What I've been doing recently, a painting and modelling log...

[Raven Morpheus]

Haven't sat at the "hobby space" since July, for reasons...

...I've been wanting to do a specific kitbash/conversion for a while now though...


This piece of art, by Geoff Taylor, was used back in the day as the box art for 2nd edition Epic's Chaos expansion, called Renegades, and also the cover of White Dwarf #144 -

Here's my interpretation using a box of the current Khorne berserkers and a few extra bits, apologies for the blur on these photos, couldn't get a clear set to save my life today! -

No left handed plasma pistols or right handed chain-axes exist in GW's world so I had to chop and swap...

The black base is temporary, it's 50mm at the bottom according to my ruler, but the two skulls are 25mm each so I'm thinking a 60mm or 70mm base will be best...



Still a bit of work to do. The skulls need rounding on their tops (the white tac roughly shows the feet positions), I may have to reposition the legs at the knees a little, particularly the left, but currently the glue is still setting (GW plastic doesn't seem to work well with Tamiya glue!?), the back of the knees needs filling and the backpack is temporarily white tac'd on (it'll be glued on once painting is done).


The chain-axe arm pose isn't ideal, and the left is also wrongly posed (shoulder is wrong, should be like the right one)...

His torso could also do with a twist to the left, something I didn't pick up on, despite having the artwork right in front of me, but I can't change it now without severe cutting! Doh!

...I may revisit both those arms, particularly the left arm.


Not bad for a first quick bash together though, despite those few problems.


He looks like he's falling backwards, but I imagine he does in Geoff Taylor's art if you could see him side on, hopefully when the glue has all set, and once I've green stuffed the top of the skulls that effect will be less pronounced.


Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Hobo86]

there are left-handed plasma pistol, check on bits sites
bits&kits, megabitshop, bitzarium, bitsbay, ...
(this also helps to find better posed arms, legs, ...)

maybe reworked terminator shoulder pads could help for the vintage look?
the illustration has bigger shoulder pads and lower legs

tamiya: it works... but tamiya sprue goo 'glues' better

pose: the legs do a lot of work,
either 'pushed off' against the skulls to er... get the squat right
or move the skulls around to get knee position right?
the left shoulder is also a bit lower

i er... occasionally also try out poses in front of a mirror to understand the pose better and drawing stick figures with the main joints (3D sketch)
also helps

 

[cainex1]

Got that gangsta lean!
Looking quite good so far.

 

[Trafalgar Law]

No left handed plasma pistols or right handed chain-axes exist in GW's world so I had to chop and swap...

I remember the days when GW weapons and arms came separately with fondness.

Can't say I've ever had a problem with Tamiya glue and GW plastic though.

Looks great though but I think I'd change the pose to make the lean less pronounced.

 

[Ben_S]

Looking at the art work, the pose and/or proportions are pretty weird.

I think you've done a good job of recreating it. If anything could be improved, maybe the axe position - but I don't think you need to try matching the original pose exactly.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

So, been a while. I seem to keep having extended "purple patches"...

Anyhow, yesterday I sat at the table for about 45 minutes and fettled with the Khorne renegade kitbash/conversion that I started back in November last year...

I added some greenstuff to the skulls to round the flat tops, some Citadel Astrogranite on the base (which is now 70mm) and fettled with the position of the figure's arms (and rebuilt, using other parts, his pistol arm) and added greenstuff to the back of the knee joints to tidy them up (you're not really meant to view this from behind (or the side) anyway)...

Today, having allowed the greenstuff/Astrogranite to set, I pinned the figure to the skulls, he's not glued in place though.

The zap-a-gap CA glue I used on the resin skulls caused the left one to grab instantly, so I left it where it stuck, hence the off-centre position of the skulls.


Photos -

He's not quite standing "planted" on the skulls so I need to adjust that.

I may end up re-drilling the pin holes slightly further forwards, and add greenstuff (to hide the pins), so that he stands slightly further forwards.


Hindsight is a wonderful thing, because I think now that I should have pinned his legs at the joints as they've broken twice already. His pistol hand fell off today...

I still need to drill the pistol barrel.

I never seem to think of these things at the table ("brain fog"?!)...


I've considered swapping the shoulder pads for terminator pads as suggested, but the only ones I could find that I feel are suitable (i.e. not just plain/blank GW) were from Pop Goes The Monkey, and shipping to the UK from them is prohibitively expensive! I'm also not pulling his arms off and rebuilding them again (he's too fragile!).



So far so good though, he's posed better now at least. A little more fettling and he'll be ready for paint...

The basic plan for starting to paint this, when I get around to it, is to airbrush undercoat black followed by gold (using Vince Venturella's Vallejo gold recipe), then hairy stick paint the red and other colours...



Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Stoof]

It looks better now he's not leaning so far backwards, perhaps he could come forwards just a touch more. However the centre of gravity in the artwork is a bit off anyway, so it's true to the source!

I'm looking forward to seeing some paint. Will you be greebling up the base? The open area in front is crying out for a felled foe.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

It looks better now he's not leaning so far backwards, perhaps he could come forwards just a touch more. However the centre of gravity in the artwork is a bit off anyway, so it's true to the source!

I'm looking forward to seeing some paint. Will you be greebling up the base? The open area in front is crying out for a felled foe.

Yes, in the artwork you could imagine him doing a rolling ball clown act, and his boots must be very flexible as they match the curvature of the stones!

I have some smaller skulls...

Don't want to go ott though, because the artwork doesn't show anything discernible in front of the big stones, and I don't want the base taking focus off the figure/big skulls.

A 60mm base might have worked better, it's not like I bought 10 of them!

 

[Raven Morpheus]

So, been a while ...

The Khorne renegade kitbash has been put on hold for the moment. I've been procrasternarating over putting paint on him (and the base) and I'm sick of the small looking shoulder pads, they just somehow don't look right even though they're "correct" for a Khorne berserker! So when funds become available, despite saying I wouldn't, I'm going to buy some chaos terminator pads and see if they look better...


Anyhow, 4 years ago I bought some Battle Systems terrain - fantasy village ruins, and the wizards tower. I built the ruins back then, but I hadn't bothered with the wizards tower, until tonight...

It's quite big.

It's footprint is about 7 inches by 5 inches, and it's about 14 inches tall. You can see my Skyrim 32mm Dovakhin figure looks small!


Took about an hour to put together, I didn't bother with the interior gubbins that aren't structural. I seem to have missed a step in the staircase, could have sworn I put them all on!

I'm not overly happy with the fit in places, even after squeezing everything in as much as possible. There just seem to be too many gaps and parts such as the buttresses don't sit level (not sure why, I watched the instruction video multiple times and whilst assembling this).




I feel it needs a craggy island or fraggle rock base...


Reasonably happy with this, it looks better than I could make a Pringles tube look, I don't have a 3d printer, I can't really make XPS "blue foam" etc. look as good, and 3d printed equivalents for sale on ebay, etsy etc. seem to be more expensive, so the cost of this (given that it's only 1.5mm thick cardstock) and time to assemble was worth it.


I'm seriously tempted to buy Battle Systems Citadel, scan wall parts, print some spare wall parts, and "ruinate" said spare wall parts for a modular-ish ruined city wall (for Mordheim)...


Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Wasteland]

So, been a while ...

The Khorne renegade kitbash has been put on hold for the moment. I've been procrasternarating over putting paint on him (and the base) and I'm sick of the small looking shoulder pads, they just somehow don't look right even though they're "correct" for a Khorne berserker! So when funds become available, despite saying I wouldn't, I'm going to buy some chaos terminator pads and see if they look better...


Anyhow, 4 years ago I bought some Battle Systems terrain - fantasy village ruins, and the wizards tower. I built the ruins back then, but I hadn't bothered with the wizards tower, until tonight...

View attachment 217006


It's quite big.

It's footprint is about 7 inches by 5 inches, and it's about 14 inches tall. You can see my Skyrim 32mm Dovakhin figure looks small!


Took about an hour to put together, I didn't bother with the interior gubbins that aren't structural. I seem to have missed a step in the staircase, could have sworn I put them all on!

I'm not overly happy with the fit in places, even after squeezing everything in as much as possible. There just seem to be too many gaps and parts such as the buttresses don't sit level (not sure why, I watched the instruction video multiple times and whilst assembling this).




I feel it needs a craggy island or fraggle rock base...


Reasonably happy with this, it looks better than I could make a Pringles tube look, I don't have a 3d printer, I can't really make XPS "blue foam" etc. look as good, and 3d printed equivalents for sale on ebay, etsy etc. seem to be more expensive, so the cost of this (given that it's only 1.5mm thick cardstock) and time to assemble was worth it.


I'm seriously tempted to buy Battle Systems Citadel, scan wall parts, print some spare wall parts, and "ruinate" said spare wall parts for a modular-ish ruined city wall (for Mordheim)...


Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

Battle Systems stuff is great. A few months ago I bought the Wasteland supplement. Great value.

 

[cainex1]

For what it is, it's pretty nice. Once upon a time these kind of things were pretty lame.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

Been a while...

OMGG it's hot in "my part" of the UK!

Despite the weather, I've been having an urge to sit at the table and try to push on with the Khorne renegade that I started in November 2025...


...I've been putting it off but this AM I acted on the urge and sat at the table for a couple of hours, for a change...


I started with the base for the Khorne renegade, I felt 70mm was too big, so I downsized to 60mm. I also wasn't happy with the "astrogranite" so as I am using a new base I put down some GW crackle paint (Agrellan Earth), it's drying in this photo, it's cracking nicely, but I think I need a bit of Agrellan badland on there for some larger chunks -

The base texture will be painted differently to the skulls, but I bought some paints for the colour I want the skulls to be -

I pulled the Khorne renegade's arms off, removed the shoulder pads and replaced them with the Pop Goes The Monkey chaos terminator pads I bought recently, they are currently black-tac'd in place. Much better looking! Probably not noticeable but I re-angled the axe hand at the wrist -

I recently bought Highland Miniatures version of Balthasar Gelt in 28mm, I then bought it again in 32mm, mainly because I didn't like the scaling of the pegasus, I wasn't happy with either scale...

Then I saw an OG GW Balthasar Gelt on ebay so I snapped it up... Turns out the pegasus is about the same size...

Many years ago (2021ish) I bought 7 Empire knights and parts. A box of them before they were fimired numbered 8, and whilst I have 2 spare horses, sundry heads, shields and a spare lance I didn't have any spare bodies/legs to make the 8th knight. So I recently bought the parts I needed and put it all together today -

I've been wanting to obtain a Wolf Priest of Ulric for Mordheim/my burgeoning Empire army, but haven't found any figures I like, so I decided to do a kitbash -

I wasn't sure all parts would fit nicely but they all went together as though it's an original GW figure.

Just in case anyone is wondering, the Wolf Priest of Ulric is made up of -

Head - Space Wolves "first born" upgrade sprue head.
Arms/Weapon - Empire flagellants double handed flail/Empire militia halberd.
Body - lower is an Empire flagellants body chopped just above the convenient chain belt. Upper is an Empire state trooper upper body.
Feet - Empire knight feet chopped just above the ankle.
The base he's on may (probably) end up a 25mm one.

I'm waiting on a part for a cape and his right shoulder needs a little filler...



At some point I might stop fettling with the Khorne renegade and put paint on it...


Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[cainex1]

Helmet seems a little too technical. I would either clean out the ribs or shave them entirely, also shave the tubes on the bottom and it should be a perfectly fine helmet of the era.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

@cainex1 I get what you mean, but I only have the one helmet and they seem to be a bit thin on the ground, so I'd rather not modify it in case I make a mess of it. When it's painted it'll look less techy, hopefully, I'll be painting it "steel". If not, just imagine it's a Dwarven built helmet...

 

[Raven Morpheus]

So, I finally made progress on the Khorne renegade, more on that below...

I sat at the table this afternoon and started with the Wolf priest of Ulric -

I put Stirland mud on a 25mm base (no photo of that)
His feet kept breaking off the body so I sanded them for a better contact patch and reattached them to the body, it's altered his stance a little but hopefully it's fixed the problem.
I also re-glued his right shoulder to mitigate the gap it had, there's still a bit of a gap but hopefully I can just treat it as a fold in the cloth as it's too small to bother with further filling.

I had already attached the cloak the other week, I may have to prise it off before painting for ease of access...

The Khorne renegade -

Last time I put down a layer of Agrellan Earth on the base, it dried and cracked into too small bits, so the other week I put some Agrellan Badland down over the top-

Today I painted the base, just need to go round the rim with black -

Base coats -

Washes -

Layer and drybrush -

Paints used -

The base texture -

The skulls -

The figure itself got a coat of Vallejo airbrush black and I attached him to a 30mm base to make handling easier, didn't make getting an in-focus photo any easier though -

Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

This is more a "wot I bought" post today, I was going to sit and paint some of the Khorne renegade but at the time of this post it's too humid for me...

Apologies for the blur on some/all my photos below, I seem to be struggling recently with photography...



I had an accident last night...

My metal Bloodthirster, that I've had since the mid-late 00s and finally painted in early 2020 (see page 1), took a dive from the window sill he was sitting on! Remember kids, net curtains can be lethal!

He had survived a 32 mile round trip on public transport to my gaming buddy's apartment and back a few years ago with only the whip falling off (it's such a small join you expect it to break).

Pretty much every joint broke. So I glued him back together and put him in a "new to me" box for hopefully safe storage. He's got some chips in his paint now (not visible in the photos below), but at this time life’s too short to tidy them up -

I've been wanting to expand my Battlefleet Gothic Imperial navy and Chaos fleets, using 3d printed models, however it's been a case of the 3d prints I wanted not being on evilbay when I've had spare funds, or the other way around.

However at the moment they seem to be available and I have spare funds, so I grabbed what I wanted while I can to somewhat complete both fleets.


"Emperor" class battleship -

"Cobra" destroyers, I'm not too keen on the stem attachment point -

"Dauntless" light cruisers -

Continued in next post due to image limit.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

The Chaos fleet expansion...

"Despoiler" class battleship (the bag is "spiky bits" I think) -

"Iconoclast" escorts (x2 sets, other 5 in bag in background) -

I have no idea how the two battleships go together beyond the main superstructures so I guess I'll have to look at the sellers reference images or ask if they have any instructions/parts diagrams. Mostly it's small parts locations I need help with...

They all look great. Just waiting on some flying stands by GW via Wayland games...



Towards the end of last year I decided to buy a copy of Heroquest...


Having bought a 1989 UK edition from ebay (a bargain at £42!), I started doing some research as I had found out Hasbro had done a rework of the game (the board now has larger squares and is split/folds in 4, for example). It turned out that the 1989 UK version differs slightly from the later 1990 US version (mostly the rules/quests/some expansions, the board/tokens/miniatures are the same) and Hasbro's version is based on the 1990 US version (almost verbatim).

As everyone online seems to play the 1990 US version, or Hasbro's version, I decided to buy the US version also, but using Hasbro's new (less expensive) sets...

I don't like Hasbro's new figures so I bought the rules/quest books, the cards, dice and board from Hasbro's version along with Hasbro's Kellars Keep/Return of the Witch Lord expansions and enough OG miniatures to swap out Hasbro's.

The Hasbro board came to me in a box for a D&D game by Parker (also part of Hasbro) that (looking at the back) looks suspiciously like Heroquest...


So, I now have both the UK/US versions of the rules/quests, all the OG and updated cards/tokens/dice and the larger more comfortable squares (25mm not 20mm) of the new Hasbro board, along with a ton of figures...


OG 1989 UK version including miniatures from OG Kellars Keep/Return of the Witch Lord expansions -

My Hasbro version stuff -

Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

Seconds out , round 2, paint!

So, it cooled off/became a bit less humid and I sat back at the table again just after midnight and pushed on with the Khorne renegade...

I blocked the gold in. I used Vince Ventruella's gold recipe (3 Vallejo metal color gold to 2 Vallejo metal color copper + 1/128 of a teaspoon of Green Stuff World antique gold pigment), but I doubled the amount as my measuring spoons only go to 1/64 of a teaspoon and while he uses antique gold pigment I bought the wrong one, just plain gold...

I then blocked in the Mephiston red -

Then I washed the whole lot with Two Thin Coats Battle Mud wash, that's drying in this photo -

Took me nearly 2 hours because I kept having to tidy the gold where I got red on it, then tidy the red, then tidy the gold...


Getting there though, finally. Some base colours and washes still to do before I go back in with highlights but at least after nearly a year I've got paint on him...


Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Raven Morpheus]

He's finished!


I think I nailed it, kind of -

Close-ups below, the original photos I posted (and the one above) look out of focus to me, blurry in places, so I took some more, they seem to be less blurry/out of focus. Original photos are attached at bottom of post.

The plan (10 months-ish ago) was to use a box of Khorne berserkers plus a couple of other recent Chaos marine bits to make something approaching Geoff Taylor's awesome artwork.

I've had a few "painting failures" over the last couple of years, I've been trying to adapt to having to use reading glasses, along with other health issues plaguing my "hobbying", but I love that artwork and I wanted to prove I can still kitbash something and do a half-decent job painting it!

I think I've achieved that and this turned out better than expected.



If I were to do this again I'd want to try to achieve a more textured look to the stone skulls, like the artwork. I'd also like to have used a Rogue Trader era backpack as they look dead on to the artwork, but they're £10+ on evilbay and don't look very well moulded. Plus, GWs scale creep might be a problem using parts that old...

I'd put the twist in mid torso that I missed, try for a more outstretched right arm, pointing with the chain-axe as per the artwork. And I'd also use pins to try to make a sort of armature for the legs/hips, they're a mess round the back and it's all green stuff and CA glue, luckily he's not really meant to be viewed from behind...



In case anyone is wondering, parts list -

Upper torso, backpack, arms, and weapons are all from the current Khorne berserker box. Although the arms are chops of a few and weapons got swapped between left/right.
The legs, lower and thighs are also from the current Khorne berserker box, chopped from a couple of pairs and filled with green stuff at the knees.
The lower torso, is made from the "cod-piece" from a standard Chaos marine and the back armour plates from a pair of Khorne berserker legs, plus a load of green stuff. There's no Khorne berserker without something covering that area at the front!
The head is from a recent standard Chaos marine.
The shoulder pads are Pop-goes-the-monkey 4th edition Chaos terminator pads.
The giant skulls I found on ebay.



Thanks as always for looking, C&C welcome.

 

[Fold]

I’ve got a soft spot for codex/box cover kitbashes. I think you’ve done a great job - it’s certainly immediately recognisable even without the cover behind it.

For me, I think the key improvement would be to get the model a bit more planted in place - he looks a little daintily perched on the skulls and from some views a bit unbalanced.