Genesis Chapter Bike Squad

I had these models finished for quite some time now, only thing left to do was the iconography. Working on these models made me realize how much I enjoy the armored, knightly look of Space Marine machinery.

To build my Bike Squad, I bought the old Ravenwing Battleforce, so these three are just the core of a larger bike squad - in total, it should have six bikes and one attack bike. The squad will be armed with plasma guns so it can reliably engage heavy infantry and light vehicles; I'm still not decided about the Attack Bike weapon, though.

I had fun working on the bases of these models. The base was covered in green stuff (though any putty would probably do); after that, I took the bike wheel and rolled it over the green stuff to leave its track on the ground. Later, I painted the base and added gloss varnish (or should I say, 'Ardcoat) to make it look like wet mud.

I tried to give different feel to each of the bikers. The first one above was more or less a test model; the second one is a sergeant (blue helmet denotes sergeants in the Genesis Chapter), and the third one is actually a homage to Terminator 2 (with a plasmagun instead of shotgun!). Various details from the Ravenwing sprue were added, like the large purity seals and ammo boxes. The rather clumsy flag on sergeant's bike was made out of greenstuff; next time, I'll have to think out something better.

First Genesis Chapter Bike

I'm working on my new Ravenwing Battleforce and I have just finished the first Bike. Since I still have six more to do, I thought I'd share pictures, in case I'm doing something wrong.

So, here it is!




As you can see, the marks show that the marine is an Assault marine of 2nd Company, 7th squad. I didn't put squad number on the bike, even thought it should be there according to Insignium Astartes. It seems illogical to me that the bike should show squad number, but not a company marking, so I didn't paint the squad number at all. After all, according to the fluff, bikes belong to the chapter Armoury, and not to Companies (as do Rhinos and some other vehicles); the Companies instead request them according to mission requirements.



This picture shows a better detail of the base. I modelled the base according to a tutorial that was available on the Games Workshop site, but it looks like they took it down now! The base is covered by a thin layer of Green Stuff - and the bike track was made by pressing a spare Bike wheel into it. The effect is pretty cool, and complements my idea of a swamp planet pretty well, although most of the track is covered by the bike anyways. Here is a detail shot of the base, before I put the bike on it:


Regarding the bike model itself, it can be seen that it's mould dates back to the third edition. The detailing is simply not that good, but luckily a good paintjob can cover that well! I hope I have achieved that.

And that's about all for now, so - thanks for reading! As always, comments are most welcome. After all, I still have five more of these to do, and an assault bike as well!

Deffkopta Squadron finished!

It took a while, but all my three Deffkoptaz are finally finished! Let's take a look at them first.


I spent so much time on these that I actually don't know what to start with! Each of them was painted in very different circumstances and it can be seen on them. Let's look at them one by one.



The first one was actually the first vehicle (if you will) I ever painted; it was finished back in June 2010. Since then, I haven't improved it much. Main change is the basing - when trying it out in a test game, the holding pole broke and I had to improvise. So I took some sand and rocks, a piece of sprue and few toothpicks, and made the ruiny stand you can see now. Lately, I added a plant as well.



This is the Deffkopta my girlfriend was working on. She finished it this summer, and as always, her work inspired me. On this model, she extensively used Bad Moon Yellow, and in quite a different scheme than I did (I used to pay only little attention to engines, and this model proves that was a mistake).

The base was done by me last week. I bought a large terrarium plant for like 5 euro, chopped it up and planted it into drilled holes in the base. The result looks pretty good, I think I'll try to make a whole terrain piece (a small forest perhaps) using this method.



I painted this one recently; in September or October, I think. I like to compare it to the first one I painted; I definately made progress since 2010. There are more colors and the Deffkopta seems richer. It's the same model as the previous one, without any conversions, yet the two look very different from each other. The check pattern is fundamental for this model's individuality. The basing was done last week as well.



On the picture above, you can take a better look at the rokkitz and the basing. One more neat detail there: notice the right Deffkopta pilot's head. My girlfriend really did a good job there - something as simple as a yellow strip gives the model a lot of character!

Last picture is sort of a teaser:



Yep, I got a Predator nearly finished! Still have to paint some details and battle damage on it though.

To be honest I'm glad I'm finally finished with the Deffkoptaz. They are great-looking models, but painting them was annoying because of the two-dimensionality of Assault on Black Reach sprues. Anyways, most of my AOBR units are painted now - only thing left is a bunch of Boyz!

Anyways, I hope you liked the orky machines and the new basing. These things took so long to get finished, but I feel the result was worth it.

See you soon! I'll try to make another post within a week or two, to make up for November.

First Alaitoc Jetbike finished!

Happy new year 2011!

I'm sorry for inactivity, just have too much trouble IRL right now. Can't wait to get back to Warhammer!

Anyways, I have finished an Eldar jetbike, craftworld Alaitoc. While I like the way the front plate went out, I'm rather dissatisfied with the rest. I will try a much lighter color scheme next time (I have a whole Eldar battleforce ready for assembly here). While I have used Mordian Blue, Enchanted Blue, Ice Blue and Asurmen Blue on the Jetbike, I plan to use mainly Ice Blue / Asurmen Blue on the Guardians. I hope it will bring a more contrasting result.

Here are pictures of the jetbike:







Well, that is all. Since I'm new to the Eldar, I would really welcome any sort of tips and criticism!

Ergotoxin out.

Bad Moons Deffkopta

Alright, quick update on the Bad Moons!

I have recently finished my first Deffkopta. I was thinking hard on the paint scheme - most people do Bad Moons vehicles with yellow all over the model, which looks cool (especially if heavy washed), but I prefer my boyz with a more serious face. Therefore I decided to heavily use black (made by mixing Chaos Black and Tin Bitz), which makes nice contrast with the yellowish details.

I chose the Deffkopta with dags (the dog-tooth pattern), since yellow-black dags were always favoured by the clan. Pity the other two Deffkoptas are clones. I'll try to be more creative next time.

Anyways, on to the pics:



It's a pity the flash I use is rather unforgiving on the yellow, making it look a bit brighter than it is. It is actually washed with Gryphonne Sepia, on all the right places.





Thank you for your time - any comments are most appreciated!