The Praetorians - Razorback #2 [Space Marines]

The main body of the Razorback transport vehicle is almost completed and is the first unit in the army to show my true colours: Alpha Legion.

There are still a few details to do but I'm relatively happy with this so far. I just need to get the weapon sponsor and the reserve weapon sponsor painted now. 

The Praetorians - Space Marine Update

My marines deserved bigger bases; large marines look ridiculous crammed onto tiny bases. So with the sun out I took out the knife and began removing the old bases and glueing them onto some nice resin bases. 

I still need to get a few last details finished and get some transfers on their pauldroms.

The whole squad with flash.

The squad without flash.

The old vet' with the weird armour.

The plasma gunner.

A random marine. 

PLUS, for the first time, a little preview of my HQ choice and the squad's transport (both WIPs)

This guy is "converted" from the 'Dark Vengeance' boxset by just removing the Dark Angel iconography with a knife. I have a hatred of all the librarian models in the Space Marine range; so seeing this one was just perfect. 

The Praetorians - Tactical Squad #4 [Space Marines]

I've been unable to paint for quite a while due to trips all over the country, my increased workload and other meaningless excuses resulting in a nearly finished librarian model, a razorback in pieces (although some sections are completely painted it is nonetheless in pieces) and only 7 men of the first tac' squad finished.

Last night I decided I would dedicate a single hour to painting (this drastically became less time due to other chores) and I decided I would give this time to cleaning up those 7 men I had already completed before I continued with the rest. Something about them bothers me; I don't feel that the colour design works and I couldn't quite work out why.

After a certain amount of deliberation I came to the conclusion that the two 'bone' shoulder pads were not working as the model didn't look like it was a single design but two models amalgamated into one. I am therefore trialling phase two, which now looks like:

 

This translates quite nicely onto the model and after a quick repaint the squad looks like this:

Bare in mind that these were done rather swiftly last night in bad light and still need to be cleaned up and inked but overall I think the effect works quite nicely.

I'm not sure what I want to do with this chap. Yes, I know he is a mismatch of different armour types and has the wrong shoulder pad on his left shoulder (see below) but quite frankly I don't know enough of the fluff to really care - I personally really like him as a model and it seems a bit of a shame to repaint both of his shoulder pads.

The Praetorians - Brother Severus #2 [Space Marines]

So, there is still quite a few little things that need to go onto Brother Severus including the smoke stacks and sensor, and the base needs a few extra coats of paint and ink, but he is standing and looking epic.

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Here he is in his full glory. Plasma cannon and close combat weapon with under-mounted flamer. 

The other plasma weapons in the army so far have been painted black but he looked a bit odd with a black sponsor arm so it turned out red instead.

His base is something that will require a little bit of work but it ties in the barren dry earth on the other bases with the stone work that I liked. He also has the remnants of an ork vehicle that seems to have been brought down by the pushing Praetorian legions.

Brother Severus served as an assault troop before his mutilation on the battlefield. His ceremonial power-fist with an under-mounted flamer. 

His back shows a lot less blue colour due to the mechanisms but that doesn't mean there isn't colour. The chimneys are showing quite a bit of damage after over-burning across the battlefield.

Another shot of the base. 

Another shot of the front plate showing Brother Severus' white helmet like his other battle-brothers'. 

And a little shot with his (completed) brothers.

The Praetorians - Brother Severus [Space Marines]

So the kit has finally arrived and I couldn't bare leaving the box unopened for the whole weekend. 

So, here is a little taster of the starting stages of my Dread - Brother Severus. 

As with basically all my recent blog entries; excuse the poor lighting as these photos are having to be done at low light due to it being Winter and over-cast outside. 

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So, as per my normal habit of modelling, the kit stands semi-completed in easy to paint sections. The only difference in this situation is the feet which are affixed to the semi-built base (but more on that later). I was pleasantly surprised to see enough parts to make all three right-sponsor arms (plasma cannon, autocannon and twin-linked lascannon) and all three will obviously be painted even if the model will primarily be used with the plasma cannon.

An over-saturated view from the front. The wounded Space Marine will eventually be hidden behind a removable panel for everyday use but i thought he should be painted up for the occasion every now and then. I've actually been working on a new technique for gold which consists of two base layers of a dark and then light red-brown, followed by a dark gold, two black ink layers and then a light highlight of metal.

The front also shows how much damage from everyday use is present on the model (although, this looks better under the right light). The blue especially is scratched and chipped to hell.

The back at the moment is looking far too bright and clean for a battle-hardened dreadnought... this is going to have to change. On top of that, the purity seal and other details still need painting, and those chimney vents need another highlight of black to really show off the smoke bellowing from them.

The left arm (without shoulder pad and under-mounted flamer) is starting to come along nicely with gold skulls, colourful piping and enough scratches to the blue to show off how many battles this guy has been through.

A little close up of the ornate hand.

My rule of thumb with adding everyday scratches and wear-and-tear is to be as messy as possible - through the book out the window and throw that brush around as much as possible. 

Together they are starting to look quite the piece. Don't worry, that black shoulder will eventually be covered by an over-sized should pad. 

A little sneak-peek at what this guy is going to be standing on. This is very much still a huge work in progress as another layer of filler will need to be put on once this layer has dried. The idea is a combination of the dried-mud (present on the other Marines) and a bit of stone (which will be painted to be a cracked road); the addition of some weeds will hopefully tie this together with the rest of the army. 

My idea behind this was having the dread walking over the wreckage of an ork vehicle (obviously painted in the same colour scheme as my bommer). 

The Praetorians - Tactical Squad #3 [Space Marine]

My squad is slowly growing. Emphasis on 'slowly'. 

The Praetorians - Tactical Squad #2 [Space Marines]

It has been an extraordinarily long two weeks which is evident in the fact that I've only managed to finish one Marine. The squad Sergeant was just begging to be painted up to make the squad look more like a unit rather than a rag-tag of troops. 

The following photos show that there is still a little bit of touching up to do and I certainly have over-exposed the photos themselves due to taking the photos before work while it was still dark. 

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With the red helmet, the Sergeant is clearly distinguishable from the other Marines. 

Considering that the other Marines in his squad have red eyes, I've had to go for an orange eye just to try and keep them looking similar. A friend suggested going green but having my Sergeants stand out as having completely different coloured visors would annoy me.

The sword is definitely still needs a lot of work with some blending and highlighting but the overall effect will be of a much more powerful sheen.

Again, the effect I was looking for with the plasma gun has not exactly worked and will need a few more small coats to really finish. A white highlight is the next course of action though. 

 

You will also note that I have finally drilled out their barrels and although it did take a few practice attempts I now have it down to an art. 

The plasma gunner (below) has taken a bit of damage to his shoulder pad - this is only a work in progress as I'm not going to paint it properly until I've decided what markings will be on that shoulder.