Hobby Showcase: Horrors of Tzeentch

Last week saw me modeling and painting vigorously, in order to get ready for a team tournament at my local hobby store.  My brother and I teamed up, him taking 750pts of storm shield/thunder hammer wielding Dark Angels Deathwing terminators and me taking another 750pts of Tzeentch demons.  Full interactions were allowed amongst team members (as long as the specific letter of the rule in each codex allowed them).  There were hordes of ork boyz benefiting from 5+ force field saves as well as apothecary granted 'feel no pain' rolls, and there were tyranids bursting forth from dark eldar webway portals aplenty.  For our part, my brother and my gimmick interaction was 2+/3++ terminators re-rolling saves from the presence of Kairos Fateweaver.  The day was close fought and we ended up walking away with a 2nd place finish, just 4 points behind the leaders.

My spate of painting added five new horrors to the ranks of my Tzeentch demon army.  As I discussed in an earlier post, horrors live a life-cycle with a dazzling array of colors at each stage.  This squad is no exception as there is one newborn blue, a pale horror ancient and horrors at life-stages in between.

With his prominent horns and pale pink skin, this horror is an "ancient."  Once suitably long-lived, horrors' pink skin bleaches until nearly alabaster.  An ancient horror is only one step from ascension to the rank of herald and a further boon of intelligence and power from his master Tzeentch.

Modeling and painting warp bases is incredibly fun.  With each new base I try to push my boundaries (and possibly sanity) by creating new and even more chaotic bases.

I wanted to paint the horror ancient's mouth blue to suggest that though he is close to attaining greater power, he is also at once flirting with a fall to regression and a new start as a blue horror.

I love this model.  The horror as a raving lunatic is never more apparent than in this one's manic demeanor.  I chose to paint the flame in the horror's hand light green to create a stark contrast against the dark blue of his flesh.

This is by far my favorite painted horror to date.  Between the writhing warp on his base and his angsty, closed fish gesticulations, this horror truly epitomizes the often awkward and frantic transition from adolescence to maturity.

The horror's skin transitions from purple to magenta, and then finally to pale pink at the top of the model.

Purple freckles litter the haunches and flank of this horror, suggesting the horror's hurried transition from young purple to adult pink.

I painted this purple horror in deep shades with accentuating highlights of light purple.  The sharp contrast between light and dark creates a striking look and helps contrasting details like his tongue and eyes to stand out.

Once again, freckles appear on a horror.  This time, however, the freckles are in reverse, pale pink radiating from the model's face and down its back and tentacles.

All the horrors painted to date, along with the Changeling.  Kairos Fateweaver is on my painting desk now, so stay tuned to see him when he's finished!

Exclusive Monster Lab Member T-Shirts!

Last month, on two separate occasions, we gave away official Midwest Monster Lab t-shirts to a few lucky members.  The shirts that were given away then will ultimately be available for purchase this spring through this blog and in-store at 31st Century Games & Hobbies.  So, if you feel like you missed your chance in the drawing, you will still be able to get your hands on an official Lab shirt!

Last month's giveaways were to show our appreciation to those who have taken the time to become a member of the Lab and outwardly show their support.  Everyone who comes to view this blog, member or no, is greatly appreciated, but being a member puts a name (albeit a possibly fake one) to those who read and enjoy the blog's content.  I highly recommend becoming a member, because like last month, we'll continually be giving away free t-shirts to blog members.

The 2012 member t-shirt hasn't hit the presses yet, and it's already an absolute favorite of mine. I think it speaks for itself.

Each month from January on, a Monster Lab member will be randomly selected to receive an exclusive member's only t-shirt.  I'm really excited about these shirts, as they are a lot of fun and will be produced in very limited quantities.  Only twelve of each design will be given away, one for each month of the year, before that year's design is retired and a new one takes its place.  Also, these shirts will not be sold to the public, so winning one is extra special.

Later this month I'll be announcing the lucky winner of January's member t-shirt drawing, so click the "Join this Site" button below the blog roll and become a member of the Midwest Monster Lab for your chance to win this month and all year long!

Dark Angels The Fallen: Belial

This Saturday my local hobby store 31st Century Games & Hobbies is hosting a 40k team tournament.  The stipulations are that each team member should bring a list not in excess of 750 points and are obliged to include the compulsory HQ and two troops choices.  That's nothing out of the ordinary, but what is is that full interaction will be allowed between team members' armies.. yes, you can buff your teammates units, your models can ride in their transports, and independent characters can join any squad they so choose (all these interactions hinge upon the letter of the rule in each codex).  The possibilities are huge.

Nearly a month ago my brother and I got wind of this and began to hatch our plans.  We decided that I would field Eldar and he chaos marines, lots of shooting and bad-A close combat.  We even played a practice game against a mutual friend, which we resoundingly won.

Our scheme was set, but after a night of New Year's drinking and dice rolling (not of a hobby gaming nature for a change) he proposed an idea that smacked of true genius... 

But sadly I can't tell you here what he hatched that night because it would tip our hand too early before the tournament.  What I can do is show you a model I converted specially for him and the occasion.

This is Belial, Master of the Deathwing.  For those who aren't familiar with Dark Angels, Belial is the special character in the army that unlocks terminators as troop choices.

Ok, so this may not the Belial you might have been expecting. This model represents Belial's turncoat counterpart (name pending), as my brother will be fielding a deathwing terminator army for his half of our 1,500pts.

The base model for the conversion ultimately fell to either Lysander's or Driago's models.  I suggested that Driago's knightly heraldry and book/sword motifs would mirror nicely the same heraldry as the Dark Angels, so we went with him.  

With the model in hand, the first order of business was to shave off or green stuff fill anything that either appeared too Grey Knighty or too loyalist.

Driago's model was an ideal fit because "Belial" will also be armed with a thunder hammer and storm shield. Still, Driago is armed with a force weapon/storm bolter on the arm he should be holding his hammer with, so a bit of conversion was in order.  I thought that I would deviate from the typical hammer design and represent something a little more majestic and possibly a tad more sinister.  I decided upon a spiked mace that incorporates an odd mixture of order and chaos elements.

To create the mace I built its base upon a brass pinning rod and Dark Angels' censer.  To create the spikes I trimmed pieces of excess Citadel Finecast sprue down to a number of varied points, first by cutting with an xacto blade them filing them with a hobby file.  With the chaotic portion taken care of, I added either a dreadnought or terminator statue (I'm not sure from which) to the top of the mace and attached a flowing streamer to the haft.  The streamer is a piece of a wizard's robe from the Empire Wizard's boxed set.  To create the power cell I cut a Tau Fire Warrior belt accessory in two and filed its side to fit the brass rod.  A little green stuffing finished where I cleaned off Driago's storm bolter and connected the mace to Belial's arm.

If all goes according to plan, "Belial" and his nefarious confederates will be putting the hammer down on our opponents this weekend (quite literally).

Winter Works in Progress

There have been a ton of projects cluttering my table as of late.  Long gone are the days when I would focus all my energies on the completion of a single army (I completed each of my previous armies, first, Iron Warriors, then Night Lords, then Biel-tan Eldar before moving on to the next).  I attribute this to when I got serious about sculpting last summer and scratch built three Dark Eldar grotesques.  The nature of working with Green Stuff modeling putty is that you should let it dry before working on an adjacent piece of the model to avoid ruining detail and leaving prints.  So, after fifteen minutes of sculpting I would have a couple hours to burn before beginning work on the models again.  Presented with this quandry, I stared working on other projects to fill the time, and so ended my career as a one project hobbyist.

Now my table is consistently cluttered with everything from demons to space marines, Eldar to Tau and with projects ranging in diversity from display boards to custom built bases.  It's great to be working on such a wealth of projects because it keeps hobbying fresh, though the danger is that one good idea may get shelved for another.  I tend to appreciate multi-hobbying for its former aspect and the creativity it brings.

With that said, let's take a look at what's currently on my desk.

Having recently completed my first squad of pink horrors for my Tzeentch demons army, I've moved on to flamers.  What really makes these little beasties cool is that their bases are the flooring from the manufactorum building boxed set, and each flamer has a specific place on the display board that I began building in October.

Another project that ties in with the display board is the creation of a large number of green stuff modeled warp bases.  This one here belongs to the demon army's general, Kairos Fateweaver.  Due to the base's 60mm size and the prominence of Kairos' position in the army I went to town lavishing on the details.  There's tentacle aplently, a few eyeballs, and a couple of gaping maws to give the feeling that potential in the warp is coalescing to form something truly nasty.

Here is Kairos himself, newly attached to his custom built base.. he almost looks to be summoning the abomination at his feet into existence.

There are two other notable works in progress cluttering my desk that I wish I could show you, but in the spirit of anonymity, I can't speak about them.  What I can say is that, come late July and if all things go golden, then there will be some added hardware taking up space next to my demon army.

Here's a look at my first commission work, paid for at the price of a free dinner by one of my good buddies who plays Blood Angels.  He said that he wanted a shoulder pad for his Knights of Blood librarian which incorporated a skull with horns and bat wings.

I went to town on Dave's shoulder pad, and in the end, it was quite large.  Though I kept trimming the wings, they still ended up being pretty obtrusive and on this test model, the pad would only fit on a downward directed arm and only if the adjacent vent on the model's backpack was cut off.  I texted him these pics and he said he loved it, so I'm counting that as a first commission job well done.

Hobby Showcase: Pink Horrors

First things first, I'd like to announce the final two winners of the Lab's December Fan Appreciation Month:  War Tales and Marshmallow Scallops (aka Stew Reed)!  War Tales runs the blog A Bunch of Tactical Whatevers as is doing a pretty bang up job over there, I highly recommend checking out his site.  Stew is a local hobbyist and has been wargaming for some years now.  He has a sizeable Salamanders marine army and is currently working on a fledgling Tyranids army.  Both War Tales and Stew will be receiving a free Midwest Monster Lab t-shirt for their prize, congratulations to both!

Now, on to the models.  I have been working diligently on an all Tzeentch demons army and am proud to finally post pictures of the first complete models.  You may remember having seen some of these guys make appearances in earlier posts in varying degrees of completion as they've been a featured in terrain building and painting tutorials alike.

The Changeling was a must take for my army, the ability to disrupt enemy shooting aside, his model was simply too cool to pass up.  Though I stayed true to the core aspects of the codex paint scheme, I wanted to utilize a few key aesthetic aspects that would really make him pop.  The fade from bright blue at the top of the model to dark blue at the bottom, makes the dark depths of his cowl a focal point, drawing the eye and making his identity more ominous.  Another touch was the transition flames in his left hands.  I chose to paint the flames moving from a lime green to light blue to show off the Changeling's magical prowess and add an aura of otherworldliness to the model.  The lighting effects emanating from the flames were my first attempt at that technique and was a really fun learning experience.

All the models for my demon army will fit into the display board that I detailed in October and November's posts, and as such, have bases that fit into where they will be placed on the display.  The squad featured in this post all are standing on the trail of warp energy that is flowing from the temporal rift.  I decided that I wanted to make the warp energy really chaotic.  To represent this I green stuffed tentacles, waves, and undulations into each of the bases along with bitz from various chaos kits (chaos spawn, demon prince, and chaos lord kits).  Another feature of the warp energy are screaming souls, shifting color patterns, and swirling eddies.  It's a tall order to represent something as esoteric as warp energy, but a rewarding prospect all the same.

One of the coolest aspects of the army's cohort of pink horrors is that there are horrors at the varying life stages of that demonic species.  A "newborn" pink horror is actually known as a blue horror, and is, well, blue!

As a blue horror matures, it's skin color gradually begins to take on a shade approaching its final hue.  Here a horror is no longer the newborn shade of blue, but transitioning to the rich purple of "childhood."

As a horror reaches adolescence his color begins to more closely resemble a fully matured member of his species.  The skin color of an adolescent is darker than pure pink, more of a magenta.

This horror is getting quite near to full maturity.  As you can see on one side of his body it is still the adolescent magenta, while the other is pink.  If he's lucky he'll grow to look like..

THIS!  Here is a fully matured pink horror who has rightly deserved the name.  A hallmark of his maturity is not only his pale pink skin, but the prominent protrusion of two horns.  This is the epitome of what every horror wants to be, but all good things must come to an end, and the cycle begins again.

For whatever reason:  death, reproduction or otherwise, a pink horror will produce more blue horrors by sloughing off their old skin.  Previous Games Workshop fiction and game play represented the death of one pink horror with the production of two less substantial blue horrors (though those rules have been done away with, the fiction still remains in the Demon's codex and rule book). 

I still have plenty of horrors to paint, along with:  flamers, soul grinders, and even Kairos Fateweaver himself, so stay tuned for more demons!

Hobby Spotlight: John Vas' Grey Knights

A couple of days ago, I had the opportunity to sit down with John Vas and take a close look at his Grey Knights.

John is definitely lavishing on the details for his Grey Knights, and  nowhere is his keen eye more apparent than on his Castellan Crowe.



Crowe has a painstakingly embroidered cloak which features a pencil thin border and dagger motif.





It's with Crowe's sword that John really stepped out of the box and pushed himself, here he is to explain how he went about painting it, "the fluff behind Gerran Crowe's sword is that it is demonic and that only he can wield it, so to represent that, I wanted to give it a shimmering effect.  What I did was put down a base of Dheneb Stone, then a layer of Skull White, making sure it was nice and bright.  Next I used the Asurmen Blue wash.  In the sword there's a lot of grooves, rune writing, and I had to go over it three times with the wash, dribbling the wash into the grooves, letting it dry, then doing it again until it was really dark.  After that I went with the Warlock Purple and stippled around the edges of the runes and then further out from that with the Enchanted Blue, doing all of that before taking white again and lightly brushing it on the very inside of each rune's edge to give the sword the feeling of contained power."




With non-metallic metals sweeping the hobby scene, John is sticking with metallic paints, and to great effect. His Inquisitor Coteaz is a prime example off his skill at building depth and highlighting with metallics.



"I start with Calthan Brown, you should always basecoat with a brown for golds, then a layer of Dwarf Bronze.  Next I apply shining gold, which is great because it's pretty translucent and the bronze underneath

December Winners and a Look at the New Lab T-Shirts!

The first winners for Midwest Monster Lab's Fan Appreciation Month have been randomly selected, and they are... drum roll...

Heavy D6 and Oink! Heavy D6 is a fledgling blogger who has done his own review of the new Necron Codex and Oink is none other than the proprietor of Oink's Overambitious Terrain Project(s). Congratulations to both! More winners will be announced throughout the month, so become a member of the Midwest Monster Lab today for you chance to win!

But what exactly did they win ? Each will be receiving an official Midwest Monster Lab T-shirt!

The Monster Lab shirts just hit the presses, and over the weekend I received into my possession the first of each of the new designs. Let's take a look.

Here, Andrew Brown, a local hobbyist and good friend, is wearing the first design that will be available to the public for sale. The design is a spin off of the I Love New York logo and is already a huge hit with local gamers and hobbyists alike.

I'm showing off a cool contemporary design that places Poly in the lower corner of the shirt with the rest of his silhouette wrapping around the side.

Joe Suber, the owner and proprietor of my local game store 31st Century Games & Hobbies, is proudly sporting the third design, showing Poly exclaim which hobby blog is his favorite (admittedly he is a bit biased).

When the t-shirts go on sale each design will be available in Men's and Women's sizes and colors. Men's shirts will come in white, black, and lime green, and women's will come in white, mint, and pink.

Shirts are not yet available for purchase, but are being given away to members this month for free! Be one of the first to own the Lab's official T-shirt and become a member today! As always, membership is free, simply click the join in the member's box on the right side of this blog.