# Hephesto's other WIPS



## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Well, my word bearers are on halt again.....I just don't have the time to
paint whole squads right now. Especially if the army has two 12 men 
squads.

So instead I figured I would spend some time on a few other minis on 
which I can dabbled whenever I do end up having some spare time.
First up is a diorama I've been saying I would do for as long as I had the 
mini for Inquisitor Gideon Lorr. 

Since he has 3 veteran guardsman I figured I'd best start working on
these, so here are the wips of the first 2. First up an Elysian-style veteran,
build from catachan bits and the head of a sentinel driver.










And secondly a vostroyan veteran made from the very cool vostroyan
sniper that can out around the Medusa V campaign. I couldn't resist buying
this model, but it has been sitting idle on a shelf ever since. But no longer,
a bit of slice 'n dice and 1 wip veteran coming up. The cloack still needs 
quite a bit of work, but at least it is starting to look smooth right now. Still
find it very strange that a citycamo sniper would have a camocloack that 
also has leaves on it :wink: 











I'm working on the third veteran as well as ideas for the scenic base, looks
like a lott of work but if all turns out well it should end up great.


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## blkdymnd (Jan 1, 2007)

good stuff man, I like the second one alot.


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## jigplums (Dec 15, 2006)

excellent work, i especially like the line of the second cloak


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## waenchile (Jan 23, 2007)

i like the first one.....so your arming them with shotguns...hmmm *makes mental note NOT to battle you"


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Not much choice on the shotguns, they're going to join Gideon Lorr the
special edition Inquisitor. His rules state that he has 3 guard veterans
wearing carapace armour and armer with frags, kraks and a shotgun.

These models are just for fun, but something tells me that I'll be revisiting
the Inquisition somewhere in the future. They are expensive, but they 
have a lott of great models. Quite a lott of fun on the conversion side as
well.

Here's a new picture of the last veteran, still very wip and still need
quite a bit of work, but I'm very pleased with how he's turning out.
The 'mutant guardsman' is also very WIP, but this is the general idea/post
I'm going for with this guy and his position in the diorama;










And comments, suggestion or ideas for other stuff are very welcome!


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Well finally some more progression, its coming together rather slow but
at least it is coming together. So here're some new pics;


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Very nice. I love the first guy, very drop troopy. I think you should do a little bit of work on your =I= though, otherwise he may look out of place a little bit, his henchmen might upstage him


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## Anphicar (Dec 31, 2006)

Can we get a closer pic of the guy about to lose his head?


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

He's not entirely finished yet, but here's another picture of the mutant.


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

I love it. It's Witchhunters Inquistor isn't it? (I mean thats what your making him not the model)


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Yes, he's a good old fashioned witch hunter 8) 

I might eventually get around to converting some inquisitorial 
stormtroopers and using him as a small allied force.


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

Man this is some cool shit.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Well time for a little update, this diorama thingy is taking way more time
and resources than I had anticipated. But is a lott of fun and I'm learning
quite a few modelling tricks.

The work on the diorama is starting to come together and I hope to get
all the building on it done by the end of the week. I then have the whole
weekend (hopefully) to work out what I want to do with the 2 still missing
mutants/heretics.

Here's a quite pic, comments/crits are as always welcome :wink:


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Love the ramp man, nice use of the cities of death stuff.

Are you going to fill the gutter/sewer thing?


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

I'm going to have a little experiment on some spare stuff with some off
that resin water effect stuff used by train fanatics. I'll have to see how it
turns out, but I'll probably add some kind of texture to it.


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## cccp (Dec 15, 2006)

very nice


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## Anphicar (Dec 31, 2006)

Agreed, love the ramp!


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Another quick update from a few thing I did last night, progress is slow 
but steady. Got a bunch of ideas from the guys over at astro, so coming
soon one floating mutant in the water


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## Eisenhorn (Jan 20, 2007)

Damn it Hepesto these fine models just kicked in my add to start my Eisenhorn and Ravenor plus retinue and my justaerin are only 1/5 complete.
Seriously this diorama in really nice cant wait to see the paint.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Needed a bit of a change and I came across this guy, great fun. 









But back to the diorama  I'm nearly done with the detailing on the diorama base. Still needs quite a bit of work, but it is really coming togetherl


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Love the flesh work. And your diaroma is looking brilliant nice and detailed.

What colours are you going to paint the walls? Are you going for a clean look or a dark sewer look.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Not quite sure yet about the colours of both the diorama and the models, they both need a bit more work. But most likely they'll become nice and dark, as it should be :wink:


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Good choice - nothing worse than a whole lot of brightly painted mini's that are supposed to running around a dark and dank sewer.


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

This is turning out to be a monster project.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Well finally got something done again....on another models. Still four more weeks of madness and exams to struggle through. But I had a bit of unexpected free time yesterday and today so I decided to take on 'the challenge' a friend of mine who's getting back into battlefleet gothic gave me. He needed some cool chaos themed scenery piece to go with his chaos/renegade fleet.

And this is what I've come up with so far;










I'll be putting together a few more asteroid and probably some pieces of wreckage. But is basically a chaos renegade base/refuelling station tucked away in an asteroid field to avoid imperial detection. Pretty happy with it so far, especially with the somewhat cartoony colourscheme which really fits well with michael's chaos fleet.


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## Viscount Vash (Jan 3, 2007)

Love yer stuff Heph,
As always nice job, You ever tinker with epic?


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Viscount Vash said:


> Love yer stuff Heph,
> As always nice job, You ever tinker with epic?


Thanks Vash, I really like specialist games stuff. Unfortunately I have yet to try out epic, I don't know anyone who plays it. However, I do have plans for something special for an astronomican project  Will be a while until I get around to it, but I'm hoping it will be worth the wait.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Looks like I'm going to have to paint up some new stuff in the coming few weeks for the open category of the paintathon.

I should be able to finally finish by ork big mek and his grot oilers, not sure I should include the oilers.....feels a bit like cheating to me. Yes they are wargear that need to be modelled on a seperate base, but they're still more than 1 model  

Time for a quick pic;

The Big Mek, still needs a lott of work:


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Hello guys, sorry about the long leave of abscence *missed a whopping 2245 posts :shock, but I'm back. And ready to pick up the brush again and embark on some more insane projects. I still need to finish of a Big Mek and the Gideon Lorr diorama (FINALLY!!!! really annoying the crap out of me that I let this stay unpainted/unfinished for so long). But since I haven't really painted anything other than a BFG scenery piece, I decided to start off with some familiar. So here's a quick picture of my latest Word Bearer champion, those guys will get some much needed love once the new chaos dex drops.










So you can expect some more stuff and a more active roll from me again....missed this place


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

Nice work Hephesto, welcome back.


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## DaemonsR'us (Jan 25, 2007)

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay my word bearer buddy is back :lol: 
Welcome back heph and good work par usual! now check out some of mine! you must critique! :lol:


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Wow very nice, I'm lucky you didn't enter that into the open cometion. Mind you it wouldn't have mattered I'm still in last place lol. Very nice work, love the text on the clothes.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Wow, thanks for the warm welcome back guys  

I'm hoping to get load of other stuff done in the next couple of months (gideon lorr diorama :wink: ), looks like I have quite a bit of forum catching up to do as well.

@ Jacobite - no worries, I might enter in the next one though. But it is just for fun, have no need to 'win'. Great initiative this painthaton (spelling :S), great fun to try out some new models you'd never normally get around to, as well as a marvelous excuse to improve on our painting/modelling skills.

@ DaemonR'Us - I'll check them out right now!


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Time for some new stuff;

First up good old captain cortez of the crimon fists, got this beauty from a mate and I couldn't resist painting it up right away. Pic is a bit dark though. One thing I really learned from this mini is that midnight blue is one hell of a strange color. It kinda turns purple after a while or during highlighting...strange stuff










I've also started to pre-emptive work for my soon to come 'mighty empires' article of at astro, if you guys are interested I'll put it up here as well...once I finish. I'll be looking at the new WHF campaign system, ideas for conversions, some fan made rules and adaptations to other game system, including 40K and my fav game yet; Mordheim. But here are the first pics;

Wood Elves' primairy citadel OR a 'sanctuary' (extra rules building only useable by some races)









Humble beginning of a dark citadel for Vampire Counts (Necrarch themed) OR 'a dark temple'









The first few ruined buildings of a Mordheim themed tiles/campaign system using the mighty empires as a template/base;


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

:? Just found out that my local store won't be getting the Mighty Empires box for another week or 2. Dagnabbit, so the article will take about as long as that to complete. The good news is that this will allow me to really do something special;

- experimental WHF rules for all races, in the style of WD's 3 special buildings
- adaptation to 40K with race specific rules
- other things you can do with the campaign tiles

If anyone has ideas or requests feel free to post away


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## Bloodhound (Feb 8, 2007)

I just love that first one. You do wonders with GS.

Keep up the good work


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

bloodhound said:


> I just love that first one. You do wonders with GS.
> 
> Keep up the good work


Thanks mate, these will eventually be used for a series of 2-3 articles. Unfortunately other endeavours are taking away a lott of time so they will take a bit of time before they'll be done. So I'd better make something special of it :wink:


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

hephesto said:


> :? Just found out that my local store won't be getting the Mighty Empires box for another week or 2. Dagnabbit, so the article will take about as long as that to complete. The good news is that this will allow me to really do something special;
> 
> - experimental WHF rules for all races, in the style of WD's 3 special buildings
> - adaptation to 40K with race specific rules
> ...



I've been kicking around adapting the rules (or at bare minimum, the tiles... the rules can probably be used as-is) for 40k. It'll be cool to see what you come up with. Your Wood Elf and Mordeheim tiles are impressive-- despite the actual tiles being a fair size, the detail is pretty tiny, and I'm always impressed with anyone who's got a fine enough touch to scratch-build something on that scale. Kudos.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Thanks for the encouragement mate, afraid it's still at a stand still right now. The store still hasn't gotten it yet, might have to order it from GW themselves if it taken even more time.

Will be cool to see what you're coming up with as well!


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## Anphicar (Dec 31, 2006)

So what are those green nurgle like things exactly?

Is that an uber mini forest? :?


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Anphicar said:


> So what are those green nurgle like things exactly?
> 
> Is that an uber mini forest? :?


Yes, a mini-minature for Mighty Empires. It is on a trimmed down staandard 40K base  

Planning on putting together an article with some extra buildings for other races like the two you got with White Dwarf. As well as having a good loo at how this stuff could be used for 40K.....if that stupid shop can get the box that is...... :?


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## Anphicar (Dec 31, 2006)

Holy crap! It is?!

I have to see the actual models!


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Anphicar said:


> Holy crap! It is?!
> 
> I have to see the actual models!


A better picture should also help to get an idea of its scale. Here are the two tiles that came with WD, the Athel Loren marker and a wip Vampire counts citadel next to one of my old Iron Warriors. EDIT: looks like the pic was a bit to big, so it got rescaled. Just click on it for full-scale :wink:











The general idea I have is to make a special building for each of the other race with two main objectives;
1. Give a suggestions what you could to to make your race's citadel unique
2. If you want to add a twist use the fan rules for them to represent race unique bonus buildings :wink:

And of course I'll be looking at 40K as well......and Mordheim....now it that @#^*$*# store would finally get that box!


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Still no frigging Mighty Empires at my store :evil: 

Ah well, at least it will give me some time to work on my Wood Elves and my entry for a Pirate themed competition. Seriously got carried away, it is turning into a full unit;










But since the competition is for a single model, I'll be using this fellow;











And finally I'm also joining in on a building project for the whole Armageddon buzz, over the course of many months a group of us over at astro will be building up 3000point armies. Some starting from scratch other adding to excisting forces. I'll be using the opportunity to upgrade my old Iron Warriors oto the new dex, might as well increase their numbers to 3000 points. 
gallery with old stuff
Kinda lucked out yesterday bought the following for 23 euro;










Think my Iron Warriors will be getting some Emperor's Children reinforcements, and of course a new shiny lord, chaos vindicator and various other bits and pieces :wink:


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Finally finished my mini....took me long enough though. Sorry about the less then perfect picture, for some reason all my pics today end up disastrous. Maybe I'll replace it tonight/tomorrow with some better ones.

So to start this one of here's Gibbitz - Lookout and spotter of the Riva Pirates, which would actually make him useful…if he didn’t have the concentration of a Squig on darkcave mushrooms that is :wink:

He and the rest of the Pirates, together with some new once will be playing a part in my Wood Elf army. More in this in a while!


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## Jacobite (Jan 26, 2007)

Lol nice dude. Very humerous - especially with the description.

Love the texturing on the telescope, brillaint.

Good luck for the competition.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Thanks as I'm still the only to enter I think I have a shot :lol: 

Did manage to score to 'most 40K mini' for the last competition with my word bearer champion.


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

Love the squid


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

The Wraithlord said:


> Love the squid


Thanks, me too. To be honest I was very doubtful about it at first, but he just turned out so cool. I just can't stop making small critters and familiars for new units and armies.......and as I'm working on Wood Elves you can probably imagine things are getting out of controle :wink:

But now to paint the rest and add 4 more and I'll have a bizarre count-as glade guard unit I need to work into the storyline of my army.

...the things I go through to make things unique


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## Viscount Vash (Jan 3, 2007)

hephesto said:


> ...the things I go through to make things unique


Well worth it though mate, as always your minis are well thought out and realised. Mmmmm squid.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Thanks Vash, that's about the nicest compliment I've gotten in quite a while. The funny thing is that I actually don't plan at all, I generally start from an idea and see where it will take me........sounds a bit new age doesn't it :wink:

I generally don't necesarrily strive to make each new mini better than the last, but just to keep trying out new stuff, while letting things take as much time as needed. Sometimes this means an army in 2 months, in other occassions it means one mini in 2 months.....damned Gideon Lorr diorama needs to get finished one of these days


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## faol (Jan 25, 2007)

Well some people (like you) work better that way than planning it out and then in mid conversion you don't like what you do :?

But as lkong as you're enjoying what your doing it shouldn't matter how long your take...unless its for a game the next day :shock:


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Very true there Faol, it is probably mostly because I do lotts of loose conversions and not many larger projects. I'm slowly working on Wood Elves at the moment and those are getting a lott of thought. But the actual conversions are still more spontanous creations to me.....with some weird stuff like pirate goblins thrown into the mix every now and then :wink:


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## Viscount Vash (Jan 3, 2007)

lol, I didn't say how long you had thought just well thought.  

Organic evoluton is the way most of my conversions have been spawned too.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Insert Cylon voice ''by your command'' :wink:


















Well as requested a quick and easy way to add some variation to your power armoured heroes and villains in the form of the cyclops pattern helmet. Had a bit of free time so I put together some new examples as well.

After messing around with Chaos bits and pieces for years I eventually turned my attentions to changing stuff on their helmets. A few years ago this resulted in the Cyclops pattern helmet, something I'm guessing was inspired by watching Battlestar Galactic when I was young(er). But back to the present, I was doing some test minis for the legion-project when I was asked how I made those helmets. So it seemed a good time for another mni-tutorial.

All you need for this is a bunch of helmets, a thin sharp hobbying knife and some imagination.









Well grab that knife and those heads and start by the obligatory removal of moldlines. After that just pick a head or plan a bit if you're ging for a particlar effect. As you may have noticed most SM and CSM helmets have their eyes placed on the same horizontal line. Usually with a small indent in the middle of as with some of the SM a small point.

The idea here is very simple, take the hobby knife and cut a line in the top section of the armour between the eyes. Take care here to cut on that horizontal line I just talked about and of course not to cut to deep. Now comes the annoying part; getting the cyclops helmet to look decent. You now have a nice shallow cut and now you can use your thin knifeblade to slowly scrape/shave out the armour section. It is better to do this with minimal corrections instead of risking a total helmet destruction. So bettr to have to make shallow cuts and corrections instead of butchering the poor helmet.




















Uses for the cyclops pattern helmet


1. Simply to add some variation, this can be very needed if you've been playing around with Chaos bits and pieces as long as me :wink:


2. The helmet really has that detached, emotionless feel to it so it works great for the methodical nature of the Iron Warriors. But it can be used for various other colourschemes as well



























3. It also works great for Nurgle themed armies where the large visor gives the already vile horde an even more unhuman/insectoid appearance. In addition it can be used (with a bit of modification) as an easy and quick replacement for thousand sons marine heads. Or as CSM bearing an Tzeentch icon;











Well that finishes of another mini-tutorial, hope this will be helpful for somebody....I've been having fun with these for years now :wink:


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

That is awesome. Will definitely be doing some of this for my own models.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

The Wraithlord said:


> That is awesome. Will definitely be doing some of this for my own models.


My pleasure Wraith, also put it in an article for the database. That way everybody can find it back!

Looking forward to seeing some pics of your cyclopean chaos marines, let me guess you're going with Tzeentch :wink:


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

Actually, that's pretty impressive. Somehow, the simplest things always are. Might borrow the idea for my Thousand Sons sorcerers who're wearing helmets... I need to make at least four new ones since all of my sorcerers had power fists... *grumble...*


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

The Son of Horus said:


> Actually, that's pretty impressive. Somehow, the simplest things always are. Might borrow the idea for my Thousand Sons sorcerers who're wearing helmets... I need to make at least four new ones since all of my sorcerers had power fists... *grumble...*


I was as impressed as you and even slightly suprised when I tried it out the first time during a silly 'I don't have enough bits to make a complete marine, but loads of spare parts'-moment :wink:

Be sure to post up some pics if you end of trying it, never tried them out on anything but standard CSM infantry, so sorcerors would be seriously sweet. But indeed a shame you can't used those powerfists anymore.


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## Viscount Vash (Jan 3, 2007)

Yep, Im gonna try the cyclops visor on a Slaanesh champ. You have started a new fashion Heph.


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Figured like 1 or 2 people might be interested.......when the next chaos codex arrives GW will be forced to include cyclops pattern helmets :mrgreen:


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## Engelus (Jul 26, 2007)

are the cyclops pattern helmets Chaos only? I am concidering doing that to spruce up a few of my Black Templar initiates.


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## Wolf Fang (May 25, 2007)

Nice touch with the visors Hephesto. I'm a fan. Let's see what that looks like on non-green plague Marines. 
Nice work on the space gobbos as well. 

Cheers, Wolfie


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## hephesto (Feb 24, 2007)

Engelus said:


> are the cyclops pattern helmets Chaos only? I am concidering doing that to spruce up a few of my Black Templar initiates.


Lol, of course not. If they work for you use them for whatever you'd like.....though some pics would be great :wink:


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