Tools of the game : X-Wing acrylic templates

More X-Wing goodness!

After seeing Rodent Mastermind acrylic templates on his blog:
http://www.afewmaneuvers.com/topic/1462-rodents-hobby-blog/

I just knew I had to get a set. His ideas never cease to amaze me (the inspiration for my B-Wing base come from his).

X-Wing acrylic templates, imperial green, after painting

The templates are sold by Cog'O'Two : http://www.cogotwo.com/war-gaming/gaming-ruler-set-orange-detail and only set me back 15.5 pounds with shipping to France.

Packaging was top notch in a nice padded envelope.
Each template is protected on the top with a layer of paper like material, while the bottom is protected by a layer of plastic film. I'm guessing the paper material is part of the industrial process used to etch the designs on top.

You can see the raw templates in Rodents blog.

I decided to paint the etched design to give them a little more contrast.

The idea is to leave the paper layer in place, paint the designs and then remove the paper which acts as a natural mask. It would have been long to paint them by brush, so I broke out the airbrush for the white coat.

Here you can see the finished templates on the left after removing the protective layers and the airbrushed templates on the right.

I was curious to see how they would match up with my store championship range ruler so I made a quick side by side comparison:

Color is almost exactly the same, a bit more yellow for Cog'O'Two, but probably invisible in action. Technology is different though, FFG etching technique is smoother somehow, leaving a pattern of very small dots, while Cog'O'Two leaves a pattern of very small lines a bit more visible.
It's minute though and I'm really happy with the templates.

Time to reload,
Ica

Step by step : Dagger squadron B-Wing

As promised, a step by step with pictures of the B-Wing repaint.

Preparation:

First came the stripping in brake fluid, then the magnets and the base mod. 2 broken guns were repaired with a paper clip. (products used: brass rod, araldite glue, 3*2mm rare earth magnets)

Next came the black undercoat (citadel chaos black) and the white base coat (pro-color white). The white was applied with an airbrush aiming from above and left of the model to create natural shadows and color modulation as if the light source was above and left. The dark side of the model also received the white base, but much less, giving a greyer aspect.

Brush time! Red is citadel mephiston red, applied in thin layers to keep the grey modulation underneath. Black is citadel chaos black. Inspiration came from this:  http://www.toymania.com/news/messages/10551.shtml

Protect the model with gloss varnish (in my case vallejo model air).
Now the scary part! Put some black oil paint on a paper towel to absorb most of the oil. Then mix the paint with lighter fluid (essence F in french). Apply the wash generously on the model:

Wait for the wash to dry (a few minutes in my case).
Reward time! Take a Q-tip humid with white gas and remove the excess wash, leaving the wash in the panel lines. The beauty of it is that you can vary how much wash you remove by controling the amout of pressure and the humidity of the Q-Tip. Take your time the wash won't stain the paint underneath.

Revarnish with mat varnish (PA air with an airbrush).

Brush time 2! Highlight panels and go back over any mistakes in the previous steps. I also lightly glazed the red parts with blood red to give them more impact.

Final step engine glow! First the engines were sprayed with white to determine the area of the model that would received the glow.

Then they received a coat of fushia pink (airbrush) and the inside were painted white.

However after showing the model on http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/101573-b-wing-repaint-dagger-squadron/ I received a few comments that the engines glow was not good enough. So I went back with a brush and redid them using Prince August fluo yellow and orange + white.

I HAVE YOU NOW!

Time to reload,
Ica

Showcase : Dagger squadron B-Wing

After messing around with the Tie fighter, I decided to tackle a slightly bigger project : a B-Wing.

The paintjob is inspired by Dark Horse Rebellion Dagger squadron, the first rebel squadron to fly the B-Wing.

To make things more interesting, I decided to magnetise the stand and the cockpit as the fighter is supposed to be able to rotate around the pilot.

Engines received a coat of fushia to represent the reactors glow.

I had to replace two of the canons, broken while stripping, with paperclip rods. Can you guess which?

The base was painted as well, to give a bit of spice to a rather bland piece of plastic.

Dagger leader! There's a Tie on my tail! I can't shake him!

Next article should be a step by step of the B-Wing paintjob.

Time to reload!
Ica

Blog hiatus over: X-Wing miniatures Tie Fighter repaint!

Long time no see! After a pretty big hiatus in my blogging I have decided to restart the blog with this Tie fighter repaint:

The game is great and the miniatures are really detailed, a real pleasure to paint.

The model was first  stripped to bare plastic with break fluid, then undercoated with black primer.

Base color is airbrushed  space wolve grey with a zenithal white highlight.

All grey parts where then washed with ivory black (oil paint) diluted with white gas after after a coat of gloss varnish.

After the wash dried I then used a cotton qtip dipped in white gas to remove the excess then resealed the model with matt varnish. All solar panels where then covered in chaos black.

Finally I highlighted the edges with a mix of space wolve grey/white and painted small dots for the laser cannons and the ion engines.

Hope you like it!
Next up on the painting desk should be either a B-Wing or an X-Wing.

Time to reload,
Ica

Frontkick tournament - Debrief

The Frontkick tournament was played this week-end in Carrières, close to Paris. 36 players, with 5 games and swiss round pairing over 2 days.

As usual, a great event, relaxed, pretty well run by the Captain, and the first tournament to open the 2013/2014 gaming season after the summer pause.

First a couple of pictures of an incredible army, the alien inspired tyranids of EDLR, winner of the best painted award :

EDLR flying prince

EDLR army and  winner of the best painted award

Sadly I did not get to play against it but as all EDLR works, it is visually stunning. I have played against Edlr tyranids since the nineties and I think this is his 3rd iteration.

I played against 5 tournament regulars:
First game against Padre with a GI/SW list,

Second game against Wilme (the French ETC Captain) with his ETC Greyknight list:

Third  game against Manix with Dark-Eldar/Eldar (sorry no-pics).

Fourth game against Lex-A (another member of the French ETC team) with a stunning Deamons and CSM alliance :

and finally Fifth game against Mogor, with a very good pure deamon list.

The venue was nice, about 20 minutes drive from Paris, with plenty of room to play:

I came with my eldars, with my newly painted Paladin Knight house as a Tau ally:

A pretty hard list with plenty of firepower and nice combos as might be expected of an alliance of 2 of the newest codexes...

On the right side you can see my eldar main force, using Iyanden rules.
Farseer on bike
10 Guardians in holofield and shuricanon, scatter laser wave serpent
7 Dire avengers in holofield and shuricanon, scatter laser wave serpent
3 Jetbikes with shuricanon
Wraithknight
3 Shadow weavers
3 Dark reapers, exarch with fast shot and night vision.

Here you can see the knight house, count as Tau:
On the top left : Technoadept on combet chassis: Tau commander with missile pods, drone controler and split fire, 2 marker drones (servo-skulls).
Just below : house serfs with a techno adept : 10 kroots and a kroot hound.
bottom right: Servo skulls : 4 marker drones
top right: Paladin knight : riptide with ion, fusion blaster, early warning overide, skyfire.
Behind :  Missile platforms: 2 broadsides with 2 missile drones.

I got a nice 16/20 in  painting  which combined with 3 victories and 2 losses led me to 9th place.

Time to reload,
Ica

Mechanicum : paladin knight and enginseer retinue

After the missile platforms I decided to continue my mechanicum forces with an enginseer from FW and a Knight Titan :

The enginseer retinue is slightly converted from dark Vengeance cultists, with all chaos markings removed and some hoods and bionics added.

For the paladin, I decided to convert it a bit, reducing the size of the canon and adding a shield in place of the sword. I intend to play him as a count as riptide, so it made more sense.

Time to reload,
Ica

Drone walker to mechanicum missile platform

I finally took the time to convert the ramshackle drones walkers:

First a quick review of the product : I got them within 2 weeks of ordering, with nice cardboard and bubble paper packaging. All parts for each models were separated into small plastic bags, nothing got broken and everything was there.

However the cast quality was only so-so. The resin is hard and brittle, with sometimes large holes (1mm diameter) and other small casting flaws. Pretty much the quality I espect from my own casts so a bit disappointed there.

Details are crisp though and the parts can be corrected (think a bit worse than forgeworld quality).

It was okay for my purposes as most of the flaws where on the "thigh" part that I would need to cut to fit the model on a 60mm base.

To do that I cut the thigh and replaced it by a small plastic ball wedged between 2 green stuff blobs, smoothed to either side.

The missile launchers of course come from the GW Valkyrie kit and are magnetised to the back with a small platform made with a bit from the campaign supplement and plastic sprue.

 I made 2 of those with a slightly different paiting pattern to experiment the Jihess style  way of fast painting.
With an airbrush and a sponge I finished them in about 6 hours.

Time to reload,

Ica