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WIP: Word Bearers "dark apostle"-inspired conversion

2K views 6 replies 2 participants last post by  jumai 
#1 ·
Though my army fluff would reveal that the character is not a Dark Apostle with a host of his own, he is nevertheless a Word Bearers chaplain/commander with no immediate superior peering over his shoulder*, so I've modelled him as I would an Apostle.

He is converted from the jump pack chaplain model, in case you missed it, and has had one extended sitting's worth of paint (and obviously, is nowhere near done). This is the first time I've gone much farther than parts-swapping with a metal figure, though I've hacked up plenty of plastic, so I'm actually quite proud of how he's coming along. I just temporarily assembled him to get a look at the combined effect so far, and figured I'd snap off a few shots to share (the wings, star, left shoulderpad, and book are attatched with sticky tac).

The right arm's shoulderpad has been seriously reprofiled (the stock model has a large, raised eagle taking up the bottom half and spilling over the trim) and the belt-buckle plate needed close to 2mm of metal filed off before it was rid of an ornate Crux Terminatus. Attatching the horns necessitated my first-ever purchase of epoxy putty. The left arm joint and the mounting surface for the backpack needed to be re-angled, the left arm itself was built up with putty so that the shoulderpad would sit correctly, the aquila on his right leg was removed, and obviously the head of the Crozius had to go (which required a hacksaw). Though he *looks* like just a few pieces have been switched around, it's actually been a ton of work to get him that way.

Paint wise, the wings, horns, and parchment have recieved the most work, while the red armour plates have recieved only a prolonged workup to base colour (no detail or highlighting). The black trim and chains will need to be blackened a bit more before the metallics can be drybrushed on. The left arm, chaos star, and a few other things are basically untouched. The rock he's jumping up from has only the same coat of pre-shading as the rest of the main body (thin scorched brown + future over white primer).

Behold:





I forgot to paint the left shoulderpad's inset parchment coloured (the whole warband does), and between that and the upcoming metallics he should soon lose that dark and ill-defined quality. Even still though, I think I'm going to need to pale down the wings a bit more so they don't crowd his silhouette.

I haven't decided if I'm going to give him the book or not. Opinions?



*(for the curious, in my fluff he's garrison commander of a small Maelstrom asteroid-base, which puts him and his warband largely outside the goings-on of the rest of the 109th. His official rank is Elucidator-Prelate, but he might as well be Apostle of a very small Host.)
 
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#3 · (Edited)
The horns come from Slaaneshi champion heads out of the regular CSM box... the lopsided fellas with a big spike coming out of the left side of their face. I steamed his right horn to get the tip to sweep back like the left one, and was just really patient sculpting the putty to get the right mounting angle. They're actually not glued on at all, rather set into putty (which after sanding I sealed with a little smear of epoxy resin).

edit: this one. Apparently I don't know left from right.
 
#4 ·
Quick update:

I've been working hard on him today, but at this point it's hard to see improvement. I've paused after working up the red to its brightest point, getting the black foundation for the metallics down, and some other stuff you can't see at all without turning him upside down. So, his colours are currently too solid and vivid, while the earlier pictures had a lot more preshading showing through. I've set him next to one of my Chosen models in these shots... I intend to keep the Lord's colours a bit brighter than usual to help him stand out, but he'll be grittied up and sent in that sort of direction.

Oh, the horns look a lot better now, though. I've darkened the very bottom further and added some marbelling, shooting for a ridged and gnarly sort of feel. Look closely, the change is pretty subtle, but the effect is quite pronounced in person.

Speaking of the horns, he survived his first metal-figure-right-of-passage today... he was dropped on the floor (eep). He survived without any parts breaking off, despite landing head first. Actually, that's not quite true; the very tip of his right horn snapped off. I actually don't mind the assymetry that lends him, and I'm pretty impressed that that broke before the putty holding it on. Maybe that resin coating was a good call?



 
#5 ·
...and here's as far as I got before running out of time. Started the metallics, got the left shoulderpad coloured properly, and tinted the base rock with Snakebite just to visually distinguish it... I'm still treating it as a safe place to hold him by, but I wanted to evaluate his shading and colouring without the rock seeming like part of his feet.



Now that all the actual colours are visible (if not in the right shades), what do you guys think? Is his silhouette pretty clear, or do things seem cluttered?
 
#7 ·
Quite a bit more done... in fact, I'm starting to feel like the end is in sight. So much of what's left (and was done since last post) is subtle or miniscule though.

I'm really not sure what I want to do with the haft of his crozius... as-is is starting to look nonhorrible though. I kind of want to do something with the seals too, but I don't want to make them into attention points. Maybe just a bit of drybrushing.




and an unprecedented top-down view:
 
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