WIP: PapaJJ Rubble Bases!

Hi again.
This time I would like to thank PapaJJ for the shout out on his blog. He was kind enough to show a lot of pics of some terrain rubble bases I made for him some months ago.

Everything begun with him letting everybody know he would ruin all his remaining bits from the modular movement trays he used for the Sector7G. I hit the ceiling and told him I would like to buy all those bits. The GW modular movement trays have enough corner pieces to put 2 per tray. I always liked how the MMT looked with 4 corners, but couldn't find anyone to sell me the bits I needed. I was going to cut some straight pieces in 45° to make some corners. That was when PapaJJ said he will make some rubble bases using those bits. The thing is, after knowing my idea for the pieces, he offered me all his bits, for free. I was going to buy them, and he was so kind that offered them to me for free!! I said at least I should have paid the shipping and handling but he refused. Then was when I came out with the idea of the exchange. I would make rubble bases for him and he'll give me the bits I wanted so much. That's how I ended making this:

You can see some beautiful pics of these terrain with the Haverbrook 212th Grenadiers from PapaJJ, on his latest entry. All the instructions I received from PapaJJ for his terrain, were the measures of the pieces: "2x3 or 3x5 would work well, and somewhere in the range of 1 to 3 inches tall". So, I had almost no restrictions and let my imagination fly away! xD

Let me explain how easy is to make this sort of scenery using plaster. First is to buy some plaster. For this project I used som rock hard gypsum. In dentistry we normally use plaster of paris, the white and common gypsum. There is also some harder plaster, that we call stone plaster. No idea how it's called in the US od another countries, but in any dental store you'll be able to buy thise and another kinds of plaster. Something better, even harder it's the artificial stone plaster (I think americans call it that way). Any of the alternatives will be good enough. I selected the stone hard plaster, because the terrain needed to fly to the US.

To make this you need some plastic sheet, or anything plastic and plain. You'll also need some rests of previous preparation of plaster.

 

Please take a look at the plaster "rocks" from the above picture. That clump of plaster came from the reminings of previous plaster preparations. For the metal bars I used leftovers from the sprues, clipped and filled to look plain. Painted with metallics paint could look like metal bars, bended and/or rusted.

When you prepair the plaster, while still humid and soft, you can put some pieces to look like half burrowed. That's what I did with the tubes, power cables, bars and rocks. I used some different types of rocks, using plaster pieces as I said, some cork pieces and some pumic stone.

To add texture, I have thrown some dry plaster to the terrain piece, while still humid. The plaster will make some clumps and will add some nice texture to the terrain piece. You can add also some types of sand to add even more texture.

 For those electric installations I used the caps from printer cartdridges. Those orange bits, yeah, cartridges caps xD I used the holes that those had, to make some cables appear to the outside.

For the electric poles I glued some leftover sprues and drilled some holes to pass the cables.

I hope that soon PapaJJ will be able to paint his terrain pieces to see some pics of his incredibly Sector 7G with the rubble bases on it.

Well, until next time. I hope you understand a little about how to handle this plaster pieces. It's really easy to make some cool rubble bases using plaster. Unfortunately I didn't make pics of the process, but I will more than happy to answer all the questions you could have abot plaster handling!

SHOWCASE: Chaos Exalted Hero

Hi again. This time I'll show you some pics of another GZ miniature, a full-of-charachter exalted hero with additional hand weapon.

I tend not to paint blood on my CW miniatures, principally because I don't know how to paint it as good as I would like to. Anyways, the axe from this miniature it's just so cool I felt the necessity to paint some onto it.

Ah! Forgotten to say that it is a charging exalted hero. Was it necessary? Hahaha!
I really  love how dynamic this miniature is.

Until next time, comments and critics are welcomed ;D
See ya!

SHOWCASE: Chaos Knights

Well, finally, more minis to show!

It was more than enough about tutorials, tips, WIPs and specially, about contests (¬¬U).
Finally some finished miniatures to show! This unit of Chaos Knights was manufactured by a spanish company called Gamezone Miniatures. They were like 100 times better than the old citadel Chaos Knights, and they were released before the new plastic citadel Chaos Knights. That's the mean reason why I spent like 8£ for each, to build a 6-men unit. Yeah pretty expensive, but in those times, they were the latest kick-ass-chaos-knights avaliable. I finished painting them in the summer, like 8 months ago, but it wasn't until last month when I retouched them, painted the bases rims with Graveyard earth and considered them really 100% finished. Enough blah-blah, let's see some pics! Click the pics for the larger versions (as usual!)

Let's begin with the unit shot:
As you can see, this miniatures come with an insane level of detail. They are metallic, an they weren't (and aren't!) comparable with the 5th or 6th Ed. Chaos Knights. And... I converted them. All of them.

I sculpted flames in every weapon they carry, changed the head from the SB and modified the helmets from the 2nd, and 6th knights. The banner? Also converted. The original one was beautiful, but it quite wasn't "enough" for an important standard like the one carried for the "Swords of Chaos". Yeah, Chosen Chaos Knights. Back in the day, that was the idea I had for this unit. I added the horizontal pole, the ropes and severed heads from an orc, dwarf, some humans and elves, among a pair of skulls. I also converted the weapons from the SB and musician. Ah! And I also replaced the shields, for the shield from Archaon.

This is the original unit painted by someone for GZ.

Well, going for some details...

 

First Chaos Knight. Modified steed pose, sculpted flames and shield swap.

Second Chaos Knight. Modified steed and knight poses and sculpted flames. Shield swap and converted helmet.

Standard Bearer. Changed weapon for a pole arm flaming one (converted, of course), sculpted flames, head swap (I love that Chaos Warrior Head!) and heavily converted standard. Details can be seen here. (fullscreen button and enjoy!)

Chaos Knight Champion. I've shown this before. Anyways, the only thing I've done to this marvelous model is sculpting the flames on the axe. Please look at the original standards-made cloak and the resting sword on the left hand. And the severed head hanging over there. Everything, just straight from the box!
Ah! And also my first attempts at weathering! Not quite good, but when I did that, I don't even had any pigments! (now I have 2, not a great difference! lol)

Chaos Knight Musician. Modified steed and knight poses, sculpted the cloak (it's the only model without a cloak, unbelievable IMHO) and fur and replaced the weapons for modified ones, that were made using Chaos Warriors maces and some spikes. That awesome severed head, it's original from the miniature.

Sixth Chaos Knight. Modified steed and knight poses (to look like jumping), sculpted flames. Shield swap and converted helmet. The idea was to make unnoticeable the fact that this and the second knight were the same miniature. For the second I added a hair knot from the Chaos Warriors box, and for this I used metallic horns from a mtd. Chaos Sorcerer. I also swapped the weapon from one of these, for another from a knight with a coverted weapon and a remaining one. Modifying the pose had helped a bit, hadn't it?

Lastly, please take a look at the bases. Every one connects with the base from both sides. It's like a little diorama. Bloody sudoku? Obviously!

Well, I think there are enough pics now. =)
Please feel free to ask whatever you want about these minis, as usual. Critics and comments would be welcomed.

PS: DAMNIT!! I completely forgot to put the unit on its movement tray! Well, it's not such a big thing, but it looks nice on a modular built tray, with four-sided-Graveyard Earth painted-rims! (Thank you PapaJJ!)

BANNER CONTEST FINAL ENTRY!

Woa! As you could have already read, I was selected as one of the 3 finalist of the banner competition held at Dark Future Games. We were asked to modify some little things to our entries and the 3 finals banners can be looked out HERE.

My final entry and modified banner is this:

I worked to "pop" the title a little. Corrected the grammar in the description (missing final point) and even a typo from the previous banner (millennium)! For the title, please don't think I reversed the colours! xD
It's a little bigger, thicker and it's not pure white and black (you can copy and paste in paint, zoom it and you'll notice!). The other thing I corrected was the description, no more italic characters. It does pop out more just as it is, and while changing the description back to normal, I made it a little bigger.

The other things I corrected were the exposition, shadows, highlights blah blah blah
As I said to OST, I won't bore you with such technichal-blah blah! But I hope that the pic speaks for itself!

Well, please take a look to the other entries and express your opinion in the comments section!
Thanks in advice for your support!

See ya soon. I have lots of new miniatures to show!