packs were done while working through the red armour. Final touch for those will be a heavy drybrush with black around the exhaust ports.
Weapons superglued into place and heads ready to go.
Plus the 10x jumps finished up (magnetised rather than glued).
Next stage will be gloss varnish and decals for shoulders/squad markings, followed by finishing the regular backpacks. The Bolter & Chainsword commitment was to finish everything including the spare packs by end of November - which is well within reach as long as I don't get distracted by other things...
Which has happened. I have ~16 Death Company marines being assembled along with a chaplain and Lemartes. All of which will have standard plus jump packs magnetised for switching. Hoping to get these fully assembled and airbrushed by early December so I can spend some time over Christmas diving into their details.
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