40K Hobby Weekend – Fireblarney’s Salamanders

It’s been a bit of a slow patch hobby wise and my German force for Flames of War arrived so I started assembling them for the slow grow league. I still managed to finish off gluing the pieces I want glued on the Dread and now that the transfers have arrived I’ll start adding them to shoulder pads.

I’ve finished the shading on the 3rd Intercessor squad, but I decided to move on to assembling the Venerable Dreadnought from the Start Collecting box to break things up a little.

I started off just doing the basic assembly on the torso and the legs. With the torso I had to cut down one of the sarcophagi chambers in order to get the conversion plate to fit. Upon adding it the body piece I found that the marine body sculpted on it was preventing a flush fit, so a bit of careful clipper work and some filing I got enough clearance for a flush fit.

The shin plates were also going to be an issue on their own, so I ended up just mounting them on a set of the existing plastic plates provided which has basically just added a thin layer of armour plating below the conversion piece.

I’m going to start work on the arms, but It’ll be back to sorting through the wife’s Space Wolves bits looking for a multi-melta I can fit. I’m sticking with the theme of flamers and meltas for the Salamanders.

I had a bit of a break yesterday after the Hobby Weekend, but got started up again today. The title pretty much says it all.

I started the day magnetising the Redemptor Dreadnought. I had a bit of a mishap with the main weapon arm, and while it still holds I’m thinking a collar of green stuff will fix the issue. I’ve touched up the primer coat since the photos.

As I was finishing off that, the postie arrived and my parcel from Spellcrow arrived. The cloaks (I got 5) I’m planning on using on the captains and lieutenants. The loincloths (10) I’m adding the squad sergeants to the mix. The tactical squad from the Start Collecting box will be getting five out of the ten shoulder pads and I’ll pick up another set of some sort of old school marine squad for them. The dreadnought from the Start Collecting box will also be getting some Salamander bits.

Finally I’ve knocked over the base coat of Waaagh! Flesh on the power armour. I’ve got an extra day off up my sleeve this week thanks to a public holiday so I’m planning to get a decent amount of work done on them.

Had a later finish at work today, but still got a good two hours in before I’ve decided to call it quits for the day.

I’ve managed to finish off the shoulder pads for the second intercessor squad and get the basing done. I’ll do a bit of a touch up around the base edges tomorrow and with any luck my Forgeworld decals should turn up and I can get some chapter badges and squad numbers sorted out.

This initial flame is put on with Mephiston Red. The second step is a coat of Evil Sunz Scarlet slightly on the inside of the first colour. The third and fourth steps are Vallejo Light Orange (don’t really have the right GW orange) and finally Yriel Yellow getting slightly smaller each time. I’ve changed the flame simply to mark out the different squads.

I use the same colours for the lava on the bases though I worry less about drying time and will apply it while the previous coats are still a little wet. The bases themselves are just an Army Painter black basing grit, with a small amount of brown cork mixed through. I’ll drop the odd Army Painter wasteland tuft on as well before they’re done.

Finally a quick shot of the squad awaiting they’re final touch up.

Only managed around 2 hours tonight, but only one more day of work to go so I’ll push for a little more work tomorrow night. Managed to finish off the final layer of highlighting today, except for a couple of quick hits on the bare faces with a slightly lighter grey. I’m going to have to go back in tomorrow and clean a few bit up, got a bit tired and sloppy at the end. Still getting to grips with edge highlighting so some of it is a little thick, though when it’s not zoomed in under a light box it’s looking fine.

The first image is from before this layer, the second is after. Although as I type this I’m realising I forgot to do the cording over his shoulder pad, but I’ll just hit that quickly tomorrow.

Final highlights are done with: Liberator Gold on the eagles/skulls etc, Tuskgor Fur on the pouches and holsters, Stormhost Silver on metallic areas, Wild Rider Red on the Seals, White Scar on the Parchment and Moot Green on the armour.

I also decided to pull out the airbrush and prime the tactical squad and the Redemptor dreadnought from the Apocalypse box. I’m going to end up magnetising the gun options and possible to body to the legs on this guy. (Again terrible photo of the dread, but it’s just a prime coat 🙂 )

I’ll be either sleeping or at work for the beginning of the Hobby Weekend, but I figured I’d best squeeze a start in between shifts so I’ve glued the tactical squad together. I’ve held off on five shoulder pads so I can add them on once the resin pieces come in for a bit of variety through the unit and the rest I’ve mixed as much into them as I can. Being Salamanders I’ve gone for as much flame/meltas as I can giving the Sergeant a Combi-Flamer, the special weapon a flamer and the heavy a Multi-Melta I was able to scavenge from one of my wife’s Long Fang sprues. Apologies for the quality of photos, I’ve got a 8 hour turn around between shifts and couldn’t be bothered heading down to the hobby room :).

A couple of them will need a little more cleaning but I’m happy with the mix of poses/equipment. Tomorrow I’ll probably get these primed and finish off the Intercessor squad I’ve been working on. Depending on her homework my daughter will be joining me beginning her Start Collecting Thousand Sons box. I may have to glue the wife’s Stormwolf together so she can work on that as well.

Sat down after work yesterday to finish off the base coating for a second unit of Intercessors and going through and fixing the backpacks on the current unit. As you can see in the picture it’s given them a much less fluorescent look to the Salamanders which I instantly came to prefer.

I was considering sitting down and beginning to assemble my Start Collecting box today, however once I’d bought my digital ticket and settled on Salamanders I started looking around for some conversion pieces. I’ve never really felt the urge to convert anything before so I have exactly zero bits boxes. After a bit of a google search I ended up ordering some Salamandra/Dragon Space Knight bits from Spellcrow. Specifically some cloaks, tabards, one set of shoulder pads and a dreadnought conversion kit, so I’m kind of holding off on the chance that they turn up before hand. I also after much deliberation (Australian Forge World pricing and postage is a killer) I’ve gone and picked up a set of Salamander decals as well, can’t see them turning up till Monday at the earliest though.

Assembling put on hold I ended up putting in a good two hours of painting after dinner and I’ve finished off the shade coats and got all but two marines finished with the first highlight coat on the power armour. The following pictures show roughly my process in getting them to this point, again I’m just following the citadel app for the recipes and muddling through as well as I can.

Prime coat down with an airbrush using a Vallejo black primer

Base colours done. Power armour with Waaagh! Flesh, Imperial crest with Retributor Armour, Gunmetal with Leadbelcher, Black areas with Abaddon Black, Purity seals with Mephiston Red and Parchment with Rakarth Flesh.

Shading is done with Nuln Oil on the Armour and Gunmetal areas, the seals and parchment are done with Agrax Earthshade and the Crest with Reikland Fleshshade.

This final shot is a marine with the power armour first highlight completed (on the left) next to a shaded marine. The highlight coat is done with Warpstone Glow. I’ve been watering it down a touch and basically over brushing with downward strokes to apply it, as it drys I move any pooling areas around or spread it out slightly to try to get a sort of opaque layer. It’s something I need more practice with, but I already feel with this second unit I’m getting the effect I’m looking for a little easier than the first one.

That’s it for today, fingers crossed my bits turn up in the mail tomorrow. Otherwise I’m going to push to get these guys finished off after work.

With the launch of 40K apocalypse and the battalion boxes I picked up one of the Space Marines boxes and a couple of the Tyranid boxes intending the shelve the Space Marines until after I had finished off 3000 points of Nids.

However once I decided to pick up a Hobby Weekend ticket the Tyranids got put to one side and I decided to go with Salamanders. (I’m currently 32 books into the Horus Heresy and it was a toss up between them and the White Scars).

When it comes to paint recipes I’m following the citadel painting app (before anyone says anything I’m putting it down to failing eye sight but I swear I saw the backpacks as green up to when I looked at the app again this morning after looking up some Salamander related stuff.)

I’ve knocked over one squad of intercessors so far (though they need to have their backpacks redone now 🙂 )and I’ve had my first real crack at freehand work with the flames on their right shoulder pads. I know it’s pretty basic stuff, but I’m happy with the end result. I’ll put some step by step posts up over the next few days, but for the moment this is where I’m sitting in regards to paint scheme and basing.

I’ll set up the lightbox and get some better quality photos with the official hobby weekend backing next time too.