Airbrush Trick: Burn Your Melta Guns

Special Weapons should be just that; special. This is a trick to make your Meltaguns and Fusion Blaster stand out from the crowd and the rest of their bolter-armed brethren.

Step 1: Mask Your Minis.
Masking off the rest of the model is really essential if you are new to an airbrush, but if you feel confident and you have a steady hand, you can probably pull this off without it.
I decided masking was a good idea. I did so by stuffing the models, mounted to an old paint pot, into a plastic bag. I then nicked a little hole with scissors and bushed the business end of the meltagun through the hole. Then I twisted up the bag and clipped it in place. as you can see here.

Step 2: Prep your colors. I chose my colors, shown below and pulled out some mini paint pots I got from an art store. 

Instead of buying a whole new set of airbrush paints, you can mix matt medium and water to any acrylic and make the appropriate mixture so that the paint flows well through the brush. You need a special consistency - people say that it should be like milk but that never seemed to help me. It should be runny, but opaque - that is it should not run clear.

Don't get me wrong - airbrush paints are awesome. They skip this step - you can squirt them right into your airbrush...but they are not a must-have, as you can mix up your own.  

 Step 4: Load your airbrush and paint.
Here I started by spraying a small amount of vermin brown about half way up the barrel of the meltagun. Then I cleaned that out and sprayed a slightly smaller amount of black onto the end of the meltagun. No real trick to it, just use your eyes.

 Step 5: Remove the model from the bag and viola!

Here are some pics of my final product. I had some extra paint so I grabbed a nearby Battlesuit and gave it the carbon scoring as well. Since it was a large model and the gun really stuck out, there was no need to mask it. Enjoy!

Space Wolves Showcase

Space Wolves are interesting models to paint and they help develop a painter because they have a wide variety of surfaces and details, like armor plates, fur, metal bits and sigils. However, because of that they don't really lend themselves to speed painting like normal Codex Space Marine models do - there's too much detail to paint that you can't bust them out with such speed. 

These were done as a commission for a friend of mine. If you are wondering, I'm not taking commissions at present. Commission painting is not a good side project to life. When you have limited time for painting, commission paint ends up taking up all of it in order to meet deadlines. I've found that I kept putting off personal projects that I really wanted to do and I have decided that I will only take commissions if we're already good friends, if the project includes 100% artistic freedom or if the price is right.

For those of you interested in painting your own Space Wolves and want a blue tint but not blue pijama blue found on the GW studio army, I would like to introduce you to Vallejo Model Color 70906, Pale Blue. This color is mostly grey with a very slight hint of blue. It's perfect for creating a cold grey that people often like to see on Space Wolves. 

My process for the armor here was:

Airbrush entire armor areas in Vallejo Air German Grey. 

Airbrush highlights with Games Workshop Codex Grey. 

Airbrush highlights with Vallejo Model Color Pale Blue. 

Break out a bristle brush to do blacklining. Then use bristle brush to do edge highlights with Pale Blue. Done. 

Yes, yes, I know the OSL is rather unprofessionally done. It needs some work. Also there isn't a variety of helmets here. That's because this is a commission of 35 Space Wolves and I grouped them by helmet type for painting. Once they are all done, I'm going to apply squad markings and fix the OSL on all the 4 guys with plasmaguns. 

Quick Shots of Space Wolves

Yep, just some quick shots of the some Space Wolves I am working on for a friend. I'll be working on their bases some more, adding grass and painting the rocks, but for now, just have a gander!

Painting Update: Long Fangs Commission Finished

Lately my painting table has been consumed by a couple commissions from clients and friends. This is my latest completed commission, 2 units of Space Wolves Long Fangs, all armed with missile launchers (do they ever have anything else?). I painted 14 models at once and really surprised myself at the level of quality I was able to maintain across all the models. Normally when I take on large chunks like that the quality suffers but in this case, I had done models like this before and I was methodical in my approach and still managed to get some flourishes like squad markings and a colorful banner.

Since I ran out of Space Wolves bits and the client did not provide more, I dug through my bits box to find alternate pieces to complete the models so you will see a mix of Dark Angels parts, Scout bits and regular Marine Tactical squad parts.

I always try to include a few models in alternate and original poses in my work and this center Long Fang typifies that. Any Space Wolf worth his salt would be ready for close combat of course!

Here you can see the Ragnar's Army Badge, as requested by the client and squad markings. This helps differentiate the squads when unpacking your minis and during the game, when like models can often get confuses with others. 

This squad was armed with Scout missile launchers that the client provided. They aren't so bad in the end. If you're short on Space Marine missile launchers, Scout missile launchers are a cheaper and decent substitute. The only problem becomes that scout arms don't really match Space Marine heads that well so I used Scout heads for some of those models. You'll have to sculpt necks on them if you want to do this too though!

While this leader is not actually armed with a shield, I think squads need little embellishments like this to individualize them and make them stand out. 

I'm starting to really like Scout heads on marines, but preparing them is a pain. You have to stick them on a pin, sculpt on a neck - eyeballing it - then when it comes time to attach to the model, you have to trim the neck down so it fits. 

Right now, I am booked for commissions for a couple months. Ahead of me is completing the Alpha Legion vehicles, a display piece for a friend and then I'll be free for some of my own stuff. Unfortunately due to this commission and other, I probably won't be submitting anything to Crystal Brush this year...perhaps. 

Long Fangs Complete

Long Fangs are one of the most popular units out there these days. Very few Space Wolf armies will leave Fenris without them and I felt that I had to do them justice in this commission. I am pretty proud of how they came out, especially the Squad Leader. I set out to make him more technical and ended up with a right-cool Space barbarian. These days he’s the object of my man-crush. Those shades just make him so hot.

There is some freehand on this unit and I follow Ron from From the Warp’s advice on doing freehand symbols. Break the object up into manageable shapes and take your time. Great advice, Ron. It worked!

Enjoy!

Enjoy!

Desktop Shot: Long Fangs

Long Fangs are in demand these days, this is my second Long Fangs commission and I'm surprised I was able to muster up enough missile launchers for it. These guys are nearing completion. I think maybe two more nights of painting, maybe one if I move fast. Then they get boxed and sent out to the client. 

One thing I like about this group are the subtle conversions I made here and there. The Pack Leader is actually operating his auspex and his head is a scouts head. Scouts apparently have no necks and are slightly smaller than a full grown space marine's. I used greenstuff to build up the neck and by making it a little longer than usual, I managed to solve the scale problem.  

This unit has really made me want to build and paint a Space Wolf Army of my own.

In other news, I placed a mammoth order for a huge jetbike army. It'll be here soon. I really can't wait to get started on that. It will hopefully re-invigorate my passion for gaming.  

The Ethereal Council: Thoughts on the Space Wolf Codex

I stepped into my local gaming store to brave the smell of Chinese food and unwashed teenagers and pick my copy of the Space Wolf codex. It is a wonderful codex. I spent lots of time yesterday reading through the fluff and rules, dreaming of owning a Space Wolf army to one day paint and send to battle for the All-Father.

I must say there is really nothing over-the-top in this codex. Even the Jaws of the World Wolf power isn't as powerful as I once thought. First off, you can only have one Rune Priest with this power not four like many a doomsayer has claimed in the 40k blogsphere. The wording on page 81 is pretty clear that "no two characters may bear the same saga, nor may they bear the same psychic powers or wargear combination." Notice how it did not say psychic power combination; it says in plain English that no two characters may bear the same psychic powers. Period. If you disagree, I say you need a refresher course on 5th Grade English. BOLS you got that wrong.

Second, it's shooting attack and therefor you must see your target to affect it with this power. This psychic power is not going to be as common as we all may have thought. That said there some other cool psychic powers; one that is defensive and others offensive. I'm interested to see how players use the psychic powers like Murderous Hurricane and Storm Caller to create new and unforeseen stratagems.

The Space Wolf army offers some interesting options to make a variety of Army Builds including an all terminator force, a fast mechanized army with Grey Hunters in Rhinos, Thunderwolf cavalry and Bloodclaw bikers, and options enough to make an awesome armored spearhead. (A wolf pack of panzers, how cool would that be?)

I hope there are enough creative and imaginative Space Wolf players out there to realized this. The codex offers lots and lots of options and I hope players pick up on that and create something of their own, without copying the latest army list they've seen on the internet. (The one list. To rule them all and in the darkness bind them.)

The writing in the book is very well-done as we've come to expect from the recent codices. One thing that really caught my eye are the Sagas. Each Saga confers a special ability to the character bearing it and an Oath. The Oaths have no in-game effect at all but rather encourage players to play their armies in-character. For example, Saga of the Iron Wolf allows the character to add 1D3 inches to the movement of any vehicle he rides and adds a +1 to any repair rolls on it. The oath for this ability is "Take the fight to the enemy," and states that the character can prove the effectiveness of Armored Assaults by ending the game in the enemy's deployment zone. There are no bonus conferred in game, only bragging rights and personal pride. Things like this really make the Space Wolf Army come alive.

In closing, I have to tip my hat to GW for another beautiful, colorful and content-heavy codex. I recommend anyone to go out and get it or at least borrow your friends for a couple days, even if you're not a Space Wolf player as it's a great read in itself.

Of course, the heavy metal pages are enough reason to pick it up time and time again. That's all for now.

Coming soon on Tau of War, another army showcase, this time a video!