Vindicator, painted

I tend to focus more on infantry than on vehicles. Painting vehicles seems to take forever, and the boxes on threads aren't as interesting to me as the (somewhat) human shapes of infantry. Vehicles also take a lot more space on my shelf. Still, I don't want to focus exclusively on either one, and a vehicle every once in a while keeps things fresh.
As far as Space Marine tanks go, Vindicators are particularly brutal with their short range, high power weaponry. The Predator's more typically tank-like shape is IMO more aesthetically pleasing, but the Vindicator looks more threatening.

Generally speaking, I added some decorations here and there, but I didn't depart too far from the tank's basic shape. Since The Blackmanes form the backbone of my Space Wolves army, I wanted to make this tank a part of it, but found it a little tricky to find a space for the company badge. Eventually, I painted a yellow diamond on the siege shield by hand and added the transfer on it.

 I was somewhat unclear as to what sort of colour scheme the model should have, but eventually decided on the black and white markings of Long Fangs, since the model is a heavy support choice.

 The Vindicator kit includes a large shell and a winch, but I broke the winch assembly while fiddling around with an almost empty bottle of super glue. I didn't want to leave the rear of the vehicle completely unadorned, so I included the wolf pelt I had left unused from Bjorn's kit.

 To make the model look a little more interesting, I decided to add a commander to the tank. His body came with the Vindicator kit, with the chainaxe from Forgeworld and the head from AdMech Skitarii Ironstrider kit. I went for the dark South Fenrisian skin tone on the small area of flesh that's visible. He's pointing to the direction of the cannon decoration, as if to say "Look at our sweet figurehead, or I'll hit you with this axe!" No-one tell him he has a Demolisher cannon, that could end badly.

The tank's brutal nature made the Wolf of the Red Moon, described in the 5th edition codex as a terrible god of vengeance, feel like a natural totem to the vehicle, so I sculpted its badge to the side armour of the vehicle.
I considered sculpting a wolf's maw all around the Demolisher cannon, but that would have required some pretty major rebuilding and wouldn't have been very visible from behind the siege shield anyway, so I decided on a smaller wolf's head.
Obviously, I don't really know where the line after which you've overdone something goes, but when I found myself trying to learn to write Old Norse in Elder Futhark runes so that I could have a slightly more meaningful text on the siege shield, I was pretty sure I had crossed that line. The text is supposed to say "Vengeance of Ironhelm" on the first line, "Burning death to traitors" on the second and "Hail to Russ and Allfather" on the third. I doubt it's grammatically correct, and may very well have some spelling mistakes, but considering it's written in dead alphabet, in a dead language, on a soft sci-fi wargame model, I thought it's accurate enough.
Finally, I wanted to make the rear hatch openable, but able to stay closed, so magnetized it, with a couple of tiny magnets I bought from a local electronics retailer.

Overall, I think the model turned out fairly well. Of course, for gaming purposes, two Vindicators are better than one, but that will have to wait. I think my next tank might well be a Predator.