Thursday 22 September 2016

Space Fleet - Full tyrannid force


AAAhhhh, the sense of achievement when you finally finish an army ! It's been a very long time since I last tasted that sweet taste. And It's probably the first time in my life I've managed to make it happen in a day !

You might recognise those from an earlier post where I was shamelessly showing off bare lead and exposing plans for the future... Well Thantsants' report about his Space Fleet games at BOYL were enough to ignite a fire in my heart.

Space fleet is a very dear subject to me as I've already said HERE and HERE and for some reason I've decided to start with my Tyrannid fleet.


This was the occasion for me to test new techniques and ways to paint I rarely use.
I started everything with a basecoat of blueish grey witch I zenithal sprayed over with white (nothing new so far).
You can note how I carefully glued the mounts in place and masked them with tape to avoid the frost of the glue and paint (I wanted to keep them clear if possible).


I then started to work with all the washes I had, combined with lahmian medium (one at a time though) and glazes where I thought I could use some. Colours I used were : Crimson Carrobourgh, Baal red, orange, blue and purple washes, Nuln oil and red and green glazes.
I just finished by picking a few details like eyes and... things that look like eyes in green and that was all really. Easy job. All models had been primed before but the actual painting only took me half an afternoon and a size 2 brush.


You can see the result above after the first washof 50/50 lahmian medium and crimson carrobourgh, the very organic look I wanted to achieve was already shaping up.

Now let's take a look at the different ships one after the other.

Hiveships

Those weird squids looking like alcoholic livers with tentacles are very flat and hence quite tricky to photograph. I tried to use the textures as much as I could and gve as much variations as I dared to avoid making it too boring. Fun sculpt even though a bit week with traces of tools in the putty and many finger prints.




Dark Prowlers : 

These giant void moths are pretty fun too (and desperately flat too). For some reason, they have gigantic eyes (probably they're huge translucid bays tyrannids can loo through when they feel like it to enjoy the beauty of the stars...)



Doomripper Krakens

The Space Vacuum cleaning leeches of the fleet. very nice sculpts, simple but elegant, given the flat surfaces on the sides, these might be the ones for which the technique worked the least but they're still OK in my book though.




Drones

Giant phallic interceptors. Every single one of them is shaped like a giant phallus with a pair of testicles (except the monoball sculpt). I have to say they're the ones I had the most pleasure to paint. Throwing washes at them just made them look even better and a few glazes here and there really made some pop. I'm eager to replicate what I learnt on these guys elsewhere.




Spore mines

Same thing here, those spores were like a solid promise of total boredom but they finally came out as fun little things to colour, especially the ones on the right.


Will I play them in a near future ? Most probably no. Will I play them one day ? Well, if I manage to make BOYL 2017 a reality, this could very well happen yes ! Or I could also paint my imperial force and invite a friend over...

Anyway, there are plenty of opportunities and they clearly haven't been painted in vain !

34 comments:

  1. These look great JB. An exercise in efficient and very effective painting. The white spray over the basecoat is not something I'd have thought of, it worked a treat.

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    1. The white over blue worked a treat, a cheap way to get a good definition right from the start. It makes the washes work more easily and gives an weird unerlying tone.
      Cheers !

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  2. They're a fleshy, pastel treat! This approach is so much more sensitive and pleasing than the saturated purple and green colours I recall from White Dwarf. Excellent!

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    1. Well I was actually surprised to see the sculpts actually had plenty of details and textures the previous PJ had totally ignored ! Working with washes was very cost -efficient here, not sure I can replicate it with the imperial force though ^^

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  3. They look fantastic -- I think the mines and the moths are my favourites; the wash technique seems to suit the detail on the sculpts and I like the colour choices a lot.

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    1. Mines were unexpectedly fun but my fave are the drones really. Thanks a lot !

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  4. You Have to teach me
    This game I missed... Bad feeling with BFG but I think rules are completely different no?

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    1. Completely different games really. Space fleet is very easy and can be gradually upgraded to something really complete. I'm eager to play again !

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  5. They look fantastic. You are going to have a lot of great looking games with them.

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    1. Well I owe a good bit to you for those. This makes me eager to get working on the rest !

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  6. An intelligent bit of painting there JB, giving those models precisely the amount of attention that they require. Slick.

    You are developing quite a set of speed painting skills.

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    1. As a matter of fact I realise I am, I know I've dropped the level a few times here and there lately to see where I wanted to be in this eternal compromise between quality and quantity. It seems the spot changes places depending on the project but this one is right where I wanted it to be. They could be greater, no question but it would take a lot more time for a little morevisual effort I reckon.

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  7. I was very sceptical about how this project would turn out, given the nature of the sculpts - but I should have known by now not to underestimate the power of The Asslessman. You did good kid, real good.

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    1. Wow, that kinda hurts, you doubting my ability to melt the failed models and denying to th eface of God that they ever existed...
      Thanks anyway.

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  8. Sweet Jesus on a wheelchair ! Awesome ! I was eagerly waiting for you to finish the beauties and I have to admit this is far from disapointing.
    THe models and paintind are awesome. Nice green touch on the eyes ! Hope these guys will soon be on a battlefield.

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    1. I just need to paint another army ! Easy right ?

      cheers mec !

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  9. Funny how modern Nids have more vagina-shaped sphincter while those old beasts are more like anus-shaped holes...

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    1. Well those surely are quite peculiar and the penis shaped drones aren't the least weird !

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  10. Wow those look amazing! Love the cohesive scheme across the fleet and those green eyes contrast brilliantly with the pastel pinks and blues. Fingers crossed we can make this happen at BOYL 2017! My only concern is getting everything we've chatted about done in a day!

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    1. This is team work, I'm not too worried !
      Thanks a lot for kickstarting me. ;)

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  11. Great work, particularly on the "eyes".

    And those dark prowlers could be used as beasts in a 28mm game...

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    1. Honestly the eyes on the giant moths look like crap but it's a good enough standard for wha I had in mind really !
      thanks !

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  12. Very nice! Credit for getting them all painted to such a high standard. I agree with Captain Crooks - these sculpts could so easily look pants with a less than stellar paint job.

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    1. Aha, thanks but believe e the standard is not that high, it's just cheap techniques really ! The sculpts have their flaws but they also have assets. they just require you work with them instead of against them.

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  13. These look sublimely gribbly! ^^

    I remember when BFG was first released (I think I was about 14 at the time), I built a load of Tyranid bioships from Milliput based on images from the old Tyranid artwork (such as from Doom of the Eldar). I was rather proud back then on how the prehistoric cephalopod, ammonite and trilobite ships turned out. :3

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    1. Fun ! They're surely something I'd love to see !
      thanks!

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  14. F%&k, man, you made these look awesome, and that's not particularly easy! They are not easy sculpts, your technique here worked outstandingly. This post reminds me all the ships I still have to paint, glups...

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    1. Loose washes work well with organic textures I think, I'd like to see them in front of your ork fleet !

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  15. Beautifully organic looking set you've painted there, I just wish Space Fleet items wasn't so damned expenisve these days :cry:

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    1. Cheers, it's true you have to wait for opportunities or prices can be stupid, average rates aren't completely off though and not as hard as the ones for some of the BFG stuff really.
      Thanks a lot !

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  16. Oh just wow! Your colour scheme for this piece is now my de facto go-to reference piece ... so beautiful.

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    1. What colours did you use? Again wow!

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    2. Oops never mind ... I just saw them in the post above. Did I say wow?

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    3. Cheers ! There's quite a lot to read honestly !

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