Imperial fleet finished

The other day I showed off my finished Imperial cruisers. With the addition of a couple of escort squadrons I now have a finished fleet. I have enough models to field roughly 1,200 points but I plan on slowly adding more ships to my collection in the future.

For those of you wondering what the marks are for on the base, these are in-game aids. The game mechanics of Battlefleet Gothic hinge around the relative positions of ships to one another (moving away, abeam, closing etc) which alter the effectiveness of firepower. The marks should make it easier to tell which arc a ship is in at a glance.

My newly-painted escorts:

The Cobras are white simply to add a bit of variety to the force. They were inspired by the Earth Force ships from Babylon 5 (possibly my favourite TV show of all time). They were airbrushed Fenrisian Grey over a white undercoat before being drybrushed Ceramite White. I’m not normally a fan of drybrushing, preferring layered highlights, but I think the technique works really well on Battlefleet Gothic models and brings out the sculpted details nicely. The basecoat of Fenrisian Grey helps tie them in with the rest of the fleet as this is the final highlight colour on the blue ships. Subtle things like this can make an army look really unified even when individual units are painted in different colour schemes.

The whole fleet assembled and ready for action in the Gothic Sector:

Finally, here is a bit of BFG related humour which I think will appeal to all fans of the 40k universe:

Link

Thanks to Gus for Tweeting me this. I also encourage you to check out his BFG models over on Epic Addiction.

Have a great weekend,

Andy.

Battlefleet Gothic – Cruisers finished

I have finished my first four cruisers for Battlefleet Gothic. These were nice, fun models to paint with lots of detail and texture sculpted onto every surface. My only criticism is that there is a little too much texture. It would have been nice to have one or two clear areas in order to add some freehand markings to help differentiate the ships from each other further.

This is my Mars Class Battlecruiser, Righteous Indignation, which will serve as my flagship in smaller games (in larger games I intend to take a battleship as the flagship). The ship features a couple of minor conversions. Firstly, as with all of my ships armed with nova cannons, I filled in the torpedo launch tubes in order to make them wysiwyg (ships are armed with either torpedoes or nova cannons). This isn’t really necessary but it a small detail that satisfies my need for exactness.

Secondly, I converted the bridge in order to make it more impressive and make it stand out from the other cruisers. This was done by adding an Imperial icon from a Space Marine banner pole to the back of the bridge behind the observation dome.

I’ve seen this conversion done before but often the icon simply looks stuck on. I wanted mine to look more integrated into the build of the bridge and so I filed down the back of the bridge and built it up with small pieces of plasticard to support the eagle statue. I then added sensor masts behind the eagle to make it look like an integral part of the bridge structure that was designed to be there. These extra senors can also serve to represent the upgraded targeting systems that you can add to the Mars.

Here is one of my two Lunar Class Cruisers, the main workhorses of the Imperial Fleet. I’m particularly pleased with the glass effect on the observation domes on the ships.

The four cruisers together (sorry for the poor picture):

Painting the Fleet

Here’s how I went about painting the ships.

Blue-grey:

1. Over a black primer airbrush with The Fang.
2. Airbrush Russ Grey leaving some of the previous colour showing in the recesses.
3. Wash with Drakenhof Nightshade.
4. Drybrush Russ Grey.
5. Lightly drybrush Fenrisian Grey.
6. Glaze with Guilliman Blue.

White:

1. Basecoat Codex Grey.
2. Highlight Ulthuan Grey.
3. Highligh Ceramite White.

The details were then picked out with gold and silver as appropriate and the observation domes were painted black and highlighted along the bottom with Codex Grey followed by Fortress Grey (as you would when painting gemstones). I then applied a small dot of white to represent light being reflected from the top before gloss varnishing them.

Now on to the escorts.

Andy.

In space noone can hear you paint

As those of you who follow me on Twitter will know, I have recently been working on an Imperial fleet for Battlefleet Gothic. I’ve only played one game of BFG but I really enjoyed it and really like the models. As with most of Games-Workshop’s Specialist Games range, it is relatively inexpensive easy to get into; the rules are free to download from the GW website and you don’t require all that many models to play.

Above you can see the current status of the fleet. Most models are largely finished and only need details such as weapons, figureheads and markings painting. The ships are nicely detailed and quick and easy to paint. In a later blog post I will give a step-by-step account of the colours and techniques used.

In other news, I have created a dedicated Miniature Miscellany email address and added a contact section (top of page) should you wish to get in touch with me. I have also created a Miniature Miscellany Facebook page which you can find here: http://www.facebook.com/MiniatureMiscellany

Have a great week,

Andy.