Well, I seem to be on something of a roll at the moment with getting long near-complete models on my painting desk finished. In truth, I think it's an excuse to avoid painting white(scars). Before the foul taint of xenos beckons me, there are Space Marines to paint however. So, joining their Imperial fist and Whitescar brothers are two further showcase chapters.
Luna Wolves:
I fell in love with the Luna Wolves the first time I glimpsed the front cover of 'false gods'. There was something about the heresy-era style that appeals immensely. Although this project was started a long time ago, it has gone through a few upheavals and as a result has never really taken off. The original concept was based around using the torsos pictured and custom building the shoulder pads using a pin-vice and ball bearings. This was in keeping with the look of the false gods marines. I scavenged a load of older bolters and backpacks from my local gaming store, but was still left with the problem of the helmet. I ended up converting a venerable dreadnought head with some greenstuff and casting it. Although the result had all the right elements to resemble the FG helmets, one important element was absent - scale. They were just too bulbous and I was never really happy with them. More about them later though.
The first hiccup came when FW released their heresy era armour/bolters. I invested in one set of each (painful on the wallet) and mixed and matched them in the army, retaining a large contingent of FG marines though to represent the majority of the army. I decided to call this armour variant 'Imperial maximus' armour; AKA MkIVa AKA finest MkIV plate (as referred to in False Gods). The terminator conversions with maxmini pads I kept, as did I the assault marines with maxmini JPs. One area I also later relented in was putting off my idea of converting a robot maniple and instead investing in a contemptor dreadnought. The Deimos rhinos/predators would be nice but I'm more than happy with the cheap and cheerful (if somewhat out of scale) 2nd edition rhinos I scavenged and rebuilt.
This served to delay the army concept and put it on the backburner. More recent events have delayed it further however. As the list is built around the chaos codex (heresy!) it may not be viable for much longer and so I prefer to watch and wait for a while. Secondly, there are rumours of a set of Heresy era Imperial Armour books, no doubt to be accompanied by some Luna Wolf specific models/special characters (LOKEN - please!) and so I'd like to see where these rumours go first. The only recent development for them therefore is the Mk2 helmet sculpt, improvised from the maxmini steam knight helmets. Much less bulbous, slightly smaller than the normal marine helmets and very close to the artwork. I'm very happy with it and trimmed the collar/lowered the backpack to make it fit better.
As for the painting/basing. The model has been repainted ulthuan grey (very similar to the shade I mixed) with dawnstone shading and ceramite white highlights. The chapter symbol is freehand and the only other points of interest really are the slight tint of blue to the metal (as per the FG cover) and the red lettering on the shoulder pad trims. I can't remember where I got the urban bases from but they're great value for money and make for easy painting with some drybrushing.
Grey Knights:
I first invested in a Daemonhunters army shortly after I first got back into 40k. I always loved Grey Knights in the fluff and was thrilled they now had a codex. As they were painted a rather awful scheme from EBay, I didn't really do much to them until the new codex came out. Supplemented with a few new models they're a great army to look at and surprisingly quick to paint for a striking looking set of models.
I use Leadbelcher over a black undercoat then wash the whole model with a thinned blue glaze to give the aegis armour its blue sheen. The armour is then higlighted with runefang steel and the soft underarmour further washed with nuln oil to distinguish it. Anything psychically charged (jump pack vanes/nemesis weapon/psybolts) was painted hawk turquoise and highlighted up with space wolves grey. Mephiston red for the weapon/heraldry. Basing was with the citadel basing slate. Dawnstone washed with nuln oil the dawnstone/ulthuan grey highlights.
I'm really pleased with the result and how quickly it can be achieved. In fact, were it not for the abundance of Grey Knight lists and the fact I've set myself quite the challenge with the Whitescars, I'd be tempted to take GKs to Blog Wars 4. Next time maybe.....
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