Blood Claw with a Flamer

One of the nice things about sculpting Space Wolves is that you can sculpt some pretty crazy hairstyles. Everything from a bald head to a foot-tall mohawk is appropriate. This is especially useful with Blood Claws, since I generally keep them clean-shaven. This time, I decided to do a whole bunch of small braids.

 Other than his head, the model is pretty standard. I prefer to not give Blood Claws too many wolfy bits, as they have to earn them, which a pack of whelps haven't had time to do yet.

 Flamers work well for Blood Claws, because they are cheap and bypass the whelps' weak ballistic skill. Blood Claws are also going to want to assault the enemy, so they'll want to get as close as possible anyway.

This is the second Blood Claw model ready to be painted so far. Long way to go, especially since Blood Claw packs have to be large to be of any real use.

Grey Hunter with an Aventail, painted

While Elites are a lot of fun to build and paint, Troops form the backbone of an army, and with Space Wolves, the Grey Hunters are the solid, versatile choice. That doesn't mean they should look boring, though.

 Umbra-Ferrox pattern bolters look a lot meaner than the more common Godwyn IVb pattern models, especially with the chainblade attachment. The irregular shape of the blade makes it a little difficult to design any decorative patterns on it, though.

 I don't think any two of the Redmaw company badges I've hand-painted have looked the same so far. Weirdly enough, it doesn't bother me, though I still wish GW would start making shoulder pads with company badges other than the Blackmanes.

With this one, the strength of the Grey Hunter pack with plasma weapons is now at seven men. Many of the ones so far have had their helmets on. Will probably have to change that for the next one, to keep things interesting.

Wolf Guard Pack Leader, painted

I have struggled with painting flesh in the past. I tried using the same method I use for painting everything else, ie. painting a layer or two, shading with ink and highlighting, usually by drybrushing, but the effect has always been somewhat blotchy. This time, I took a more subtle route, by just using the same fleshtone paint for highlighting I had used for the initial layers. I did end up blending it with a lighter shade, but even before that, the results were far better than before.

 Forgeworld's Legion Combi-Plasma doesn't have the magnetic accelearation coils shown on other plasma weaponry, so I decided to put the blue glow on the seam between the bolter and plasma weapon part.

 I wanted to add some bronze highlights on the model's bionic leg, instead of just painting it in steel/iron tones throughout. This makes the model look more interesting.

The knotwork pattern on the helmet's crest was largely a happy accident. At first, I just tried to paint a pattern yellow X's, but noticed that by adding a few thin black lines, I can make it into a knotwork pattern. I'm very happy with the result.

Having just now learned to paint flesh, I probably will have to go back and redo a few earlier models. I'll probably end up showing them in a single update in the future.

House Taranis Imperial Knight Errant

The Imperial Knight model has a couple of problems. The most obvious one is the price, though you could argue it's pretty much in line with GW's pricing policy in general. The next problem is that there's only one way to position the legs, and while fielding multiple Knights may not be very sportsmanlike in standard-sized games, I'd still prefer to be able to position the legs differently without having to rebuild the model too drastically, or without turning to Forgeworld.
That all said, the model is still very cool-looking. Of course, I still couldn't just build a standard one, and decided to add some LED's.

 I used a multi-tool to drill holes where the model's eyes were, and added two green 3 mm LEDs. I had to slightly modify the diodes so that they would fit in the sockets, but managed to make them replaceable, in case the original pair burns out or is otherwise damaged. There are also two superbright orange LEDs in the thermal cannon, but they are disconnected from the circuit for now.

I included a wolftail talisman and what I imagine was Berek Thunderfist's (Ragnar Blackmane's predecessor) company badge. In my headcanon, the knight and the Thunderfist company served together on a campaign, where they earned each other's mutual respect. I still plan to give one of my Space Wolves models something to tie them together with House Taranis. It will probably be a Long Fang model or possibly a Dreadnought.

The mask is magnetized and removable, as can be seen here. If I buy the new, expanded Knight set at some point, I plan to magnetize the other Mechanicum masks similarly to make them interchangeable.

 I was going to magnetize the main ranged weapon, too, so that it could be changed between a thermal cannon and a rapid-fire battle cannon. However, I would have had to somewhat compromise the appearance of the weapon, and decided against it.

Despite the effort to tie the model in with my Space Wolves, I did eventually end up basing it with the red sands style of my Adeptus Mechanicus army.
I'm reasonably satisfied with how the model turned out, and am tempted to buy the expanded kit, probably making it into a Knight Warden. We shall see.

Wolf Priest in Mk.IV Plate

It's surprising how little reference material there is for Wolf Priest helmets. It is often mentioned that it's shaped like a canid skull, but the only actual example is Ulrik the Slayer miniature, and he wears a special relic helmet supposedly worn by Leman Russ himself. Now, you could argue that considering the size difference between Primarchs and Astartes, it's very unlikely Ulrik could possibly wear a helmet worn by his Primarch (I also have my doubts concerning the so-called Armour of Russ), but either way, it stands to reason this relic helmet would somehow differ from those worn by other Wolf Priests. I suppose the differences are in more advanced auto-senses, better HUD etc, so it doesn't have to be apparent outwards.
In any case, I decided to take the perhaps boring, but safer route and just sculpt a helmet similar to that worn by Ulrik.

 The model's pose turned out very energetic. I was going for an aggressive look, as he's meant to join a large pack of Blood Claws, and combining the running legs with a forward-leaning torso fit the bill. His Rosarius is formed of a Crux Terminatus from vanilla Terminator kit glued on to a short piece of fine chain, with some wolf teeth added on for a more Fenrisian look.

Crozius Arcanum is a power maul, so I decided to sculpt this one shaped like Mjölnir. This shape is more typical to Scandinavia, as opposed to the Icelandic style used by Marvel's version of Thor (a completely different character from the mythological short-tempered, gluttonous and honestly rather dim-witted gingerbeard). I sculpted a small badge of Morkai on it, to signify Wolf Priest's role as the first and last person a Skywarrior typically sees.

The chainblade representing the Fang of Morkai is from Tartaros-pattern Terminator set, used to turn power fists into chainfists. The fit isn't perfect, but works well enough.

Painting the model will be interesting. Black is a challenge, as it requires some subtle highlighting to make the model look painted at all.

Tartaros Void Claw

I was going to do stuff other than Terminators for a while, but I can justify this, since it's not the Indomitus-pattern. A good while back, I ordered a set of Tartaros-pattern Terminator Armours from Forgeworld, as well as the set of Power Weapons. As far as I know, they were primarily meant to be used by Forgeworld's Minotaurs chapter in 40k, who can get their hands on the rarer and more advanced armour through their connections to the Inquisition. Space Wolves are sort of the opposite of that, but they are a first founding chapter, and have an armoury that dates back to the Great Crusade, when Tartaros pattern armours were being mass produced.
I decided early on that Tartaros patterns would be mostly used by the Great Wolf's company, with the High King of Fenris also acting as a custodian for the chapter's most prized relics. When I made the decision to have all my Wolf Claws keep their battle helmets on, it made it even easier to find a pack for one of the armours, since the high collar makes it a little difficult to make bare heads fit right on the models.

 Because the armour is as old as it is, I thought it made sense it's been repaired a few times, so I added some molecular bonding studs to the legs. I also added a rondel with my Void Claws pack marking on it to the left shoulder. The chestplate has a simple wolf's head design.

 I kept it simple with the decoration on the claws, too. I scupted two axe heads with a rune on each of them.  He also has the extra cabling helping with the teleporting.

I tried to pose the model so that he's using his right arm to check the opponent while preparing the left for a powerful thrust or slash. Tartaros pattern Terminators give the modeller a little less choice regarding the pose than many other armours in that there's a fairly limited range of motion for the waist, more so than with the standard plastic Terminators.

Thunderwolf Cavalry w/ Thunder Hammer, painted

Back when I first (re)started my 40k hobby a couple of years back, I briefly considered just making simple green grass bases. Good thing I didn't, because I find it really difficult to come up with a solid reason why Space Wolves would be fighting on a golf course.
The importance of bases is brought into a sharper focus when the model is just large enough to need a 60 mm base, but not large enough to just dominate it with their presence. Thunderwolf Cavalry is a great example. The wolves' legs are long and slim enough to show plenty of the base underneath. It's an invitation to make interesting scenic bases.

 I admit, there were times when I thought I had bitten off more than I could chew when I decided to give the Thunderwolf mounts barding. However, it turned out fine, at least in this case: the armour plates look straight enough to be what they are meant for, and the helmet looks fine, too.

 The combination of satin and gloss varnishes gave the metal parts a really nice, dark shade, and the red of the storm shield and the thunder hammer's grip give the otherwise dark model some nice contrast.

 The corpse on the ground ended up looking good, as well. Obviously, the skeleton is too large to be that of a normal human, which gives it an air of mystery and leaves one guessing why a Space Marine would have taken off his armour and died on the frozen wasteland the fight takes place on.