The Gun Cutter- A mock up

Evening all.  So after some scribbling of ideas and ruminating on the insanity of embarking on what looks to be a huge investment of time, not to mention plasticard... I knocked together a rough mock up out of an old carton and my trusty glue gun.  The point of this is to make sure that it hangs together as a whole and to help me visualise how I'm going to model it.  Judging from the size it looks like it will have to be a modular build so I can store and transport it easily, as the current dimensions are about 55cm long with a 35cm wingspan.

This is actually the second attempt- the first one was way too fat and bulky and looked stupid.  Hopefully this doesn't look (as) stupid, anyway it's pretty close in shape to how i visualise the Gun Cutter described in Dan Abnett's Eisenhorn novels with the hawkish profile and dagger like aspect.

The diagonal bit under the belly is an access ramp which might be intended to house a Chimera or Rhino inside the lower fuselage, that depends on my insanity levels when it comes to cutting the plasticard (I've ordered 8x A4 sheets of the stuff, and I've got a feeling that might not be enough)

The engines, of which there are four will be scavenged from some pod racer toys.  I've seen this done on some Thunderhawk scratch builds and they look spot on for a 40k ship.  I need lots of vertical jets to make the prospect of this huge lump operating in a gravity well at least fairly plausible, because let's face it..... in the grim darkness of the future, there is no aerodynamics.

Looking at the photos I'm questioning the proportions, maybe the fuselage could be longer and or skinnier.... hmmm.  I'll sleep on that, and start buying every imperial flyer bit I can find on ebay for the next few months.

Building a 40k Gun Cutter- Planning

It's been a while since I've done a scratch building project, and after reading Dan Abnett's Eisenhorn Trilogy for the third time I realised that the inquisitors 'Gun Cutter' would make an interesting project. Having a look on the internet and taking a few notes from the books inspired a few points about the craft- it's a void capable craft that can enter planetary atmospheres, it can house 20ish troops and it has berths for about 5 crew. It has three autocannon turrets and it's about 80 metres long.... ok in 40k scale that would make it about 1 metre long but I think I'l stick to about 60-70cm for practicality. After some very rough sketching I have a shape, instead of following the model of the Thunderhawk gunship, I'm going to take my inspiration more from Battlefleet Gothic as this is more of a spacefaring system ship that can land on planets rather than a dedicated lander.

I've got plenty of plasticard on order, and will be making my own resin castings for the more repetitive detail (I'm too lazy to cut out the same pieces over and over again!)

I see this sort of vessel as being a transport for high ranking Imperial agents, dignitaries like navis nobilite and rogue traders, something along the lines of a yacht.  It should make a cool centre piece for my rogue trader themed army.

Crimson Fists Captain Jorge

After a fairly large break in my painting I've been hankering after trying out my painting skills to 'benchmark' them and see what I'm capable of.  When you're painting loads of rank and file troops for an army it's easy to forget about the more sophisticated painting techniques that are saved for special characters and commissions.   So I broke out this plastic Space Marine captain to really flex my painting muscles and here is the result....

One thing I really wanted to try was NMM- that's non metallic metal, and I used this technique on the sword.  As you can see I've used conventional metallic paints elsewhere and it seems to hang together.  The sword is just Revell dark grey blended up to GW Skull White in a way to mimic shining steel.  I'm fairly happy with the result and will incorporate it into future projects.

I'm really trying to up my game when it comes to painting as I felt for a while I'd got into a rut (painting an Imperial Guard infantry company, over a hundred guys in brown overalls was a killer!!) so it's nice to show off a bit and remember that painting minis is meant to be an enjoyable experience!

Crimson Fists Tactical Squad with vintage minis

After another hiatus from blogging I thought I'd show you my most recent paint job... these Crimson Fists are assembled from a motley crew of vintage metal Space Marines and painted to my normal spec Crimson Fists paint scheme that is visible elsewhere on this blog.  I haven't painted much in the last 18 months as my hobby stuff has been packed away in a loft after a succession of house moves,  life keeps getting in the way of the Emperors work, Gah!!

The minis in this squad cover a range of eras, with the smaller looking 'Aquila' Armour guys actually being the first next gen marines that were released in something like 1992.  They were initially available as a boxed set of 15 bolter armed marines called the 'Strike Force', the other figures include some old Blood Angels and cetre stage in the bottom row is a Mk8 Mentor Armoured marine, now that too is a pretty old figure but it's a nice example of Jes Goodwin's exemplary sculpting technique when Games Workshop started going from the standard 28mm scale to the more familiar 28mm' Heroic' scale.  I love the pose on the Mentor armoured marine, he's giving out some tough vibes for sure.

I remember when this boxed set came out (yes I am a wizened veteran) and for my birthday I had the choice between this box and the Terminator boxed set, in the end I went for the Terminators because I already had something like four squads of beakies painted up as Blood Angels by then, but it reminds me of how back then everyone who collected marines had a hotch potch of different minis sculpted in many different styles.  While at the time it was frustrating, it also looked pretty cool, as up to 2nd Edition Warhammer 40k everything tended to have a more anarchic look and feel.