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Tuesday, November 17, 2009

The Greening of Canis Wolfborne

In an earlier post, I mentioned that I had happily acquired the new Games Workshop model, Canis Wolfborn for my Space Wolves Warhammer 40K army.

I was so excited by this acquisition that, although I was completely awash in pre-convention painting projects, I took time to clean the model and put him together.

I will reiterate that I have never seen such an imposing hunk of metal designed for the tabletop! Canis is a "mere" Space Marine, his size alone is inconsequential - unless compared to a "mere" mortal! However, his mount, the cybernetically enhanced Thunder Wolf, Fangir is another story altogether.

I have not done actual measurements so cannot provide an accurate size for the model; let's just say it's really big!

Unfortunately, when I built Canis and Fangir, I was out of "green stuff" modeling putty and could not fill the cracks left between larger bits.

I finally got some green stuff and went to work on Fangir - and here are a couple of photos showing the results.
















Fangir and his rider, from the front















Looking down at Fangirs' tail end



As I worked with the model, it became apparent that the spaces left between Canis' arms and his torso did not require putty. However, poor Fangir had a few spots that needed a bit of help.

I mushed up the yellow and blue parts of the green stuff, squished it around till it was nicely blended, then rolled it out in long strips that would nearly fit into the crevices. Using a dental pick, I pressed the green stuff into the cracks, and poked it into a similar appearance and texture as his fur.

I also learned a bit about photography while getting the shots for this posting; Note to budding miniatures photographers - when using the Super Macro setting on your camera, using a flash will leave a large black shadow in the shape of your lens! DOH!

I have begun the carbonite freezing process... umm.... I mean the priming process, and hope to begin painting Fangir and his pet space marine soon!

2 comments:

Sigmar said...

Hi El Bandito,

Did you ever finish Canis and Fangir ? I find that there is usually a need for green stuff with these larger models (it's not as bad as it used to be in the "old days" though !)

With the camera macro, try using a light "studio" - a box filled with tin foil (on the left and right sides) with a couple of lights shining into it and a plain non-shiny background). If you can't be bothered with that I find that miniature photography outdoors provides the best results (although not in direct sunlight).

Nice blog, thanks for sharing. I'll be back.

Sigmar
(my WFB blog)
(180+ Battle Reports !)
(my WFB Modeling Gallery)

PS. I'm enjoying your 365 internet radio.

El Bandito said...

Hi Sigmar! yes, well. no. almost? He's looking lovely, really nearly done.. I'm at the "fiddling" stage. I hate to say he's "done" and still feel there are tweaks I can add.

I'll try to work out those techniques you describe for photographing and use it to get a few pics of him up here to enjoy!