Grey Hunter with an Umbra-Ferrox Bolter

Another example of my earlier paintwork, this Grey Hunter of Bran Redmaw's Company was among the first I assembled using Mk. V parts from Forgeworld. Incidentally, the Redmaws have the only company badge I'm comfortable painting freehand.

 The pelt on his shoulder is sculpted out of green stuff, as are the fangs and rune medallions hanging off it. I like how the pelt works together feral look of the Mk. V helmet.

 The white and red colour scheme of the Redmaws is fairly eyecatching when combined with the heavily decorated look of the Space Wolves. The whole pack should prove impressive, once finished.

Mk. IV Venerable Dreadnought with close assault weaponry

Bjorn the Fell-Handed is, appropriately, the HQ unit I have had ready for play the longest now. The dreadnought kit left a lot of pieces over, and I have had my eye on Forgeworld's Venerable Space Wolves Dreadnought for some time. The decision to order the resin body and combine it with the other parts came naturally.

 As awesome as the banner in the kit looks, I decided to leave it out, perhaps using it as a standard for a Grey Hunter squad in the future. I didn't think it would be right if some other Dreadnought had a banner larger and more impressive than Bjorn's.
Standard Blizzard shield looks good as it is, but I still wanted to add a wolf tail talisman, even if it was only out of stubborness.

 I felt like the double-headed Fenrisian great axe looked a little too bulky, so I trimmed it down, removing one of the blades and sculpting a wolf scull in its place. I also sculpted a couple of extra wolf tail talismans to add a sense of movement to the piece

The standard dreadnought chassis looks pretty squat, making it look in a way powerful, but also making it difficult for it to look dynamic. I decided to elevate one of the model's feet slightly. This gave the model a little more life.
The Dreadnought still needs smoke launchers. Green stuff doesn't lend itself too well for making mechanical parts. I'm thinking of sculpting a lot of decoration around the launcher tubes, possibly in a similar fashion to Bjorn's model.

Adeptus Mechanicus Skitarius Ranger w/ an Omnispex

Of the two main Skitarii troops, I find I like the Rangers more. Though the Vanguards look nice with their sallet-type helmets, the snipers capable of moving and firing are more interesting to me. The general steampunk appearance is interesting, even if it wasn't what I imagined when I first thought of AdMech troops.

 Mars' red, black and white colour pattern is pretty striking, especially with the long, flowing robes.

 As I mentioned with my Sicarian Ruststalker, I think the models look really nice, just wish there were more posing options. Of course, it would be difficult to fit the robes with various kinds of legs, and would probably lead to clunkier-looking models. Still, I hope GW finds a way how this cake could be had and eaten, too.

Thunderwolf Cavalry with a Thunder Hammer

The title makes me wonder, if I had the rider also wearing a Mk.I "Thunder" Power Armour, would I hear from AC/DC's lawyer?
Anyway, I decided to move forward with my Thunderwolf Cavalry. Of the mounts in the box, this one has the least dynamic pose, choosing to stalk instead of running or leaping. I decided to make it look like the wolf is going around some rough terrain. Because I happened to have some very old Citadel Skeleton Warrior parts lying around, I decided to throw in a corpse, too.

 The Thunder Hammer is scratch-built. I wanted to have an axe blade along with the hammer face. It sort of does look like a big meat tenderizer, but then again, why shouldn't the Wolf Guard have their steaks tender? I'll still have to sculpt Ragnar Blackmane's symbol on his left shoulder pad before painting.

I gave the mount a somewhat Gjermundby-style spectacled helmet to make the Viking influences more obvious, and drove the point home with the runes on the plates covering its shoulder blades.

Again, his Mk. VI battle helmet is attached to his belt. The rear of the wolf mount is somewhat unprotected, but it sort of makes sense to mostly protect the side that's going to charge the enemy and otherwise try to keep your equipment load light.

Arjac's Next Shieldbrother

Arjac's Shieldbrothers is potentially a fairly big project to model, especially for someone with my refusal to accept standard solutions. Not every model needs to have a huge gimmick, though. With this Shieldbrother, I had a couple of fairly simple goals: to have a Terminator with a mohawk, and to customize a hammerhead.

 There's not much to be said about the head. It's just a fairly typical male head with sideburns and a mohawk, sculpted to be shouting. Of course, sculpting a head could be a whole topic in itself, but I'll save that for later, in case I decide to make some sculpting tutorials in the future (not a simple thing, sculpting in general has more art than science to it, and using green stuff for the medium doesn't exactly make things more predicatble). For the hammer, I went for a design where four wolf claws hold on to a runed orb and with a fang-shaped backspike.

 The rest of the model uses a mixture of vanilla Space Marine Terminator and Wolf Guard Terminator parts, with pieces of cork on the base. The only other customized part is the shoulder guard, where I sculpted the Great Wolf that Stalks the Stars, or as the less nerdy people call it, that rearing wolf symbol.

This being the fourth Shieldbrother just on this blog, I should probably get around to finishing the pack leader model, not to mention my Arjac conversion.

Modified Space Marine bike

Space Wolves clearly have a biker-kind of look to them, even if it is because they share influences, rather than one directly influencing the other. Long hairs, big beards and general over-the-top masculinity is very typical to both looks. That's why I decided to go for the custom bike look when I started modifying the first of my army's bikers.

 I lengthened the fork with pieces of 1.5 mm wire, while cutting out most of the front and bottom plates. I also sculpted extra pieces to the exhausts so they wouldn't look like they end so abruptly. Future plans include sculpting drum magazines for the bolters for the same reason.

 Another thing to modify was the handlebar. Instead of the standard straight model, I used pieces of wire to set the bar higher and slightly wider. I also cut off part of the seat to accomodate the rider sitting further back. Of course, this requires some modifications to the rider as well, but that's getting ahead of things.

This one will just be the pack leader's bike -- I doubt I'll go through all this with the whole pack. Then again, it's not like they need to be ready by some specific date, so you never know.

Sicarian Ruststalker

Ever since I first read the 2nd edition Codex Imperialis, I have always liked Adeptus Mechanicus and consider them to be an integral part of the fluff. I actually find it a little strange GW didn't publish codices for them earlier, but better late than never, I suppose.
I bought both Codex Skitarii and Cult Mechanicus as soon as they came out. Never mind that I basically paid twice for what really should be just a single codex (together with the Imperial Knights), the models look cool and most importantly, it's AdMech.

Sicarian Ruststalkers have an appropriately menacing look to them. It's not easy to have no facial features and still have a threatening stare, but these guys somehow manage it.
Game-wise, the combination of chord claw and transonic razor would have admittedly been better, but it's a little too late to change the equipment now. Besides, I don't think I could have made a pose like this with just a hand with unclipped nails and a knife.

 I wanted to have one of the Ruststalkers crossing his/her blades (I suspect the recruits may be of any gender, but by the time the Tech-Priests are done with them, I don't think the concept of gender really applies to them) and painted the blades reacting violently to each other. Martially speaking, there's hardly any point to do this, except maybe to intimidate the opponent, but WH40k isn't about realism.

 I do have one complaint about the models, and that's the fact you can't really repose the legs, torso or head. That just leaves arms, and while a lot can be achieved by using various combinations of weapons and arms, a large Sicarian army will end up a little deja vu-y. The other Skitarii models have the same problem. Green Stuff can't help much either, unless you want to resculpt the torso, and while I do enjoy challenges, that's just a little too much work for the reward of just having a slightly different Sicarian. As a result, my AdMech army will probably remain a small, secondary army.

You may notice that I based my AdMech differently from my Space Wolves. I went for a red desert look, as if they were on the surface of Mars. I also decided to base my Imperial Knight in a similar fashion. I'm sure I'll end up showing the Knight in a future update -- after all, there has to be some use for that Lords of War tag besides Logan.