Hey folks!

In between watching episodes of The Office and Spartacus, I managed to finish off painting some models, finalised some modelling and test out Tamiya's Grass Effect texture paint. It's meant for dioramas, but it looks pretty sweet on a Rhino! I also took all of these images on an old piece of scenery I made years ago that I still like. I think it makes the images more interesting.

The Night Lord touch-up project only has six models to go, so once that's out of the way I'll have twenty-one models painted to the following standard:

I'll be glad when they're done. I really think the lens effect sets them apart, and doesn't take too long to apply.

Next up, Tamiya's Grass Effect Paint on my Rhino:

Looks pretty good too! I think the next few tanks I have will have scratches/etc.

Next, the following models are re-takes on some of the Chaos Mercenary models that I worked on a while ago. I didn't like how some of them looked, and thought that they should look closer to their fluff. They didn't really follow any fluff other than "generic Chaos Space Marine", so it was easy to pick out a few details to draw upon.

Also, this first guy is actually a member of the Black Legion. The twist is, he's an Oath-Broken! Cast out by his legion, he finds little more acceptance from the Mercenary troupe. I'd like to think of him as one of the more experienced, yet cursed, members of the group; the primary reason that he is tolerated... He has a hook hand, plenty of war-plate damage and some metal banding on areas of his armour where the damage has been severe enough to impact it's performance. I think he'll add a lot of character to the group:

Next up is a member of the Brotherhood of Darkness. I picked this warband because they seem to have some kind of tie-in with the Night Lords. They also use the same "batwings with a skull" motif as the Night Lords, which allowed me to use a Night Lord shoulder-pad on this model. I also mutated him up a bit and gave him a Power Fist, since I'll be using him as an Aspiring Champion:

Next, a member of the Disciples of Destruction. I saw lots of imagery where they had scrolls, etc, attached to their armour. I replaced the bolt pistol arm with a metal one that had a purity seal on it. I also nipped the sword-arm at the wrist and replaced the rest of the arm with a regular Chaos Space Marine arm. This was mainly to allow for more chest space on the model, to accommodate more scrolls:

Last on the painting front, I finished Hasslefree Clint. He's based on Joel from The Last Of Us, so I painted him up accordingly. I added some blood to his Machete too, since it looks sweet:

Any constructive criticism is appreciated. 

Thanks and good luck!

Hey guys!

Spent a lot of the last two weeks modelling up this Predator. I wanted to go for a more traditional feel for this tank, and so avoided the usual Chaos symbology that would normally adorn Chaos Space Marine tanks. The idea is that this is a Chaos tank, but is not necessarily "tainted" by the warp.

This won't extend to all of my army, as I do have a Defiler that I'll be converting up as much as will make it look good. I just wanted something to fit in with my Night Lord Chosen that was anti-chaos, but also anti-imperial.

This tank has a lot of trophies and grisly parts, fitting in with the Night Lords quite nicely I think. I also "borrowed" Brother Heinrich's idea on having a loyalist Space Marine on the front of the tank. You can see his thread on Bolter And Chainsword here. It is absolutely worth checking out, even if you aren't a fan of Chaos Space Marines.

I stripped the entire tank again when I found stronger nail-polish removed. The results were exceptionally good!

Thinking of bulking up the front of the right arm more, to make it more realistic. I also want to sculpt some armour around the remains of his left leg, and put some spikes through his limbs to explain how he's pinned to the tank, as I don't think that blu-tack is an acceptable answer to that question...

The main parts on this still aren't fully glued together yet, as I still want to do some modelling on the interior.

This is a cultists head from Dark Vengeance. I figured that this is actually something the Night Lords would do, so why not?

I'm quite happy with the turret, even though it isn't very converted. It just looks really nice to have it finished I guess!

This is from the corpse cart I think? I ordered three of these before Christmas, planning to use two on the Predator. I ended up just using one, as I thought that these trophies should all be unique, lending to more realism.

An Elf head, probably from some Ogre Kingdoms box set. I can't remember, but it looks sweet.

The main prize himself, his hands taken, his torso flayed and his legs removed. He is having a bad day.

But at least he didn't lose his head over it, like this guy. Or the Eldar. Or the Ork below.

Speaking of orks, this is a regular fantasy Ork head that I combined with green stuff to make a trophy on a spike. There's some gore around his neck that you can see too.

So there you go peeps, this is the current incarnation of my Predator tank! There's still some work to be done on it before painting can begin. I want to have an interior with ammo stores, and whatever else some be in a Predator tank. Any suggestions or ideas on that would be appreciated! 

I also want to smoothen out the lines between parts of the model, such as the gap you can see in between the two parts that make up the twin-linked lascannon above. I also want to magnetise the Lascannons, finish off the marine trophy on the front, and fix up the green stuff that's holding the main Lascannons in place. I couldn't stand how they were able to move up and down, as they would always point downwards for obvious reasons. Bleh.

I'll likely be putting a similar effort into my other tanks before I start painting them. I figured that there's no reason to not customise all of them, as they are big centre pieces of my army. I'm also currently painting up my Hasslefree Clint and going through 21 Night lords again, this time painting up their eye-lenses with a technique I saw in one of GW's painting books and going over any areas I missed when highlighting. The latter isn't taking as long as you'd think and is yielding awesome results!

Anyway, until next time, g'luck!