Site News: Space Marine Fever

September has crept out of no-where and with a plethora of Space Marine goodies to help us bide our tide in the coming Autumn/Winter months. By now everyone has seen the new Space Marine kits coming out this weekend, the question is: Just what am I doing about it? Well the answer is, painting Space Marines of course! I was incredibly impressed by the upgraded plastic kits coming out, there are so many options coming with the new Tactical Squad and Sternguard boxes to make unique looking squads. While I am still 50/50 on the Centurions, I will reserve full judgement for when I have the models in hand, but after looking at them again (and again) I feel I can do something to make them stand out in a good way...keep your eyes on the blog, if what I intend works, it will look pretty Gundam crazy...

So obviously I have been painting, but the question is what exactly? The last few posts showed a lot of Dark Angels, but once again the concept of painting bleach bone and green fell flat for me, so of course begun the long journey of finding a chapter I actually wanted to paint. Initially I looked at Executioners, in order to keep a Badab theme, but the idea of using metals paints for the next few months put me off, having spent most of last year working on the Minotaurs. In the end after much searching I decided on an old favorite: The Crimson Fists.

The Crimson Fists were the first Space Marince Chapter I painted back in 1988, mainly because they were the guys on the cover of the infamous RTB01 box, I got the Space Marine paint set, a pack of 3 metal Librarians and of course the infamous RTB01 box itself, I remember working solidly on them for two days before finally finishing that Saturday morning. Very fond memories for me, so in tribute to how I got into the hobby, I have decided to work on a Crimson Fists army, and the test miniature is non other than the 25th Anniversary Crimson Fist Space Marine.

I am happy to report that this cast was actually quite a good one, there were the inevitable small air bubbles, but no major deformities were present in this cast. This meant I could go straight to paint after a quick clean up as opposed to messing around repairing huge holes and melted bits There is nothing worse in than being hyped up about a paint project only to be bogged down with unnecessary repair work, so for me this was already off to a good start.

I have pretty much thrown all guides out of the window and gone with my instincts on the colours. I want a very deep, dark blue with stark sharp highlights, to make the figures stand out, while the reds are pretty much my standard recipe, with deep contrasts sharp pink/white highlights (toned downed to blend). once fully painted I will go back and add the weathering and battle damage effects, to make the figure look more eye catching. This with probably be the way I do all the Space Marine infantry with a slight tweaking here and there for vehicles due to size - probably more liberal use of airbrush highlighting as opposed to brush.

In regards to painting technique I actually used the airbrush to get a smooth application (and speed up) the base coating process, rather than do it by brush. It has turned out pretty good despite the basic nature of the airbrush and I am already thinking of ways of experimenting with my new airbrush which should arrive by the weekend.. Figure wise, I have salvaged some old figures from previous projects, including an old favourite in the form of my old Minotaur Contemptor who is currently sitting on the paint production line, with a new pose and new weapons load outs to better fit in with the Crimson Fists theme. It is nice to be painting again after a uneventful summer, I naturally want to get games in, but first things first 1000pts fully painted.

Thanks for reading,

DiStudios
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