A project of epic dimensions: battle suit cadre

After way too much time since the last post here is the completed Crisis Suit Cadre:

5 units of Battle Suits, one upgrade to a Shas'el Commander (for a total of six), Shas'O Supreme Commander up front.

Shas'O (haven't come up with a good name yet - any suggestions?)

The whole units is made with Onslaught Miniatures, except the two commander's shield drones which are Forgeworld's.

The Tau lettering on the back banners is made with parts from old WH40K decals sheets.

I probably spent too much time on these tiny figures, but I am always satisfied when it paid off ;-)

The amount of detail that Onslaught has put on the miniatures is just stunning. I love them.

The Shas'el Commander, leading the Battle Suit Cadre.

Given the close combat weapon that he was modelled with, it probably also could be used for Commander Farsight - but I have no intentions to do so.

A project of epic dimensions: battle suits test piece

"Crisis" battle suit team

First test piece for my battle suit teams

Ok, taking the time that passed since my last post, others would by now probably have finshed the entire formation or more. :-)

But spare time to paint is something that I would really need more of. This is my first test piece of a unit of "Crisis" battle suits, again produced by Onslaught Miniatures.

What do you guys think?

A project of epic dimensions: armored transports

After real life has taking its toll over the last couple of days, progress was rather small. Nonetheless, core formation #1 has been finished by now, with painting its transport tanks.

Again, these are models by Onslaught Miniatures which will "count as" Devilsfish transports.

The core formation of "Firewarriors".

I have raised the whole tank (which is a skimmer) with stripes of plastic card.

Not sure if the large recesses on the side panels are supposed to be windows but I decided to paint them as such.

Even the rear ramps have vision slits.

I didn't go with camo on those transports but I was thinking about adding some to the battle tanks that share the same chassis.

A project of epic dimensions: tiny little "Firewarriors"

So, here they are: my first ever painted 6mm miniatures. Six bases of Tau Firewarriors, using proxy models by Onlsaught Miniatures and a Forgeworld Ethereal (+drones) upgrade.

Ethereal and shield drones

I have added some flock to create little bushes.

Start of my infantry forces for Epic Armageddon.

Their transport tanks are going to be next in line for painting.

A project of epic dimensions: TAU Air Caste support

The Air Caste is lending its support to my Firewarrior ground units:

Manta, Tigershark AX-10, Barracuda Fighters and Orca Dropship

More air units are going to be purchased soon, I just need to get paid for this month first ;-)

A project of epic dimensions: TAU army in 6mm

The begin of yet another project: 6mm TAU for Epic 40k

It's more than 20 years since my mates and I got into the whole tabletop gaming hobby. We started with Warhammer 40,000 (which we still play today), got into Battletech, Necromunda, Blood Bowl, Force On Force, Modern Combat and many others. Most of them we still play from time to time.

The latest game we have decided to build forces for is Epic 40k. Although no longer produced and not supported by GW any longer, it has a huge and living web community that stepped up and took the place that GW left behind when they decided to drop all Specialist Games.

Finding miniatures also wasn't that hard since there is plenty of second hand stuff to be found and a growing amount of little companies that supply some really nice looking 6mm Sci-Fi stuff that can be used as a Epic "look-alike" model.

With that in mind I was aiming for a TAU army. What is shown on the pics is a mix of original Forgeworld Epic TAU miniatures and some Onslaught Miniatures "Okami Technocracy Combine" troops. They mix together quite well I'd say.

Perfect miniatures to be used as "Devilfish" APC.

Forgeworld "Tetra" recon speeders.

Forgeworld's "Piranha" light skimmer.

FW Tau Ethreal with shield drones and flanked with Onslaught miniatures' troopers that are going to be my Fire Warrior Cadre.

Onlaught Miniatures: to the left what is going to be my Shas'O Crisis Commander and a stand with a Battlesuit team to its right. I really love those - they are perfect Tau look-alikes.

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" - finished

"Fantan" and base finished

ready to fly CAS missions, using guns, rockets and two FAB-250 bombs to support ground troops

The aircraft is held in place by a strong magnet. The base can be adjusted in height.

The long painting war continues. :-D

The Dragon Rises: painting the Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" part#3

Today a considerable amount of time went into cleaning the panel lines' excess paint away. After I was done with this step, I added some weathering and dirt to the aircraft, using washes and Tamiya weathering set powders. I think I am going to leave the Fantan this way, finally adding pilot, canopy, payload and base with the next steps.

The Dragon Rises: painting the Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" part#2

Today I've painted the panel lines. I used Revell's matt black enamel paint, thinned down with turpentine. This needs to dry until tomorrow evening and then I have to carefully clean any excess paint around the recesses. Stay tuned.

The Dragon Rises: painting the Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" part#1

I have spent this afternoon with painting little details here and there, that I wanted to be finished before the gloss varnish layers are applied.

The decals have been taken from various Soviet aircraft and out of the vaccu-form kit itself. Surprisingly they went on quite easily although they were already pretty faded (probably very old). Good thing about faded colours is: it looks natural on an aircraft that is used by the Chinese navy.

The decals were applied using the Micro Set and Micro Sol solutions. I will let everything dry over night and apply the varnish tomorrow. That will allow weathering and pin (panel) wash with oil paints next week.

I am really excited how the kit turned out. I would have never imagined I am capable of building a vaccu-form model. But I can also tell you: it was probably the one and only I will ever assemble. ;-)

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #8

I have decided to give the Fantan a classic gloss white paintjob like its used with the PLA Navy air units. It just had the first layers painted on, so this is far from being finished of course. I painted the pilot (he's missing one arm, because otherwise I won't be able to fit the ejection seat into the cockpit - I'll glue it in place once he's in there).

Four FAB-250 low drag bombs that will go under the fuselage can be seen as well as a WIP of the Fantan's flight base.

This is what I am looking to achieve once completely painted:

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #7

I have put primer on ;-) All coming together now. Barely visible that it was not an injection-mould kit.

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #6

Another couple of hours went into the build and this is the current status: some more work with putty here and there and I think I really can go over with primer this weekend. *yeah!*

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #5

Slowly everything is coming together. The cockpit canopy (which I took from a MiG 19) still needs some filling with green stuff, the fuselage needs another go with putty in some places but other than that its starting to look like a proper airplane. If works continues to go on like today I might be able to put primer on next weekend. :-)

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #4

It's been a while since I last worked on my Q-5 "Fantan".

I have added the air intakes and put together the two halves of the fuselage. As you can see, a lot of green stuff was necessary to fill the gaps. :-(

I have not sanded the model yet so the filled gaps look pretty rough on those pics. Once having sanded them and adding a layer of fine putty (even more sanding afterwards) I am sure it will be looking OK.

I have ordered a 1/72 scale MiG-19 since the Fantan and the MiG are similar in appearance and the Q-5 is based upon the famous Soviet fighter. Some parts of this kit will come handy to complete the Fantan.

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #3

Today I continued with sanding the parts of the wings and fuselage.

Here is what the wing's upper and lower half are looking like after I sanded them down:

And then glued together:

Obviously the parts will need some trimming here and there but more or less they fitting together quite well.

The two parts of the fuselage.

The fuselage was sanded down to a certain degree, too. I opened up the air intakes and cut out where the cockpit will be placed later on.

The Dragon Rises: Hongdu Q-5 "Fantan" WIP #2

Today I have sanded the first parts of the Fantan. I started with something small to try it and so the smaller rear wings were first to go.

The first pic shows the already sanded parts for the left rear wing. Above those you can see how the parts were looking like on top and from underneath before sanding.

 After sanding them with 120 grid and 180 grid sand paper, they became really thin but to my surprise still very stiff.

At first I thought the wings will be hollow on the inside but after sanding it became clear that the two halves will have a large surface to put glue on top.

Tomorrow the sanding process will contine and I might already have a wing or two show off with. :-)