Drug-Crazed Psychic Vampire Space Elves

It's definitely useful to hear people's methods for keeping themselves motivated personally, I tend to get really bored painting one squad all in one go (especially if it's 10+ models, all in shades of brown like most of mine!) so I like to paint little sections of different squads in bursts, then move onto a different colour on another squad. While that helps it does mean I tend to go a long time without actually finishing anything! Keeping track of the hours I've done would help motivate me in those fallow times where boosts of motivation from finishing things are thin on the ground

Also, love the retro-reapers. The cracked earth/mosaic effect on the exarch's gun is particularly stunning

I guess the moral here is that if you fish for comments, you'll get comments.

@Evil Space Elves

Thanks! I've got just over a dozen more, but it's a pretty random assortment, and I'm still trying to come up with a way of assembling them that would let let me maybe actually use them in something. A couple of them are the old Squat Adventurer models, which are gorgeous. I'd love to paint them up for the entourage of a Rogue Trader or something. (Why don't we have Kill Team type rules for Rogue Traders and their entourages, anyway?)

@Korona

While you're fishing for compliments, that RT Farseer is stunning. You really nailed the reflection on the eye lenses. Outstanding.

haha, wow I had no idea those existed!

Kind of tame though, given how extravagant and awesome the fantasy Chaos Dwarves were, they seem more like corrupted squats rather than a unique faction like the Chaos Dwarves:



Frankly, if they ever bring back Squats they should be coming back evil.

@Evil Space Elves

Well, constructive criticism is even better, compliments are good too. Thank you.

@Korona

I don't know all that much about the Chaos Squats, but you're right, they're basically corrupted Squats, like Chaos Marines are corrupted Marines. In the Squats army list from Rogue Trader it mentions them briefly, and says that Squats fought on both sides during the Heresy. Presumably they're talked about in detail in Lost and the Damned, and Slaves to Darkness, but I don't have those books. (I will never forgive myself for not buying them when I was a kid and they were in print.)

...

Honestly, I'm kind of surprised I was able to keep this thing more or less on topic for as long as I did before going off on a tangent about something. The only thing that's kept me from sharing photos and video of me performing in here is that I'd want to pair them with Harlequins, and it takes me forever to paint them.

My reaction to all of your awesome models

I think the Jesus Haemonculus really just wants to give someone a big hug.









I spent 31 hours painting this thing. Much of that time was an absolute joy. For some of it, I just wanted to jam my brush in my eye, but knowing I was working on a Haemonculus, I wasn't about to give it the satisfaction.

Some things worked really well. I'm really happy with the glazed-over vascular freehand on his skin, and I got to expand on the flesh tone techniques I was experimenting with on the Squats on the Haemonculus's skin garment. I also spent some time looking at pictures of human branding for the freehand there, and I think it works well.

And of course, some things didn't. The box doesn't read as well as I wanted it to, and the undersuit fell short of what I was attempting. I was trying for a somewhat complicated relationship between his skin and undersuit - shade the skin warm and highlight cool, but shade the undersuit cool and highlight warm, and create some ambiguity as to whether the undersuit might actually be flesh or not. Some of that worked, but not as well as I'd hoped, and some of it didn't. I can live with the results - otherwise I'd have changed it - but it's a concept I might take another stab at if the opportunity presents itself.

This was one of those models that was difficult to photograph because it's hard to find shots and angles that show all the important bits, but splitting it up too much leads to a bunch of somewhat redundant pictures. For example, the front-on establishing shot I used shows the head pretty well, but this one shows the feet, bottom of the skins, and the bones in the base better.



(Also I'm being lazy and explaining that so I can post this photo, instead of just sucking it up and doing another round of reshoots.)

Also, none of these pictures show the top of his head. The next few days promise to be busy for me, but I may try to shoot some more/better pictures next week. I'm fond of saying that photography is the extra hobby I never wanted, but which was forced on me by this hobby; that said, when you spend 31 hours painting a model, you want to make sure the photos are good.

As always, constructive criticism is appreciated, and I'm happy to explain how I did things if anyone wants to know.

That's the best Haemonculi dress i've ever seen!
The brandings are gorgeous!
And i feel you on the photographing front.
Hate it, the human's binocular vision is so much better for appreciating our models.

Edit: I also like the veins on his head very much!

Thank you!

I was having a conversation with someone recently about human vision versus photography - some of the differences between them are why paintings can look more "real" than a photograph, which is why the photorealism school of painting is not painting that is intended to look "real" - it is intended to look like a photo.

In this case, I think it's more a matter of being able to slightly move the model or your head to see obscured parts of the object, and having a brain that processes that data into a single "image."

Photographing your model is translating the work you did in one medium - painting the thing - into another, and every time you have to decide how much you're willing to lose in translation. I struggle with that because I assume that, fundamentally, no one will care about the things that I do as much as I do. If they were as interested in juggling and sideshow as I am, they would also juggle and perform sideshow. Posting my models here is comfortable because everybody here should be interested in models - but most people aren't willing to spend over 30 hours painting one.

When I painted the Haemonculus's veins, I pulled my beat up old copy of Grey's Anatomy off the shelf. The model represents an alien who has taken significant liberties with his own anatomy, so I didn't feel like I had to match real life humans, but I wanted to use it as a starting point. The veins on the head are a heavily modified, but based on human cranial veins. The veins on the foot are more or less correct, because I liked it and didn't have a better idea.

There are also some veins on the hump, but they're both more subtle and get lost amidst the contours. I'm not even going to try to shoot a photo that emphasizes them. That said, if you look at the photos, you can spot them.

All of that is to say that the tiny bit of glazed freehand on the model's foot is something that I spent some time thinking about. It's important to me, but I don't know that it would be important to literally anybody else, and even I don't want to scroll through endless photos of the same model.

I hope all of this doesn't seem pedantic. I'm mostly trying to share some things about vision and photography that I think are really interesting, and the way I regularly struggle with shooting and posting models until I get frustrated and decide to just post some stuff and move on with my life.

They remind me of an episode of Criminal Minds where the victims' limbs were ligated for some time, resulting in darkened veins, before being dismembered alive.

Damn that show is messed up

That's stunning dude! Seconded on the best skin cloak I've ever seen. The skintones are brilliant, and the branding idea is really novel and really well done

I also love the mottled look you've got on his skin. He definitely looks slightly unhealthy, exactly as a Haemi should look

Edit: just read your latest comment and good lord that's impressive! What I thought was mottled skin is in fact veins adapted from real human anatomy. Unreal!

I can definitely say that I am most interested in a model you've spent 31 hours painting. It's awe-inspiring!

I've been meaning to get back to my Wych cult for a while now, but I'd kind of wanted to get my Pain Engines painted first. Then Shadow War happened, and so the Pain Engines will have to wait.

My Wyches never made it into this plog, so here's a brief summary of what I'm going for with these guys:

I'm using classic models only. I like the new ones just fine, but I don't want to mix and match. If I ever buy the current Wyches, they will be a different Cult. This also means that despite all the conversions I'm doing, I'm actively trying to retain the aesthetic of the classic range.

The models are all converted (to varying degrees), inspired by my time at Burning Man. Functionally, this means goggles, respirators/gasmasks, fur vests/hoods/coats, and source lighting effects.

I initially converted and painted 9 models - a full unit that could escort a character on a Raider. Past that, I have a whole lot of ideas and unfinished conversions. The Succubus is probably ready for paint. The pilot for the Raider is pretty much finished, but I haven't started in on the gunner or the Raider itself yet. I've also done a lot of work on the Beastmaster and Khymerae, but they're nowhere near done. I've thought about Reavers and Hellions, and set aside some parts for them. Finally, I'm converting a classic Haemonculus to be associated with this Cult. A lot of green stuff has gone into that model but it's nowhere near completion.

All of this is from years ago. I lost momentum on the project because of how much work it was, especially the Raider. It's not that I mind doing the work, it's just that I also would like to be able to play a game now and then, with painted models that I feel good about, and the very slow progress on the Wych Cult just wasn't getting me there.

So, here we are with Shadow War. I wrote up a list with 7 models in it, which means I have to build 4 new Wyches. Looking at the old ones, I think some of what I did works well, and some of it not so much, so I'll also be making some changes to those original 9 models.

Models! After 10 hours of work, 2 of the four new Wyches are ready for paint.

This was a more or less simple conversion, though it was my first time wrapping strips of styrene around anything. I built and tore off the stuff on the impaler three times before I got something I was satisfied with. The ram horns are from the old Fantasy Skeletons kit.



This one was a bit more involved. Because one of my other Wyches is built from this sculpt, I wanted to make sure the two models were as different as possible. I cut and rotated the head, removed the hair, and replaced it with the hair from a different model. The model in game carries plasma grenades, so I gave him a quiver from the old plastic Dark Elves kit with the crossbow bolts filed off.



That's two down! Unfortunately, they were the easy two. The remaining two models are supposed to have chain hooks, and apart from using the old falchion and razor snare models I still don't have a good plan for how to build them. I also only had one of the sculpts; I've ordered the other from ebay, but I'm still waiting for it to get here.

There's a Shadow War campaign starting in my area in a week and a day, and I badly want to play in it. It seems pretty unlikely that I'll be able to get the last two models built in that time (assuming the second one even shows up), so I may need to write up a different list without the chain hooks.

Next time on Drug-Crazed Space Elves: chain hooks! Names! Left-handed splinter pistols! Calyptra loses his mind! Don't miss it.

I really hated to do this, because I think this model's pose is wonderful, but I couldn't think of a way to make it work with a gun instead of the sword. (Yes, I could have put the gun in the right hand, but the neat chain spool thing's proximity to the right hand makes it awkward for that hand to hold anything but chain.)



I hacked a left arm off another model and trimmed the blades from above and below the hand. I also scraped off the index finger. I cut a splinter pistol and its handle blade from the same sacrificial model. Then everything got drilled for pins.



I love this model's skull cap thing, so I didn't want to give him goggles or a respirator or anything in order to retain those lines. So far I've done two models with horns, and I really like how they came out, so I decided to give this guy a single spiral horn. I made a press mold to duplicate the helmet spikes so I could add them where the top knot had been, and because I couldn't find a model I was willing to maim for its horn, I decided to try sculpting it. (Your horns are safe for now, Dark Emissary.) I also assembled the left arm and sculpted the trigger finger. I have to do all this because, although I may be overlooking something, it seems like every model in the range with a pistol is holding it in the right hand. I don't know if there's a good reason for it, but it makes extra work for me.

The horn came out ok. (The one I tried to make in the Tentacle Maker did not.)



I filed off the remnants of the top knot, drilled holes for the horn and spikes, and discovered that my plan for the spikes was flawed - they were too small for the spike to have sufficient retention on the wire I used. I managed to get one trimmed and placed, but for the other I trimmed down the press mold, put some green stuff and wire in the hole I drilled on the model, and then used the mold as a stamp to get the shape where I wanted it.

...I don't know if that makes sense. Plan A did not work, plan B did, and if anybody wants, I'll try to explain what happened better.

And here we are.



I figure there's no reason why he can't be both a bloodthirsty killing machine *and* a magical unicorn. The drugs probably help with that.

Does anyone know of any stories/movies/what have you with evil unicorns? What are their names? Or really, any unicorns at all, other than Unico. I am not naming this model Unico.

I frequently have a hard time coming up with good names for characters. It was always difficult enough in something like a role-playing game, but with this hobby I have to come up with loads of names for groups and characters.

This Wych Cult is the Cult of the Shrieking Vein. I changed it at one point to the Cult of the Cacophonous Vein, but I think the Shrieking Vein rolls off the tongue better. What do you guys think?

The Galra in the Netflix's Voltron have great, Dark Eldar sounding names, like Sendak, Prorok, Morvok, and Haxus. I'll probably base my names on those. As for the kill team itself, so far the best I've come up with is The Sevenfold Maiming of Agnia. What do you think? Too unwieldy?

As for my magical unicorn here, everything else is done, but I still don't know how to represent the chain hook. I keep thinking of extending the chain by sculpting/press molding green stuff onto armature wire, which seems like an excessive amount of work. Alternatively, I can just leave it as it is (there is both a chain and a hook) but I feel like the hook is somewhat lackluster, and the way he's holding it doesn't exactly evoke swinging the thing around. Do you guys have any ideas? Right now I'm just hoping that when the other model gets here it will present or inspire some other options.

Finally, here's my Succubus, Pynk Rospael. Again, I had to do an unnecessary amount of work in order to put a gun in her left hand. The gun came from a Mandrake; the blade of the archite glaive is from a Dark Elf Spearman. I'm happy with what I've done so far on this model, but I keep feeling like she needs something else, and I don't know what it is.

I used to have a few of these back in the day. Your little tweaks work very well, and just adds to the character of the sculpts. Very definately looking forward to seeing them painted.

As to evil unicorn films... no idea I am afraid

Very nice! I'm impressed by the conversion work on metal models. Never tried that myself before.

As for evil unicorns I have no idea. Closest I can get is the Thracian Horses from Greek myth which were carnivorous and I'm fairly certain ate one of their owners. Perhaps Thrax?

Ooh, Thrax is a good name!

I was considering some sort of variation on Deckard, because he dreams of a unicorn in Blade Runner (I think we can all safely assume that unicorn was evil), but I instead think I will name him Shunn, because Charlie the Unicorn.

Have I overthought naming this tiny lump of pewter? Absolutely! And just think, I still need to settle on names for the other six Wyches on the team.

(And I wonder why I never get anything done.)

I am not good at WIP updates.

So, here's the state of Shunn. I wasn't able to think of a better chain hook that both retained the aesthetics of the classic range and worked with the lines of the model, so I think he might be ready for paint.

He of course died in the first game I played, to a random hive-quake.



Fortunately, his comrades were able to recover a chunk of his butt cheek, so the Cult's Haemonculus associate will be able to regenerate him.

Next up, I finally got the other Razorsnare Wych.

Without checking, I think there are 12 unique Wych models in the classic range (1 Syren, 3 regular Wyches, 1 with a blaster, 1 with a shredder, and 2 for each of the 3 Wych weapon options). However, several of them use the same torsos and legs as a basis. For example, the 3 female Wyches (not including the Syren) are all the same model with different heads and arms. This model - with the face on the left knee plate, cybernetic piping on the right ribs, and little hook hanging over the right thigh, is also a repeat from a couple other sculpts. So in addition to putting a splinter pistol in his left hand (sigh), I wanted to make him more different from those other models.

I ground out the face and thigh plate on the left leg with a dremel, and resculpted them with green stuff. I cut off the left arm, and then ground off the shoulder as well, because I had a left arm with integrate shoulder plate that I spent a lot of time preparing, only to discover that I hated the pose I ended up with. Oops. I grabbed a different left arm, and rebuilt the shoulder I had carefully dremeled off with green stuff. The splinter pistol I used had some hair flush with it, so I had to resculpt parts of that as well.

Here's what I ended up with. I'm not sure how happy I am with how the goggles came out, and I have a feeling I won't know until I paint it. That said, this is a space elf who looks like he's on a lot of drugs.





In shooting and posting these pictures, I've noticed that I'm going to have to rebuild some of the ribbing under the left arm. It's going to be a pain with the arm and shoulder plate in the way, but shouldn't be insurmountable.


Part of my backstory for these guys is that the Shrieking Vein spends a fair amount of time hunting daemons of Tzeentch for sport. The Haemonculus who provides their drugs has devised a way to prevent a daemon's former flesh from dissolving into the immaterium, so the Vein are able to take trophies. The pink furs they wear, for example, are daemon-skin.

I came up with that partly to give the Cult some nuance, and partly just to justify Dark Eldar running around in pink fur coats. (Of course, the True Kin would tell you that they don't need to justify anything they do.) It wasn't intentional, but I've realized there's another layer to it - classic models literally fighting against change - and so now I'm trying to think of ways to lean more heavily into it.

The obvious choice is adding feathers and bird skulls. Are there any kits that are good sources of feathers and bird skulls? I think I can get some feathers from Empire sprues, but I'm wondering about other options. Rubric Marines? I'll probably want to stick a Thousand Sons helmet on their Raider anyway; it looks like their bird skulls are integrated, but I can probably press mold or grind them off and it will still be easier than sculpting them.

I haven't been able to come up with anything else. Books and scrolls aren't the sort of trophies I envision Wyches running around with, though pages torn out of spellbooks strung up like flags on the Raider might be neat. Anyone have a suggestion?

Man I absolutely love what you're doing with these OOP models and I'm someone who's never really been interested by the old DEldar range.

I love the little nuance that they're old models fighting against change that's truly brilliant

As for feathers, some of the Goblin kits have some small feathers attached, as well as some of the Lizardmen plastics (I think the Terradons have loads of little greebles with feathers).

The last time I tried sculpting feathers was several years ago, and I ended up with something that wasn't terrible, but wasn't great either. I used this tutorial, and in hindsight, I think that the tutorial, which is excellent, wasn't the right approach for what I was trying to achieve.

I think I should have done something more like this.

So I'm gonna try that, and see what happens.

I'm slowly repairing my various project logs so they'll function in a brave new post-Photobucket future. In the meantime, I've also done some painting.

This is Tevim Bao. His signature twin blade technique has accumulated rather less acclaim in the arenas compared to his signature surprise plasma grenade technique. He feigns irritation about this, but is secretly pleased that everyone appreciates the jest. "Everyone" does not include his opponents.





Shiunn possesses an unbending force of will, and his unbending force of will is sick of your nonsense. Shiunn's disciplined mind has been unmoved by hallucinogen grenades, Harlequin psychic attacks, the reality-bending insanity of the warp, and the bad batch of hypex that was sold to the cult by a mercenary whose gruesome fate is better left uncontemplated. Shiunn simply does not believe, for which reason his kin have named him "the Nonbeliever."





Provok is trueborn, ruthless, ambitious, and has a sibling. His younger brother Antevok, who spent his life hurling anatomically unlikely insults at any figure of authority within earshot, now either commands or liasons with all Hellion gangs within or connected to the Vein. Provok's bitterness and jealousy seethe beneath his every thought. How could that howling, unthinking brat have risen so high, and not him? He dearly wishes to take his brother's life, but he will not; having a close familial contact so highly positioned is far too valuable.





This is Diabrex, and I'm sorry to admit that no piece or fragment of background or personality has popped into my mind for her. I imagine she enjoys long walks along the Khaides in the outer Corespur districts, watching prey species get disemboweled in the arenas, watching other Eldar get disemboweled in the arenas, and playing the harpsichord.

Nice color scheme & attention to details

Haha! I love your fluff snippets absolutely brilliant.

Painting's of equal caliber!

Thanks!

I've been neglectful of this plog and more active elsewhere on the internet lately (in part because of an error message I was getting from visiting the Dark City, which seems to have gone away), so here's an update and explanation of my current ill-conceived endeavor.

I redid the paint on my Nightfiend's weapon because I wasn't happy with it, and then managed to get a much better picture of my Mandrakes.



I also painted most of a unit of Dire Avengers. I was trying to get them finished up by October 1, for reasons that will be clear later in this post, and I couldn't quite manage it. The last two models are going to be languishing in nothing more than a coat of white primer until January at least. (In my defense, I'm up to my eyeballs in work stress right now and don't have much time for painting.)









The reason for the October 1 deadline is I'm an idiot, and agreed on another forum to try to paint a Haemonculus, a Talos, and a Cronos in three months starting on that date. I normally don't do that sort of thing because I don't find arbitrary deadlines helpful and because I think this sort of thing prioritizes painting things quickly, or painting lots of things, over painting things well. I'm doing it this time for a number of reasons, but a lot of it is that I've been putting off painting these models for a while because I'm a little intimidated by them and because of how long they're going to take. My guess is that each model will take about a month to paint, so I'm not at all certain I can pull this off. I've set a quota for myself of an hour and a half of painting each day, but I'm having trouble meeting it because of work. Things will calm down in November; we'll see how behind I am then.

I'm going to try to post pictures of my progress weekly. Here's week 1.

I spent 9 1/2 hours painting my Cronos, discovered that the green stuff/crackle paint was peeling off the base I'd prepared ahead of time, and accidentally snapped off one of the spindly dorsal arrays from handling it while painting. I want the flesh tones of the pain engines to be distinctly different from the other models, which means I overdid the purple. This stage is mostly establishing mid tones and contours, so it won't be a problem to fix it.





Action shot!

Everything looks cool, all very pretty but I cant work out what the smudge is on the shell of the cronos, if its intended?
Skin looks really similar to your wracks from what I can see, also like the action shot, lol. You always came across a colourfull character, i wasnt sure how to picture you irl.

It is, in fact, a smudge. This model is nowhere near finished, though I got another 11 hours of work in on it over the past week. Because of its size and the absence of any reasonable way to hold the model while I'm working on it, I'm painting everything below the carapace first. When all of that is done and thoroughly varnished, then I'll paint the top.

The flesh is done now, and I'm quite happy with how the subtle veining on the arms came out. I'm less happy with the vials. Because it floats (and isn't attached to its flying base post yet) I don't have much to use as a horizon line, so I'm having a lot of difficulty painting the surfaces of the liquid in the vials consistently. There's a couple that are still noticeably off. More than that, the pain engine vials are large, and I think my system for painting Covenite vials is looking a little cartoony when applied to these larger surfaces. I have some ideas for what to do about it, like more bubbles and glazing in some color variations; I'll start experimenting with them once I've gotten the remaining vials painted. I think I'm also a bit out of practice painting Covenite models, because the tubing didn't come out nearly as well as I expected. (I'm pretty sure I can live with it though.) Finally, I managed to snap off two more of the dorsal arrays by dropping it. My solution may be to just replace them entirely; if I snip them off and drill out the posts where they're glued in place, I can glue in the same parts that are leftover from my Talos. If I do that, I think the main difficulty will be getting the angles right when drilling and replacing.

Pictures.







Action shot!