Templar's Minis

Fulgrim. The Phoenician. Primarch of the III Legion Astartes.

I finished Fulgrim and I decided to post a video now that I have a spinney dealey!

This has been a while coming but I’m happy to say he’s done and I can now pair him with Ferrus Manus.

I was hoping to have this completed in time for Sword and Brush this year but since that event was cancelled due to the pandemic situation that will have to wait until next year. At least I will be ahead of the game for then!

There were a couple things that didn’t go as planned on this model and couple of things I was pleasantly surprised on. I wanted to try doing something different with the armour but since that wasn’t really working out I abandoned that.

On the other hand I didn’t really have an idea on how I wanted to paint the sword at first but now I’m pretty happy with how that turned out!

Unlike my other models I didn’t include any scratches or weathering on Fulgrim to try to drive home his pristine appearance. Even on his white trifurcated cape!

I included a few more pictures below as some highlights. but since this is a video post I can’t re-arrange them like a photo post so apologies for the overall length and size of the pictures.

I will also include a picture at the bottom of Fulgrim and Ferrus paired together now that they are both finally done!

Until the next post!

Thank you very much for the kind words! Much appreciated!

Now I am assuming you are referring to the Beholder model I painted as that is the only model where I used this technique. So just in case anyone else is looking at this and doesn’t know what we’re talking about the post for the model is here and I’ll include the first picture of that post below:

So with that out of the way the product I used to obtain this effect is called UHU glue. This type specifically:

I had to buy this online because the only option available for this brand where I live is a glue stick. I guess it’s more prominent in Europe.

Apparently this also works well as just a regular glue but I haven’t actually used it for that purpose  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I did follow this YouTube tutorial from MiniWar Gaming for the technique.

To give an overview though what I did was pour out some of the glue on to a palette of some sort (I think I used the inside of an old blister pack) and let it set for about 15-20 minutes. This will let the glue start to set but still be workable.

Then I took a toothpick to gather up some of the glue and applied it to the gums and one of the top teeth on the model. I looped the glue around the tooth a few times before stretching the glue down to the tooth on the other end and making sure it sticks. The glue will form a string like in the picture to look like saliva.

This did take more than one try and I had a hard time applying the glue with the right consistency. If there was too much glue then the whole thing would just gloop to the bottom however if there was too little glue being stretched then the strings would break before the glue could set.

But after some tries this is the result that I got. After the glue dries it will stay in place like this and look like saliva. That being said I’m not sure how long lasting this technique is. I painted this for a friend and I have since seen it again and those strings have broken at some point, so there’s probably some room for improvement on my technique. Perhaps allowing an application to dry and then re-applying the glue the same way would help. It’s not a perfect method but I don’t have a lot of opportunity to experiment with this either. Most of the models I have painted are not of the monstrous variety but this is still an interesting and fun technique to have available.

The glue works because it dries transparent. As you can see in the video tutorial I linked you can also mix colour into the paint if you wanted to make it look more like slime or gore. I will probably want to experiment with that at some point as well.

And with that I have finally finished the entirety of the Betrayal at Calth boxed set.

This certainly took a while! I’m sure everyone else already finished their box long ago but I took my time and tried to not get burnt out with them.

I have to admit though, these last 5 Mark IV marines felt like a real grind to get through! I’m glad they still look pretty close to the rest of the models from the box as I definitely felt like I rushed some parts. Some elements are a little rough but I’m happy with the overall appearance. Especially for troops.

Admittedly I could assemble and paint one more Mark IV marine from the box as I have a spare set of legs. You get plenty of extra bits in the box however you get 30 pairs of mark 4 legs so even with extra bits you would only be able to assemble 30 full marines. But since I used another pair of legs kneeling legs from a different kit for one of the marines with a missile launcher I could technically assemble one more. I’m definitely not feeling up for that right now though and I am calling this box done! I may just keep those extra legs as part of extra bits that may get used for some other project some day or I might use them to put together another marine with a heavy bolter as I was not able to magnetize those successfully from this kit.

I painted these all as pre-Heresy Emperor’s Children as the basis of a Horus Heresy Army. There are a few Forge World Emperor’s Children legion bits mixed in that I tried to save for sergeants or characters. I did have a couple of these left over however which is why I used one of the Forge World Mark IV shoulders and one torso on these regular marines. Otherwise I wouldn’t really be using them and would instead just be using the vanilla bits from this box. And since I bothered to buy those upgrade bits I’m going to use them instead!

I also magnetized most of the weapon options for these marines. Anywhere you see a special weapon that marine could have the weapon swapped for a different special weapon or a standard bolter. Same with the sergeants. Their left arms are all magnetized to be able to take the regular arm which is also magnetized to hold either a power sword or chainsword, or the entire arm can be swapped out for a power fist or lightning claw. The dreadnought of course has it’s right arm weapon magnetized as well to also be able to take the multi-melta.  Finally the Cataphractii Terminators have ALL of their options available. I purchased custom shoulder pads from a 3D printing site as Forge World didn’t make specific legion shoulders for these terminators for the Emperor’s Children. I ended up using these with some of the vanilla shoulders to give them all the options that they can take. Now that was a grind! This way I get the most options out of the box for playing either Horus Heresy games or even the Betrayal at Calth game itself. I just have to enlist my old Black Templars army to stand in for the opposing faction :D.

My Emperor’s Children army is by no means done, however. If you look at my previous posts you will see a few character models not pictured here that are completed. I also have the Burning of Prospero box to complete as well. At least for that box I already have 10 of the Mark III marines done leaving 20 more to do. Then there’s just the 5 Tartaros terminators which thankfully don’t have as many options to magnetize as the Cataphractii ones! That’s all from that box that will be included in this army.

Beyond that I have the other Forge World Emperor’s Children units to complete, a couple more characters and of course Fulgrim himself! Other than that who knows! If I actually wanted to build a usable Horus Heresy list I know I would need some armour/transport/fast attack/heavy support but who knows if I’ll ever get to that.

Hello!

Just posting up my finished unit of Stark Sworn Swords from A Song of Ice and Fire Miniatures Game.

Painting progress has been slow over the past year and a half overall but I’m still trying my best to get some things done. I painted a test model from this unit, then proceeded to complete half of the unit with the movement tray and finally the rest of the unit all in separate batches. Hopefully I can finish the other unit before too long so that they end up being mostly consistent.

Unfortunately my posts will probably be few and far between but I will still complete things here and there that I will show. I’m also always logging in here to see what everyone else is working on. So I’m still around just not completely active!

For this paint scheme I’m not totally sure I’m happy with the colour I went with for the clothes these soldiers are wearing. And of course when you take really close up pictures all the brush strokes are a lot more apparent. But in person I’m happy with them. They are rank and file soldiers so I don’t want to sweat the details too much lest never finishing anything.

Hopefully sometime soon as well I can finish some of the characters and put a little more into those models.

Ferrus Manus, The Gorgon, Primarch of the Xth Legion - the Iron Hands

I have finished another Primarch model from Forge World for my collection! Only 15 more to go!

This is Ferrus Manus, Primarch of the Iron Hands legion of Space Marines from the Horus Heresy. I completed this as an entry for this year’s Sword and Brush competition which is coming up next weekend. I kind of figured the way things were going for my productivity this year that I would only have time to finish this before the competition and nothing else. Good to know my prediction was on track! It would have been nice to have finished Fulgrim as well but alas, that will have to wait until next year. Giving yourself realistic expectations in what you can accomplish can be a blessing!

So for this model itself I did mostly follow along with the studio paint job like all of the Primarchs I painted so far, however I did put my own spin on things and put my own interpretation into the look of the character.

The first thing i altered would be the “necrodermis” skin that Ferrus is supposed to have coating his hands. I wanted to approach this a little more subtly so that more of his skin was still visible and not just base coat his arms in a silver/gunmetal paint. So, I painted his entire arms and hands the same skin tone as his face completely and then came in with some metallic paints to gradually make the hands look more like they are coated in a metal substance. I tried to include some different metallic colours to try to make it look a little more organic and eventually built up to pure silver as the brightest highlights. It’s not exactly what I was expecting but it was a fun experiment and I’m happy with it.

The armour was of course a challenge as painting black usually is. I tried putting some gradients and highlights in with grey but as usual it’s difficult to find a balance in highlighting and shading black to give depth but still have something “read” as black. I also added a little bit of metallic paint to the base coat of the armour just to give a subtle difference to the Iron Hands casualties on the base. I’m not sure if that really came through but that was also a bit of an experiment.

I also tried to paint his skin in more of a Hispanic skin tone. Again I’m not sure if I pulled this off but I wanted to start adding some more obvious diversity to the skin colours of the Primarchs I’m paining.

I did also copy the studio colour scheme when deciding how to paint the casualties on the base. It was fun to paint some Iron Hands, which I haven’t done an entire model before, alongside one of the Emperor’s Children which I’ve already painted a lot of. It was also fun to try some different freehanding to expand that skill a little more.

One thing I could have probably done a little differently is the colour of the ground. I did still want to follow the descriptions of Isstvan V in the lore as having “black” sand. However, since the Iron Hands casualties and Ferrus himself are wearing black armour, there is not a lot of contrast between them and the earth they are on, which is ideal to have on the bases. If I had time to complete Fulgrim this may have come out a little better as there would be more contrast in the piece overall. However if I had done the ground colour a little brighter the figures would stand out a lot more.

You may also notice that there is a small bit on the base that has an Emperor’s Children backpack and pauldron which is removable. This is apparently an optional piece that you’re supposed to leave off if you want to put Fulgrim and Ferrus’ bases together. I do plan to do this eventually however since I don’t have Fulgrim painted yet I just magnetized this piece and painted it so that it will stay in place for now and remain easily removable when I have Fulgrim completed. I love magnets!

Well as I mentioned I will be entering this in Sword and Brush next week so wish me luck! It’s being held in Burlington this year which is a little closer to me and that’s nice. In the meantime I have a few other projects I want to get started and partially assembled/primed while the weather is still nice so that I have plenty I can work on over the winter.

Hi again!

Just another quick update for what I’ve been working on. I have finally finished another batch of my Mark IV Space Marines for my Emperor’s Children Pre-Heresy army.

My progress has been quite slow but since I had these prepared and partially painted for a while I wanted to put as much effort as I could into finishing them so I could move on to something else. I was originally hoping to have these and the last 5 marines from the Betrayal at Calth box done by the end of last year. That of course did not work out!

There’s not too much different with this batch compared to others that I’ve done, however I did include a couple of pieces that are not original to the Betrayal at Calth box.

First, you may notice that I used kneeling legs on the space marine carrying the missile launcher. These are not Mark IV legs (they may be Mark VI?)but I really wanted to make sure the 3 missile launcher wielders from the set looked distinct and not all in the exact same pose. I found these legs in a bits box at a store and I had picked them up with a bunch of other random pieces. They fit the Mark IV torso well enough and are not too noticeably different in my opinion.

Second, I used an auspex that came from I believe the 3rd edition Warhammer 40k starter box. I decided to add it to one of these marines just for variety and to use up some old pieces that otherwise would never find use. It’s probably not canonically accurate but again I think it’s close enough that it’s no big deal. Since all of these marines besides the missile launcher wielder are magnetized the pose makes swapping weapons out a lot easier.

So, now I really need to decide what I am going to work on for this year’s Sword and Brush competition. I am very quickly running out of time and I need to get to work! Hopefully I can come up with something and have another decent showing before returning to this army and slowly getting to their completion.

Well hello everyone!

I am making my first post with completed miniatures since November, about 7 months ago!

I’m not sure how many people follow me regularly expecting updates, but I’ve been settling into a new job with a new schedule and I have yet to get into a good routine that will allow for significant painting time. Hopefully I will be able to make more regular updates, especially if I want to have anything finished for Sword and Brush this year!

Anyways, what I have completed here are a few loose minis that I wanted to use as a palette cleanser before going back to my Space Marines. They are just random miniatures for use in D&D games and the like.

The first two models in the top picture starting on the left are from WizKids as part of their primed, unpainted miniatures line. They are called Female Knights/Gray Maidens. I thought they looked cool so I bought them and painted them! My favourite part is probably the big gem on the one with the shield.

Next is a figure from Reaper Bones called Garrick the Bold. This was a mini my fiancee picked up a long time ago and had just been hanging out here until I asked if I could give it a quick paint job for her. I like how the blue wash came out on the armour.

Finally in the top picture is Drago Voss, male Assassin also from Reaper Bones. I picked up and painted this figure to represent my Triton rogue that I play in one of our side games of D&D, thus the bluish complexion you can see peeking out from under the hood.

Here’s another finished model! This is the White Knight - Heavy model from Kingdom Death.

I am using it as a player character model for my Paladin in a D&D game. We just started that campaign recently and I wanted to have my miniature completed in time for the start.

Honestly once I first saw this miniature I knew I had to have it for something. I had no idea at fist what I was going to use it for, but I just think this model is so cool. The pose, the details, the hammer.. I just had to paint it. I didn’t end up using the gigantic ball-on-chain that the model comes with as well, although I’m kind of regretting not at least magnetizing that as an option just for the ridiculous scale of it.

I have to say I’m happier with how the white came out compared to my previous attempts, so that’s also a plus. I got to practice that a little more. Of course, I didn’t need to paint it white just because that’s what the model was named, however it was also fitting for the character I’m playing.

The cape also served another opportunity that I did not pursue. I had considered freehanding a design on the back of the cape, but in the end I decided to just paint it one colour. I wasn’t confident enough in being able to do a good job of that on top of shading, highlighting, and weathering a white cape. I kind of needed to do some heavy weathering as well since there was already a lot of sculpted detail on the model to indicate weathering. Obviously such a thing could be done, however as I said I didn’t feel confident in going that route. Maybe another time!

Anyways I have a couple weeks off now before I start a new job (woo!) so I am trying to squeeze in some more painting time before then. However I do have a number of other things that I want to accomplish as well so I may still fall a little short of my goal this year of finishing the Betrayal at Calth box. The weather is already getting pretty cool here so I may not be able to get those primed and ready in time.

Here’s some finished models I should have posted a while ago.

These are characters that I painted for my friends for our D&D home game. These three are pewter Reaper models that my friends selected to represent their characters. I coloured them as best I could based on their requests so hopefully they will like them!

Each of these three models also gave me the opportunity to experiment with some techniques and try something new. For the first one, the half-orc ranger, my one friend wanted a maroon coloured skullcap painted on him. This was the first time I had to mix that colour myself. For the next one, which is supposed to be a dragonborn fighter (despite having a tail) I was able to try a little more weathering on the metallics to make them look more oxidized using some rust and verdigris that I mixed myself. Finally, the last model is supposed to be an Aarakocra (this one is a Tengu but there aren’t a lot of Aarakocra models around just yet), and my friend wanted the metal of the sword and armour to look “blackened” as though they were darkened for tactical reasons so they wouldn’t reflect too much light.

Since this Aarakocra character is also supposed to be an “admiral” I freehanded a couple of medals to the coat. He is also supposed to have a “Napoleonic” style hat, so @orenjikitty who is running our campaign fashioned one for now out of a sculptable eraser. If we can find an appropriately sized one from another model then we may get that as a replacement in the future.

Finally at the end we have a picture of our entire party, called “The Fighters of Foo”. We came up with a bunch of different names and then rolled for it :D. The other two models I had already posted previously and are both from WizKids.