Heretics from the past emerge from the warp!

To remind myself of things I've done in the past, I pulled up some pictures of an army I did several years ago.  Death Guard!

I actually sold this army off and recently bought it back from the generous guy I sold it to.  Thanks again Mike!

This is the gritty direction that I hope to take the Imperial Fists in, sans the weeping open sores and Chaos Stars of course.

Pictures of some First test models

Here are a couple of my first test models.  I've spent severals weeks working on different yellow recipes and how to get the tone I was looking for. Trust me on this one: I think I have tried every acrylic yellow paint made - and more than a few enamels and spray's.  I even tracked down the yellow that Caterpillar heavy equipment used in the past and bought that.

To put it simply , yellow aint fun to work with.

Back to the topic at hand.  The recipe for these two models is similar, but different:

Marine on the left:

Primer: Testors Flat White

Basecoat: Vallejo Golden Yellow

Highlights: Vallejo Sunny Yellow

Marine on the right with the Fist shoulder pad:

Primer: Testors Flat White

Basecoat: Vallejo Sunny Yellow

Glaze: Vallejo Sunny Yellow

The marine on the right was an experiment to try to start with a bright yellow and glaze it down to a slighter deeper tone.

The marine on the left was a classic deep base coat that was brought up to to a brighter highlighted tone on the edges.

Needless to say these approaches were VERY time consuming. Working with yellow isn't something to be underestimated. The time commitment would be fine if I wasn't going the turn and chip up the marines, dirty down the color and basically thrash the underlying color that I worked so hard to create.

Back to the drawing board...

Stay tuned!

The first post

In a sea brimming with great Games Workshop blogs, why start another one?

Great question.

The answer is that this blog is really for my own use to chronicle the creation of a new Imperial Fists 5th Company army. I was going to start a WIP thread on one of the many 40K forums but to be honest they are so busy and that I feel that anything I post will get lost in the chatter. I'd apreciate some honest feedback but don't want to keep fighting to keep a thread I am adding to on on the first page of a forum. I would love comments, and especially critique. I've used to be able to pull of a mean paint job back in 3rd Edition but kids and 'real life' has gotten in the way more than once. Now that I'm making a renewed serious commitment to the hobby I wanted to start a log of my progress to keep the drive alive to finish a painted army.

I have always been taken with the Imperial Fist's look, and back story... but rarely do I see any Space Marine armies painted up in what I think their armor would actually look like while on the battle field. I love well painted armies (heck I like nearly any army as long as it has three colors!) done up in a fresh cartoon-esque style, but that show room new look is just not what I think a Marine would look like when in action crushing xenos and decapitating heretic's in the name of the Emporer and Primarch. A Space Marine in the 40K universe gets the dirtiest of dirty jobs, routinely performing the impossible in extremely hostile environments.

I'm hoping to paint an army that looks the part.

So, with that in mind I endeavor to create an army that looks dirty, chipped and battle worn, bullet riddled and more than likely the odd limb here or there - yet still in action, devout and stead fast. Why else would the Emporer have blessed the Adeptus Asartes with two arms if not to have a spare?

If your choose to follow my slow progress I hope to never disappoint, but that said keep comments, if any, positive. I'm willing to address a short coming with a model or paint job and I'd like to focus on the goal of sharing information on how to pull off a cool conversion, paint job or weathering technique.

For Courage and Honor!