Reinforcements for the Flesh Eaters rumble off the production line this week, in the form of a Forge World resin Deimos Predator.
Painting & Modelling
This is a slightly unusual one as it’s a rescue job – from myself! This Predator has been languishing base coated on my ‘Shelf of Shame’, waiting to join the Imperial Fists since around 2014. Anticipating an upcoming game of my Flesh Eaters against Apologist‘s Silver Stars, I decide to quickly revamp this model to add a bit of firepower to my boys in red.
The LED work on this miniature is incredibly basic by my current standards, as you can see in the picture below. The headlights are cast resin, each with a white LED inside, and these are the only part of the model that illuminates. The battery and switch are accessible via the magnetised front panel. I did consider completely re-doing the LEDs, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort as they were still serviceable. All I did in the end was swap in a fresh CR2032 battery.
I took a lot of influence for the paint scheme from the classic Blood Angels Predator above. I wasn’t aiming to replicate it exactly, but I certainly wanted to capture the Rogue Trader/2nd Edition vibe. My Flesh Eaters are themed around the War of the False Primarch in M33, so the whole army intentionally has a retro feel.
In terms of colour selection, I stuck with my normal Flesh Eaters palette of colours (as detailed in this post). I’ve chosen to limit myself to only green and yellow LEDs in this army. The LEDs originally installed were white, but a quick yellow glaze over the headlights helped to give them a yellow hue that fits in with the rest of the army.
The Imperial Eagle and numerals are transfers that I then painted over in Administratum Grey and Corax White so that they matched the rest of the army’s heraldry. The Flesh Eaters chapter symbol is freehand, as usual. I added the white stripe to the turret to emulate the white stripe on the Flesh Eaters helmets, and also to give a bit of visual interest to what was otherwise a very large area of flat red.
I also applied some damage and corrosion around the bottom of the tank, mainly near the treads. The battle damage was Rhinox Hide applied in spots with a sponge and then highlighted at the bottom to give the appearance of depth. I also applied a little Typhus Corrosion technical paint in areas where I thought dirt and mud might naturally collect.
That’s all for today, I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing this relic from another age! As always, thanks very much for reading, and please don’t forget you can also follow my work on social media at Twitter, Mastodon and Instagram.
Today we’re looking at the Surgeon Acolyte, minion of Fabius Bile. This isn’t the start of a new army and my fall to Chaos (yet), but part of a birthday gift ‘commission’ for a friend. Fabius Bile himself will be following soon, but I wanted to test the LED technique on the acolyte first. Rather than helmet eye lenses, or weapon muzzle flares, LEDs in this miniature are being used to represent ominous glowing vials of daemonic ichor, super soldier serum, or whatever it is you think are in the glass containers on the acolytes’ back. My friend, who will eventually be the owner of this miniature, specifically chose the blue colour for the LEDs.
Modelling & Painting
As with many of my LED techniques, I was looking for a uniform glow from the point of interest – in this case the ‘vials’. After all, it’s not supposed to be a single point light source that is glowing inside them, but rather every part of the liquid they contain that is emitting a sinister glow. This is why I didn’t simply stick two 3mm round LEDs on the model and call it a day, as in that case all the light would have been coming from one visible point (the p-n junction) in the centre of the LED. I’ve written a short-form tutorial for how I achieved the glowing vials below.
I began by cutting off the plastic vials from the back of the model and inserting two 3V blue SMD chip LEDs in their place. These are connected to a battery in the base following the principles set out in my Simple LED Muzzle Flare tutorial.
Next I coiled the excess LED wire on top of the battery holder and filled in the gaps between the dead space marine and the base with modelling putty. It’s good practice to test the LEDs repeatedly at this stage, just to check you haven’t created an accidental short circuit while hiding the wire.
I then cut the rod to the same length as the plastic vials that were originally on the miniature. I used a combination of needle file and sand paper to round off one end, to more closely match the shape of the original vial. The other end was left flat.
The next step was to drill a 1.5mm hole in the centre of the resin rod starting at the flat end, being very careful not to drill all the way through to the rounded end.
I made sure the miniature was base coated at this point, especially around the areas where the resin vials would be attached. I knew it would be easier to glue them to a painted area rather than trying to paint the area after they were stuck down.
Next I applied a thin ring of PVA glue to the flat end of the rod, and stuck it in place over the chip LED. I used PVA rather than super glue to help avoid any accidental frosting effects.
Once the PVA glue had dried, I applied a thin blue glaze to the bare resin to give a pleasing tint to the resin when the LED is switched off.
When it came to painting the miniature, I largely stuck to the official colour scheme as I didn’t have any good inspiration for an alternative. I’ve noted a few of the colour recipes below, in case anyone is interested in replicating them, and as a reminder to myself. The model was undercoated with Chaos Black spray, and all colours mentioned are Citadel, unless otherwise noted.
Sickly Flesh
Rakarth Flesh basecoat
Carroburg Crimson shade
Rakarth Flesh thin layer
50:50 Pallid Wych Flesh:Rakarth Flesh highlight
Pallid Wych Flesh fine highlight
Emperor’s Children Pink dots on finger and toe nails
Bloodstained Surgical Gown
Russ Grey basecoat
Drakenhof Nightshade shade
50:50 Russ Grey:Ulthuan Grey layer
Ulthuan Grey layer
50:50 Contrast Apothecary White:water shade
Skull White highlight
Khorne Red applied with sponge as ‘blood splatter’
Blood for the Blood God technical paint layered over Khorne Red areas
Black Rubber
Abaddon Black basecoat
Eshin Grey highlight
Dawnstone fine highlight
I gave my friend the choice of chapter for the space marine casualty, and he chose Imperial Fists. I think this was a good call as it’s a visually striking choice, plus I have a lot of experience painting yellow power armour. I used my Yellow Armour recipe found in this blog post. I may have actually spent more time painting the space marine than I did the rest of the model!
So there we have it, the Surgeon Acolyte is finished and ready to assist the big man himself! I’ll be back again soon with Fabius Bile, as well as plenty of other LED miniatures. As always, thanks very much for reading, and please don’t forget you can also follow my work on social media at Twitter, Mastodon and Instagram.
Allow me to present “Burn traitor!”, my Imperial Fist vs Sons of Horus mini diorama and entry to the ‘Duel’ category at Golden Demon 2023. This is my second entry for this year’s contest along with the Ultramarines Veteran Sergeant.
Concept
The idea for this miniature diorama came to me shortly before Golden Demon 2022, although sadly too late to build in time for last year’s contest. Long time readers of this blog may recall me talking about my Flesh Eaters Ancient and how I had experimented with filament LEDs to create an “energy beam” effect. I was trying to use the LEDs to give the impression of the energy beams glancing off the armour, but I couldn’t get it to look how I wanted, mainly because the ends of the LEDs with the connecting terminals on them did not glow. That set me to thinking though, what if I could find a use for the LEDs where both ends were hidden, perhaps with the energy beam leaving a gun and entering a target? And so the idea for this duel was born!
I’ve always been a big fan of volkite heat rays ever since we heard about them in the first Horus Heresy books from Forgeworld. You can see my previous attempts to tackle them with LED effects here. I’ve taken a lot of influence from the cover art of the Tallarn: Executioner, which I believe is one of the most iconic representations of volkite weaponry in official GW art.
As a big fan of Imperial Fists and their successors, I knew from the start that the Marine wielding the volkite would be from the VII Legion. As to who they would be shooting, I considered Iron Warriors and Night Lords, both iconic enemies of the Imperial Fists. But in the end, I settled on the Sons of Horus since they are essentially the main antagonists of the Heresy setting. It also helps to make the duel a microcosm of the Horus Heresy as a whole.
Painting & Modelling
The majority of components in this diorama come from the Legion MkVI Tactical Squad kit and the Citadel Skulls set. The volkite charger is the old resin version from Forgeworld, now discontinued in favour of the plastic version, which had been hanging around in my bits box for a while.
The main point of technical interest in the construction is of course the filament LED. These types of LEDs are often used in lightbulbs or similar applications and are available in a variety of colours and voltages, although 240V is the most common. I picked up mine from a seller on eBay who was UK-based and selling many different varieties in small lots. The type used here was 12V. The higher the voltage, the brighter the LEDs tend to be, but there will always be a compromise between brightness and the number of batteries you are willing or able to conceal in a model. In this case I used four 3V coin cell batteries in series to create a 12V source. I did experiment with a 12V ‘A23’ size battery, however I discovered my normal CR2032 coin cells have a much higher milliampere hour (mAh) rating and would therefore last longer. Battery life is obviously a concern for display miniatures, particularly if they must sit in the Golden Demon cabinets for a day or two. The underside of the base is shown below (I’ll talk about the extra battery in a little later).
The circuit used in this model is incredibly basic. A wire runs up from the batteries in the base, through the Imperial Fist’s leg, body and arm, and connects to the terminal at the end of the filament LED which is hidden inside the hollowed volkite. Another wire connects to the other end of the filament LED inside the Sons of Horus’ torso and runs down through his leg and back to the single resistor, switch and batteries in the base. It really is that simple!
A word of caution if you are attempting this yourself – filament LEDs are extremely fragile! They are built around a thin strip of plastic that holds an array of sub-millimetre LEDs. This strip of plastic can not take any real amount of bending or pressure and will snap at the least provocation. If you are using them in a project, I’d strongly recommend buying twice as many as you need, just in case of accidents.
The LED array is surrounded by a coloured ‘gel’ as an outer sheath. This is even softer than the plastic strip and does not provide any protection to the LEDs. Its only purpose seems to be to evenly diffuse the light from the individual LEDs, which it does very well. As a matter of interest, I attempted to peel away the gel from a couple of spare filament LED to see if it was possible to run the LED array without it. I thought it might be useful for future projects if I could insert LED arrays into very thin spaces. However, removing the gel seems to destroy the LEDs, or otherwise prevent them from functioning. I’m not entirely certain why this would be the case, but I thought it was worth mentioning in case anyone else had the same idea.
Before I even assembled the models, I built the circuit using only the bare components, and then allowed it to run for 48 hours, which is about the maximum time I expect this entry to sit in the Golden Demon cabinets. There was a significant drop in brightness after the first 12 hours, but the batteries did struggle through for the entire time. I’ll be taking spare batteries with me, and if the filament LED is looking too sorry for itself on Sunday morning, I will perhaps ask if I can change the batteries. I’m not sure if it will be allowed, but I don’t see the harm in asking!
The circular muzzle flare near the volkite barrel is intended to mimic the concentric rings shown in the Tallarn:Executioner artwork shown above. These rings were slowly and carefully built up by applying tiny layers of acrylic gel around the filament LED, using a fine wire as a sculpting tool.
My original plan for the skull was for it to be entirely lit from below by the end of the filament LED which penetrated the Sons of Horus’ torso. But after testing the circuit, I began to worry that this would not be very effective as the batteries started to run down. This could be a big issue for the diorama as the skull and flames are very reliant on the LED to get the full effect. So I decided to include an extra 1.8mm red LED inside the Marine’s torso to provide some additional underlighting. This is supplied by its own separate 3V battery, making the total hidden in this base five. This separate LED should remain brighter for longer than the filament LED.
The skull is from the Citadel Skulls kit, recast in resin and partially hollowed out to allow for better light penetration. The lower jaw is a plastic component directly from the same kit – I judged it too flimsy to cast separately, and it needed to be separate to achieve the open-mouthed “silent scream” look that I was going for. The skull and jaw are supported on transparent flames built from successive layers of acrylic gel. I was trying to give the impression that the volkite beam had penetrated the Sons of Horus’ power armour and was burning up all the organic matter from the inside. Hopefully that comes across well.
The individual Imperial Fist and Sons of Horus Marines that I’ve posted previously were both painting test models for this project. The painting recipes I used discussed in these posts were reused for this project. The only change I made was switching the ‘under suit’ on both models (i.e. the joints between the armour plates and visible power cables) to the recipe below.
Black Under Suit
Corvus Black basecoat
Mechanicus Standard Grey highlight
Dawnstone fine highlight
I used this recipe on the Ultramarines Veteran Sergeant and was pleased with the look. Also, by standardising the colours of small details like the under suits, leather pouches and weapon casing, I’m hinting that really all Marines are the same underneath. That’s just another part of the tragedy of the Horus Heresy!
I knew from the start of this project that I wanted to use a bare head on the Imperial Fist. It felt important to be able to see his expression to add some emotion to the duel. I wanted it to look like it was personal. The Sons of Horus marine has a skull trophy taken from a Loyalist, so maybe it is…?
I didn’t just want to use a generic “off the sprue” head, so I decided to sculpt some hair onto a bald Space Marine head to give it a unique look. I went with the generic 80s/90s action hero haircut to tie-in with the vibe of the MkVI Marines. I painted his skin tones using my standard go-to recipe for pale Space Marine flesh, which I’ve detailed below. This is the recipe that I’ve also used on my most recent Flesh Eaters Marines. In this case it was painted over a white undercoat, although I normally paint it over a black undercoat.
Pale Space Marine Flesh
Bugman’s Glow basecoat
Reikland Fleshshade shade
Bugman’s Glow layer on all but deepest areas
50:50 Bugman’s Glow:Cadian Fleshtone on all raised areas
Rhinox Hide layer on eyes
25:25:50 Alaitoc Blue:Bugman’s Glow:Lahmia Medium glaze on lower jaw, lower cheeks, and around mouth (ensure glaze has fully dried before proceeding)
25:25:50 Evil Sunz Scarlet:Bugman’s Glow:Lahmia Medium glaze on cheeks, nose and around eyes (ensure glaze has fully dried before proceeding)
25:25:50 Yriel Yellow:Bugman’s Glow:Lahmia Medium glaze on forehead and eyebrows (ensure glaze has fully dried before proceeding)
Screamer Pink layer on tongue
Corax White layer on eyes and teeth
Rhinox Hide dot in centre of eyes
Corax White dot in centre of Rhinox Hide dot from previous step
Cadian Fleshtone highlight on all raised edges, such as nose, cheeks, expression lines, scars, etc.
50:50 Cadian Fleshtone:Kislev Flesh fine highlight on extreme edges to accentuate expression
Additional optional steps
If the Marine has a shaved head, a 50:25:25 Hoeth Blue:Bugman’s Glow Lahmia Medium glaze on the scalp
If the Marine has facial bionics, service studs, or raised scars, a Carroburg Crimson shade around the edges of the feature
I should probably explain about the colour glazes on different areas of the face. From the steps above, you’ll notice that the lower part of the face is glazed blue, the middle glazed red and the top glazed yellow. The glazing is intended to be subtle, but it does add a slight tint to different areas. This is to add a little realism, as different areas of the human face tend to have subtly different shades. When painting male faces, the jaw area tends to have a slight blue-grey tint from stubble, the centre of the face around the cheeks and nose are often red due to high blood flow, and the thinner skin of the forehead can sometimes have a yellow tint. This is one of the many useful tips and techniques for painting that I’ve picked-up over the years from my good friend and fellow Golden Demon competitor, Apologist. If you don’t already follow his blog or Instagram, then I highly recommend checking them out.
I decided on white hair for the Imperial Fist primarily as a homage to Rogal Dorn, but also, I felt it suited the style and vibe of the miniature. My simple recipe for white hair is reproduced below for reference.
White Hair
Corax White basecoat
Apothecary White shade
Corax White highlight on raised areas
Skull White fine highlight on fringe and around temples
The dusty wasteland base is achieved mostly with the Martian Ironearth technical paint, the use of which I’ve discussed previously here. One of the main reasons for choosing this basing scheme was to really emphasise the point that this was not some carefully stage, honourable duel. It’s a down-and-dirty, life-or-death battle in the middle of a hellish battlefield. I’m imaging this taking place in the closing days of the Siege of Terra. The death toll is already unimaginable, Terra has been laid waste, and the Imperials are on back foot, as indicated by the scattering of skulls and abandoned Imperial Fist helmet. The duel itself isn’t a grand triumph for the Imperial Fists and is unlikely to affect the outcome of the battle. It is simply a small victory and moment of personal catharsis for the Imperial Fist amongst an unending tide of horror. But sometimes you have to grab those little moments where you can.
I did experiment with small ruins and other battlefield detritus behind and around the combatants during the build process, but in the end, I felt that too much extra stage dressing detracted from the duel itself. The base used with the final model is a Citadel 90mm oval, but I did start the build with a 90mm circular base. However, once I had the combatants in place, I realised there was just too much “dead space” on either side of the duel. The two Marines need to be very close together due to the length of the filament LED, making the moment captured almost intimate. So again, any set dressing used to fill the 90mm circular space would have detracted from the duel, hence I decided to switch to the oval base. The plinth was purchased from Taro Modelmaker and sprayed Halfords Satin Black.
I hope you’ve enjoyed that summary of my design and build process. If you’re at Warhammer Fest over the weekend, then maybe you’ll spot it in the Golden Demon cabinets. I’ll be sure to post again soon to let you all know how the two entries get on. As always, thanks very much for reading, and please don’t forget you can also follow my work on social media at Twitter, Mastodon and Instagram.
Allow me to present the Ultramarine Veteran Sergeant, my entry to the ‘Warhammer 40,000 Single Miniature’ category at this year’s Golden Demon. So now you know why I haven’t posted many new miniatures since the end of February!
The Road To Golden Demon
I originally started on a different model for the single miniature catergory, but after a few rounds of testing I couldn’t quite get the LED effects to look how I wanted, so I shelved that project and decided to have a re-think. Then, while browsing old rule books for inspiration, I rediscoved the classic art shown below, and was suddenly inspired!
This art was reused a number of times, on everything from colour inserts, book covers, and even on the box art of the short-lived Ultramarines board game. I think it is one of the iconic pieces of Rogue Trader art, so I decided to give it a modern reimaging – with a little added LED magic of course. I did briefly consider planning the whole unit as a ‘Warhammer 40,000 Squad’ category entry, but decided that was a little ambitious in the time available. I decided to concentrate on the veteran sergeant at the front of the unit, as he is definitely the most recognisable part.
Painting & Modelling
Both the sergeant and his fallen comrade are made almost exclusively from the Legion MkVI Tactical Squad kit, with a couple of minor exceptions. The power fist came from my bits box, and I think it’s from an older version of the Space Marine Tactical Squad sprue, and I chose it because it was a closer match to the art. The skull in the fallen marine came from the Citadel Skulls set. The LED helmet eye lenses are achieved using the technique described in my LED Eye Lens Tutorial. I did the same thing for the fire inside the casualty’s skull, only in this case I used an LED from a LED Tea Light to achieve that flickering fire effect. The flames themselves are sculpted from acrylic gel. Both LEDs are connected in parallel and operated by a single switch and coin cell battery. I’ve tested it, and fingers-crossed the battery will last for 48 hours in the Golden Demon cabinets!
My recipes for the Ultramarines blue armour and the silver metallics are below, if anyone is interested. The whole model was undercoated Chaos Black.
Ultramarine Armour
Macragge Blue basecoat
50:50 Kantor Blue:Abaddon Black shade
Altdorf Blue highlight
Calgar Blue fine highlight
Fenrisian Grey fine highlight on top edges and corners
Blue Horror dot highlight
Silver Metallics
Leadbelcher basecoat
Nuln Oil shade in deepest recesses
Gryph-Charger Grey shade
Ironbreaker specular highlight
Runefang Steel edge highlight
60:40 Runefang Steel: White Scar edge highlight on sharp edges and corners
This model included quite a lot of freehand, much of which you can see above. My biggest tip for this type of freehand is to “sketch” the words or shapes with thinned Administratum Grey, and then go back and fill it in more firmly with Corax White. I try to avoid using White Scar, as it’s just to bright. I normally then finish off with a thin glaze of the base colour over the freehand – in this case that’s Macragge Blue. This helps to dull it down a bit and make the insignia look weather-worn and faded. As an aside, while studying the word ‘ULTRA’ on his shoulder, I noticed the font used in the artwork was Times New Roman! It’s good to see some things never change, even in the grim darkness of the far future!
I think it’s also worth discussing the base. Not a lot of the ground is visible in the artwork, so I felt I had essentially free reign. I’ve always interpreted this picture as showing the Ultramarines breaching a wall or fortification, and I’ve tried to echo that feeling with the way the veteran sergeant is clambering over the fortifcations and even his fallen battle brother. There’s no time to commend his soul to the Emperor, the breach is not yet secured!
The ground in the artwork is a red-brown, and I decided to skew red. This was to enchance the “retro” nature of the model, and call back to some of the weird battlefields you saw in White Dwarf in the late 1980s, before everything became uniform green flock grass in the early 90s. Dark red is also quite an 80s colour by itself. This is also why I chose a square plinth for the model, rather than a round one, to further enhance that retro vibe. Now I think about it, I kind of wish I’d put the miniature on a square base!
Red Rock Base
50:50 Rhinox Hide:Gal Vorbak Red basecoat
Seraphim Sepia shade
Gal Vorbak Red drybrush
Wazdakka Red drybrush
Wild Rider Red drybrush
Trollslayer Orange drybrush
That’s it for today, but I should mention that this is the first of two Golden Demon entries that I will be submitting this year, so there will be more from me again soon. As always, thanks very much for reading, and please don’t forget you can also follow my work on social media at Twitter, Mastodon and Instagram.
I’m back on the Seraphon this week as I try to clear some room on the ‘Shelf of Shame’ and complete a unit that I started building in – checks notes – May 2021! This week I finished the third and final Terradon rider, shown on the left in the gallery below.
It’s very satisfying to finally finish this unit after nearly two years, especially as the unit box is weirdly large and taking up loads of room on my shelf. Now that’s done, it’s full-steam ahead on my Golden Demon entries! That’s it for this week. As always, thanks very much for reading, and please don’t forget you can also follow my work on social media at Twitter, Mastodon and Instagram. Finally, if you’d like to see more of my Seraphon project, you can check out my gallery here.
Chris Buxey Paints 