A Miniature Odyssey: Land Raider

Let me just say from the start that I hate painting tanks. Large flat surfaces, endless hours of edging, copious amounts of metal and a looming threat of flat painting, I hate it. Add this to the fact that I haven't painted anything in a long time and this was going to be my 'easing in' project, meant that I was not exactly looking forward to painting the Land Raider. A positive start.

To make matters worse the first stage of the project kicked off with a catastrophe. On the advice of the guy in the store, and against my better judgement, I bought a can of Macragge blue. I have never got on well with the colour spray paints from GW. The colour doesn't usually match the pot, they can either very watery and weak or dry and powdery and never seem to give an even covering. I should have known that the long way always gets the best results. I sprayed it black, then sprayed it blue then spent maybe three days stressing about how to fix it. The blue paint had a mind of its own. On some sections it was as rough as sandpaper and on other sections it was gloopy and smothered all the detail. In the end I had to actually cut off some of the Epic models from the roof and replace them as the detail had just vanished. It pains me to look too closely to the roof details as to my eye it still looks very thick. Shame.

Anyway, rant over. For the record, the colour of the spray did match the pot perfectly...however, I decided it was too light anyway and repainted the whole thing! After looking up a few painting guides and finally doing some tests on old models I settled on my own mix (a little tip, do these tests before you start painting your masterpiece...not half way into the project!!). For the basecoat I used a 1:1 mix of the old Regal blue and Macragge blue. This was then washed with Drakenhof Nightshade and then tidied up again with the same blue mix, just to paint over smears or pools of the shade. Then began days of edging. The first highlight was a 1:2 mix of Regal and Macragge, followed by Altdorf Guard blue and then, fittingly, Calgar blue for the final extremes.

The blue was by far the longest and most tedious part and really highlights the things I hate about painting tanks. However, once it's out of the way it feels great and you do feel a sense of achievement when you see it all highlighted up. Next step was the silver metals. Nothing out of the ordinary with this, Leadbelcher and a couple of washes of Nuln Oil and Agrax Earthshade before a silver highlight. After that I wanted to get the stone sections out of the way and, if I'm honest, I found this quite difficult. The detail I lost from the spray coupled with highlights and washes just not looking right meant that this section took a lot longer than I expected. It's a shame that the section I had been most excited about has now become the section I am least pleased with. Perhaps I will try it again on a Stormraven at a later date.

Closing in on the finishing line I then started the gold. This began with a Balthasar gold base coat followed by a true base coat of Gehenna's gold. The reason for the two base coats is that Gehenna's gold is a layer paint and will be very weak without the right colour underneath it. Once I had a decent coverage I then shaded with my favourite, Agrax Earthshade, and then highlighted up with my older paints of Shining gold and a mix of Shining gold and Mithril silver, depending on how light you want it to go.

All that was left now was the fun bits of detail as the whole thing starts to come together, like the chapter symbols, lights, purity seals and texts. A quick tip for writing text, as I'm awful at painting writing, is to go to an art or craft store and pick up some fine tipped artist pens. They come in a variety of colours but at least get a black and a brown one. You can now write the words with your usual dexterity without worrying about controlling the movable and bendy tip of a paint brush, plus the ink wont run out during a letter like paint might. Then, if it still looks crap get your girlfriend to do it as girls are better at handwriting (not that I did this...honest).

So there it is! A testing but ultimately rewarding project and I'm glad to say that even after six weeks of working on this I am still excited about Ultramarines and plan to continue the army. My next project will be to convert ten Honour Guard fit to thumb a lift in this beast!

Until next time,

Jericho

I can't believe it's been a whole year since Shazam or I have posted on this blog. That's shameful! Equally awful is the fact that in that time I don't think either of us have painted a single model either. So when some friends of mine suggested a 'Tale of Four Gamers' style challenge I jumped at the chance. The rules were simple, 250 points of 40k each month. I decided quite quickly that I would try an army that I've always wanted to do, the Ultramarines. I've always been a sucker for the heroic and chivalrous good guy and in the 40k universe, for me, the Ultramarines are it. However, because the models are designed as generic Space Marines, I feel they lack the gaudy and glorious pomp that the Ultramarine artwork depicts. So there stood my challenge, an Ultramarine army with more bling than Mr. T.

Having been out of the hobby for a little while I thought it best to start with a single model that I could really sink my teeth into and be really inspired by, hoping that would keep me interested as I am notoriously bad at finishing projects. So what better than an incredibly ornate Land Raider, fit to carry the finest of the Emperor's finest into battle?

Drawing inspiration from the Land Raider GW created for Marneus Calgar I knew I wanted mine to also look like a shrine and monument. GW chose a Gothic feel, however, I decided on Roman imagery, in particular an idea I had a while ago of creating a great stone battle scene, like in ancient Roman architecture, but using Epic models.

The first stages involved using plasticard to cover over the side doors and create a new panel on which to work. I then used strips of thin plasticard to edge large sections of the tank that I would later paint as gold trim to make it all stand out. Once the whole tank was done I then started the fun bit of adding detail, starting with a few pillars based on Roman styles using more plastics and some sculpting.

After a few days scouring ebay I managed to get hold of some Epic models to make the battle scenes. I wanted two battle scenes on the roof and since the models I'd bought included Eldar and Orks I decided I would be commemorating the battles of Armageddon and Commrath. Along the sides above the pillars I then lined up a few spare marines ready for battle. To add the models to the tank each one needed to be sliced in half and filed down so that it didn't stick out too much...a very fiddly job!