More chaos – some of it intentional…

I realise this week’s update is late again, plus it might be slightly less substantial than I would have liked. But since I’ve been suffering from a bad back for the last two days, I wasn’t really in shape for any earth-shattering content, so all I can offer you today is a small update on my various chaos projects — I hope you won’t mind ;-)

So anyway, let’s take a look at what’s on my desk right now:

I. Hey, it’s that guy again…

This will be our last look at the unpainted model for the Doomwall, promise ;) I added some chaotic decoration to his warhammer, and with that the model is finished:

Like I said before, I am super happy with how this model turned out, and I will hopefully start painting this big guy as soon as my back stops acting up!

II. Red Butcher

While I was working on a Terminator model anyway, I took the chance to also revisit another model in TDA: You may remember the two Red Butchers I purchased a while ago. One became a character named Raas the Butcher:

And the other one looked like this when we last saw him:

However, there was a problem with this guy: I want all of the Terminators in Captain Lorimar’s retinue to be fairly unique characters. And this guy shared exactly the same face mask as Raas the Butcher above — actually one of my main gripes with the Red Butchers in the first place! What’s more, in this case the mask really seemed to work against the model’s overall pose, leading to a model that’s neither here or there composition-wise. So I carefully started cutting (and also swapped in a new arm). Here’s what the WIP looks like right now:

Both the face and arms may still be subject to change at this point, but I feel like getting rid of the original head was the right decision!

III. Knight Fever

And finally, a look at the current state of my very own Chaos Knight. As you may remember, the overall conversion was basically finished last time, so only a bit of detail work remained.

So I only made some minor changes to the prior version of the model: Thanks to a bitz drop from my buddy Biohazard, I was able to use a defiler bit as a muzzle on the Knight’s main cannon — the part is just a perfect fit for that! I also added some spikes to the gun barrel in order to make it look slightly less plain. And a chain was added to the Knight’s left greave, bringing it more in line with the pauldron on the same side.

Anyway, this is what the pretty much finished Knight looks like now:

The one thing still missing at this point are some dangling chains that I want to add to the weapons and arms, and after that, I suppose I don’t have any more excuses to put off painting this guy any longer?! Speaking of which, I am already making plans for one particular area of the paintjob, at least:

Those of you who have been following my work on this model so far might remember one particular idea supplied by fellow hobbyist dantay_XV. In his own words:

The other idea I had, but again might not work would be bloody hand prints on the lower limbs and small totems or skulls at the feet of the knight like offerings or devotions. As the 4th company go to war, they walk by Harrowthorne’s Knight & touch a bloody hand to its armour in the hope of receiving Khorne’s blessing for a good hunt etc before going to battle.

Not only did this seem like a beautifully fluffy addition to the Baron’s background, but I also began asking myself whether it would be possible to incorporate the bloody handprints on the actual model. So here’s what I did: I used a GW plastic hand trophy (from the old Night Goblin kit, if memory serves) and made a simple press mold from it, using GS. The two hands were made, using more GS. And these were then coated with Tamiya Clear Red to be used as some kind of “stamp”, so to speak:

So far, my attempts at creating the “bloody handprint” effect have been limited to paper, though. Here are the first results:

As you can see, while some of the handprints do look pretty convincing, I am not yet able to make sure that this effect works 100% of the time. So I’ll need to work on the process a bit, in order to make sure it’s more or less foolproof, lest I ruin a very expensive model. But the results so far definitely merit some further exploration, don’t you think?

IV. A new home for the XIIth

And finally, a shout out to a thread you might find interesting: All those of you who either contemplate starting their own World Eaters force or who already are commanders of the Eaters of Worlds (both in their Heresy and post-Heresy incarnations), let me just point you towards a little community topic recently started over at The Bolter and Chainsword by renowned Skull Championess Flint13, with a little support from some other blood crazy maniacs, including yours truly:

The World Eaters players over there are having a little roll call to assemble all the various companies and warbands of our glorious legion, and we are hoping this topic can become a new home for the forumites at B&C for discussing topics relevant for our great legion, as well as a way of assembling the full might of the XIIth. So whether you want to join the ranks of the World Eaters, already own a warband or are just looking for some inspiration, it’s all in good fun, so head over there and go take a look:

And with that, our little emergency update is complete. Wish me a speedy recovery, people ;-) And feel free to let me hear any feedback you might have.

As always, thanks for looking and stay tuned for more!