Elysian 205th lands on Facebook

Well I've decided to take the plunge and make my small updates a bit easier to do by creating myself a facebook page. I'll us this for posting pics when playing games, updates during the painting process and anything else that takes my fancy hobby related. I'll use the blog as more of a showcase type tool. I'll look to possible create some nice features that I can add, such as youtube vids etc - but I'll see how we go to begin with.

Find us on Facebook

Also I was pointed in the direction of this awesomeness by Tim over at The Vanus Temple

Logan Wing Painting Update

So I have actually pulled my finger out and done some painting. On with the pics.

Mostly done, just need do decal on shoulder pad, crux terminatus and metals. I will varnish and do the metals after I've the dullcoate applied feel it needs a little more contrast.

 Well, that's what I'm telling myself anyway. 

Next update in 6 months ;)

Krom

Space Wolf Terminator Completed (almost)

I can hardly believe it, I've completed this space wolf terminator... almost. I have some minor additions to add to him, such as his base and some weathering powders around is feet - possibly higher up, depending how I'm feeling. I personally feel quite exhausted after painting him - though that could have been the recent spate of flu that has swept my family and the reason this guy wasn't done sooner.

Joined a Tale of Gamers

So I've just joined a Tale of Gamers type thing. It's a group of gamers from Hulls Angels... Based in and around Hull UK.

The aim is to finish this year with a fully painted 1500pts force. Painting 250ptd every 2 months. This is just the approach I'm looking for no pressure to spend hours painting in the garage every night to achieve a monthly goal. It goes hand in hand with real life first.

So the link where this will all be happening and where you can catch up with the other gamers taking part in the Tale of Gamers.

WIP: Sculpting a cloak

So anyone that has been reading my posts will have seen in my previous post Link here that I had attempted to sculpt a cloak covered in fur. However, discussions in the comments echoed my own thoughts and I removed the cloak... I left it at that point for the Christmas period whilst I pondered what and how I could tackle the cloak.

The best tutorial I found on the article was from Ron at From the Warp. Link to article

I also added some studs to the model as well to try and make him a little more unique. Here's the tutorial on Drowned in Plastic I followed. Link to article

Logan wing gains some firepower

So the construction continues. Not getting out to the garage too much... but I can't complain as it's a result of my daughter at the weekend as she's now started walking and some great TV series mid week on Netflix and other places.

Loganwing progress

Ok ok... So I was starting to paint and I spent around 4hrs on the one guy to date and all was going well, however the toe being dipped in got slightly more drenched and I've jumped straight in (as much as family time allows).

So rather than paint I've been working on the rest of the models and getting those right ready for painting.

I've been detailing with some brass etch and some fur details I've sculpted myself and some of it using a fur mold I got from Germany. So onto some pics for this update.
More after the jump.

Dipping my toes back in

Wow... 9 months on and I'm just starting to dip my toes back in with the hobby. Still not sure if it'll hold  or if it's going to be a flash in the pan.

I won't bore you with everything I've been up to rather just show you a wip pic of one of the wolf wing I started painting.

Total 4hrs painting so far. I'm quite pleased with him so far, but I think the sculpt is helping the painting along.

C&C welcome as usual

Krom

Time to Talk Turkey - Army list!

So I've posted pics of Logan's new wolf wing, no it's time we sat round the table, grab a goblet of ale and talk turkey... What is this berk on about I here you all ask. The army list of course. First things first the image is from The emperor watches and used without permission. I'm such a bad lad!

Anyway enough of this rubbish here's the army list and those that know me and have played against my old wolf wing will know this is a different route for me:

HQ Units

Logan Grimnar - 275pts
All his usual jazz

Rune Priest - 150pts
TDA, Storm Bolter, Runic Weapon, Chooser of the Slain, wolf Tooth Necklace and saga of the beast slayer
Powers: Jaws of the World Wolf, Living Lightning



Elites

Dreadnought - 165pts
Multi melta, close combat weapon, heavy flamer, extra armour, drop pod

Dreadnought - 165pts
Multi melta, close combat weapon, heavy flamer, extra armour, drop pod

Troops

Wolf Guard Squad 1
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Thunder Hammer, Storm Shield - 63pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Bolter, Power Weapon - 33 pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Combi-Melta, Power Fist 48pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Bolter, Power Fist - 43pts
Drop pod 35pts
Total 222pts

Wolf guard squad 2
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Cyclone Missile Launcher, Storm Bolter, Power Fist - 73pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Bolter, Power Weapon - 33pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Bolter, Chain Fist - 48pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Shield, Power Weapon - 48pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Combi-Melta, Power Weapon - 38pts
Drop pod - 33pts
Total 275pts

Wolf guard squad 3
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Assault Cannon, Power Fist - 73pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Bolter, Power Weapon - 33pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Combi-Melta, Chain Fist - 53pts
1 Wolf Guard Terminator, Storm Shield, Power Weapon - 48pts
Drop pod - 35pts
Total 242pts

The aim is for Logan to join wolf guard squad 1 and the rune priest wolf guard squad 3 (hence only 4 in each squad).

I think the force is fairly strong for a Logan list which is inherently weak due to small numbers. I have a mix of anti tank and some anti infantry with the massed storm bolters.

Using the drop pod assault rules, I'd deploy Logan and the two dreads first on the first turn and try to land near enough to something that I might just be able to pop something nasty with the multi melts.

It's not a particularly competitive list, but I hope it fairs a little better than my last double land raider wolf wing list.

On Hiatus - The 205th hit the battlefield in 2012

As you will have noticed I have been absent without leave from the 205th... Generally from gaming as a whole. It's been great, I've had more time for me, saved money and had time to play some console games. The mojo is starting to return - but will be halted this Friday by the oncoming Battlefield 3 on PS3...

But you guys don't want to hear about that, you want to find out when I'm going to get moving with the Elysians!

My plan is to give myself until Christmas for playing BF3 as much as possible, then in the new year to get back on the wagon. Starting with finishing my Valkyries so they are all up to a finalised standard.

Once the Valks are done I'll be aiming to paint up my second Tauros Venator and the 2 / 3 Tauros I have. Whilst browsing the usual pages (forge world) I took a fancy to the camp pattern they have on the Tauros.

Seeing as these guys are the fast moving scouts, the camp scheme makes perfect sense. The next big challenge is to decide if I build them with the heavy flamer or the grenade launcher... decisions decisions.

In between all of that I have some more drop troopers to get painted and the original guys to get finished off... And my Protectorate of Menoth force to paint.

So until next year... unless I get the urge to slip into the garage in the meantime ;)

Krom

Gaming weekend

So I have a gaming weekend coming up... or at least a gaming day drinking night and possible gaming morning...

I have my freshly painted realm of battle board... pics to come, my menoth army for warmachine ready (starter set) and my Elysian army 1500pts per my previous post I'm having to proxy to of the tauros venators with tauros... but I know the guys won't mind :D



I also picked up this week a new pack of elysian troopers and the elysian hq command set. Interestingly I think they made a boob with so e of the content, as I received two copies of a few of the sprues. This may be intentional... but I'm unsure, maybe someone else has had the same with this pack?

Hopefully by the end of the weekend, ill have managed to have tested my army and find any weaknesses that might be there.. such as the loss of the vulture!

In addition I have seen I missed some comments made on some previous posts that had been marked for moderation for some reason. so if I have not replied, I'm sorry and if there was a specific question, I will come round and answer them all in a single post for ease! :)

1500pts Elysians IA8

So I've not done an army list on here before, but I though I'd post this up and source some critique on it before I go too far with buying more elysians.

Tauros Venator Diorama

Well I finished the diorama on Saturday and went and entered it at the local GW store. I wasn't completely happy as I painted the guys on Friday night / Saturday, but hey I did all this in to weeks.

the pictures aren't perfect and when I receive the model back I'll take some better ones. I took a couple before these where the lighting was even worse, but I loved the way it add quite a bit of drama with the shadows.

So I'm generally pleased with it all however, I felt I rushed the two troopers and I think it shows... I also think that effected the results of the competition as well as I came second out of three of us.  And this is the winner. It is excellenty executed however something about it rings of something I've seen before by Keith Robertson (Heavy Metal painter) though I can't find pictures. None the less it was very well produced and a worthy winner.

Oh well better luck next time... and must try harder!

Elysian Diorama to date

So rather than post too much waffle... I did that earlier today I'll just post some pics of the diorama to date.

These are WiP, such as the image #4 has a wheel raised off the floor :( This will always be difficult as I'm aiming to be able to use this model for gaming as well.

Thanks for looking and if you have any questions, please fire away!

Day whatever in the diorama building house

Soooo, this regular posting I was going to do whilst doing this diorama seems to have gone out the window!

I have been working on it pretty much every single evening and trying some new techniques... I even bought myself another airbrush for the heady cost of... £20. It's become my new staple airbrush now. Its a simple dual action gravity feed airbrush, no adjustments can be made to it, so it's free of all the usual baggage and weight. I simply control air pressure with my air valve (connects the airbrush onto the hose) and amount of paint by how far I pull my finger back.

It looks a little like this, but with a smaller capacity paint chamber (about 2cc I believe) and a red housing at the back.

So onto my diorama stuff. In the image attached the tauros venator is almost complete, I need to just add pigments and oil effects.

I'm quite pleased with where I'm at, I tried applying rust staining with acrylics. This worked much better than expected, normally I would use enamel and oil paints for this as they can be feathered and adjusted with thinners easily. With the acrylics I added a whole bunch of drying retarder to the paint, this enabled me to do similar as I would previously, but create the feathering and effects with just water! Always a bonus.

I also applied a heat damage style effect to the lascannon muzzle. I tried this before with my valkyries, but it failed. I could never work out why... until last night when it all worked, due to the lascannon muzzles being matt this time and gloss previously.

To explain a little further, the technique is achieved by airbrushing layers of inks (red, purple, blue and black - in that order) to achieve a banded spectrum look about it... similar to how a stainless steel exhaust looks on a motorbike. The reason it failed before was I tried applying the ink onto a gloss surface and it immediately beaded away from the surface. This time as the surface was matt, it stayed in control and where i placed it.

So onto to tonight when I'm going to stay priming the models that are going on the base, I should also have mentioned I've changed the theme from roadside checkpoint to roadside IED.

Thanks and feel free to ask away :D

Day Three in the diorama building house

So I got back into the garage last night to continue working on the diorama. I didn't get too much done as I spent a good 30 mins cleaning and reassembling my airbrush after a really big deep clean.

Once that was done I lay done a dust layer to the tarmac section and more of a colouring layer to the earth. Utilising lighter shades to add dusting to the sand. I then made a different earth works mix, made out of plaster, gulf war sand, beach sand, light dust, a smidgen of europe dust, a splosh of some VMA sand shades, a splash of VMA white and lashings of vallejo matt varnish. I made this into a real putty like mix and smeared and tapped it all over my sand area.

Once this was one, I threw done a few different shades with the airbrush in the troughs that have ben created by wheels. Just to add a little more shape and texture to the base.

Obviously once that was done I got far too excited with myself and mocked up the venator onto the base.

And here's a few close ups of the decals on the venator.

This is quite an exciting project for me and I hope your enjoying following along. Any questions regarding the techniques etc, I'm more than happy to help.

Laters Krom

Day two of building my first diorama

Wowser... so soon I here you say???? Well the posting boob was all my fault and I apologise for that.

So onto the ultra cool and exciting stuff :D I received a package in the post today containg a few new cool items: Mig Acrylic Resin, Mig Thinners for washes, Mig Pigment fixer: Some great sanding boards, Tamiya putty and some Mig brown for desert filter.

So I've applied some filter to the chassis and parts of the Tauros Venator, but I didn't take pics as the difference isn't too noticeable by camera. Basically th filter works very similar to a glaze and is applied to alter the hue of the model, rather than shade it.

I also got onto doing the ground works for the base as well. Using a mix of plaster, Mig acrylic resin, matt varnish, Mig Gulf war sand,beach sand, light dust and europe dust I made a sickly looking paste/mix

Yeah, don't worry, it does look like I've had a botty accident in the plastic cup, but I do assure you it is the mix from above... Oh I also added tamiya buff paint and some model scenics medium buff ballast.

Then using an old paint brush I painted / stabbed this onto the base.

Looks like cool wet mud at the moment, but it is drying a nice colour.  Tomorrow I plan to lay a dust coat down with the airbrush before adding another small amount of mix with a litter colour to it and alternative mix formula.

In addition to this I also applied gulf sand pigment to the wheel before applying pigment fixer in a circular motion towards the centre of the wheel hub. I'll take phtos of this tomorrow so that the full effect can be seen.

Until tomorrow night.

Krom

My first steps into diorama buildng

Well it's been ages since I posted last... Again! I'm really starting a theme here for this blog. So, why've I bothered posting? Well Pottered into my local GW this Saturday to spend a gift voucher (thanks mart)... I got a sky shield incidentally.

After having a chat with the staff, I found out they do a monthly painting comp. Turns out this month is dioramas.

My first reaction was to not bother, but after going and eating some scran (corned beef pasty!) I decided I would join in. I raced to the nearest trophy store so that I could get a plinth.... With that bought I went to the model shop and grab some more supplies.

I realised I better go and check for rules and deadlines. Eek, the only rule was... There are no rules and the deadline was 2 weeks!

So, I got on with the task in hand. I've already developed a partial name / theme: roadside check point.

So here are a few wip pics.

Wooden plinth base with Das modelling clay added for structure and also Tamiya diorama texture paint (pavement effect dark grey) painted on for the road.

The beast to be the feature of the diorama. Been meaning to get one of these painted for ages, I've got another one to build and the lesser Tauros (Big thanks to blueronin and his crew for this beauty :D)

The awesome wheels! prior to weathering... this is rather experimental as I've never created rubber wheels before

And here is a little detailing added to the tarmac. A simple addition of Iyanden darksun foundation paint applied between a set of masks.

I'll be posting another set straight after these were meant to be last nights images... but i had an incident where I left my laptop in the middle of the street for an hour before I realised... Mart from Marts Warhammer Blog went and collected it for me.

Any comments and questions please fire away, and I'll be more than happy to help/answer where possible.

Krom

So.... I better do an update before I lapse into my old self huh?

Well in my last post I discussed I'd been building a new work bench for my hobby zone (or garage to a non hobbyist!).

I basically built a large bench using Formica (kitchen worktop), smooth timber, screws, blood, sweat, a cel power8 workshop and some google sketch up.

And this is my current state of affairs.

Fairly swish I must say. It needs some more work such as wall brackets for the speakers and some sort of hanging shelf underneath for the amp. You may also note that within that shot there is also a rather "slick" bookcase... You'd be right if you guessed it had been crafted by my own hand and the nifty power8 workshop in the left of the image.

Here it is




Ok there might be a slight angle to it... But it was built from my last gaming board. A fitting end to an old friend, after years of having dice, models and rules thrown down on it, it is now a perfect storage facility for all my rulebooks and gaming aid paraphernalia.

So onto the new kid on the block... The Realms of Battle Board! Basically it's going to be a desert board and have some cool as monkey poo terrain on it!

I've textured with sand so far... And the pics to prove that fact!















Since these pics have been taken I've also started laying down the undercoat of grey primer for the sand sections and black for the rocky bits.

And a little tease of one of my Grey Kinghts



I'm currently planning and working out how I can get a really cool textured and detailed base to represent a marble mausoleum type effect.

Hopefully results will appear once I've done some more testing!

thanks for reading

Location:New workspace and board