At this point I went back to the base. With Hazael’s right arm bluetacked in place, I could position the models and place the extra bits on the base. I used a thin layer of filling plaster for the mud, by slapping it in place with a butter knife, and then sliding Hazaels foot through it to make a skid mark where his foot is slipping. Also added shards of broken tile with some more Knead-it…
Undercoated…
And then drybrushed the same as the rest of the base. I actually left the paint a little bit thinner on the mud, so that more grey would show through, giving it a slightly different texture to the rock. The tiles, on the other hand, were drybrushed a lot heavier, and given a heavier highlight of Skull White, to make them stand out more. The wall section was painted the same as the tiles.
Painted up the two backpacks…
As you can see, I’ve continued the ‘old armour’ theme for Hazael by using an old 2nd Ed backpack.
I also painted their chapter badges onto the shoulder pauldrons at this point, but couldn’t get the pictures to turn out large enough to see the detail…
To fit the marines into the base, I muddied up their feet with a drybrush of Bleached Bone, followed by a highlight of white…
Brother Hazael now also has a left hand glued on (The bolter-holding left hand, simply cut off the arm, and then re-attached facing down), and a right arm ready to go on… The right arm is the standard marine assault arm with bolt pistol, although I cut off the pistol and bent the wrist inwards by cutting wedges out of each side, bending it over, and filling with green stuff. I then stuck on a 2nd Ed bolt pistol.
Hazael’s right arm could then be glued on, by applying a small dab of glue, standing both marines in their places on the base to check the fit, and slotting the arm into place.
Had a small panic when I tried to fit the last two shoulderpads on… Hazael’s pad would fit between the bolt pistol and his arm!
After muttering a few naughty words, I simply shaved down that corner of the pad, and sliced a tiny piece off the back off the pistol.
Then came time to put it all together. I applied a small dot of superglue to both marine’s feet and slotted them into place on the base. Then, a small dollop of plastic cement to their necks, and sat the heads in place, turning them so they were glaring directly into each other’s eyes. A bit more superglue to re-attach Gabriel’s scabbard, which I had managed to knock off while painting his feet…
Decided at this point that the base was a little plain, so grabbed an axe from the old Chaos Marine weapon sprue, sliced up the blade a bit, and slapped on some Boltgun Metal. Then took a Bolter, cut off the magazine and drilled out the magazine slot with a 1mm drill bit and hobby knife, and painted it up…
And there it is.
As I said back at the start, I didn’t wind up making it to Games Day ’02 with this, although I did make it down in 2004, and entered this along with my crashed Aquila.
The Brothers didn’t get anywhere, but it was great to finally get them on the table…
Update: Here’s a slightly more recent pic of the finished piece.
