Paint Rack v2

 

More paint.

Just a quick post on the second iteration of my own paint rack design. There will be a third.

• The major changes are:
• Shorter brackets.
• Some of the L-shaped rails are lower (because the wood is cheaper that way).
• Less space between rows.
• Bottom of frame serves as an extended bracket.

 The lower rails benefits the older Citadel paint pots, but isn't quite as nice for Two Thin Coats or the dropper bottles I used for some things. I have enough for a second paint rack but haven't yet bought L-shaped trim for a third as I'm undecided as to which I'll go for. I have a lot of Citadel paints, but I'll replace many of that range as I go through them with equivalents from other brands. Maybe. On the other hand it's always simple to just put tags in front to know which paint is where. Still some time to decide.

I put more effort into making this paint rack flat so that the wall hanging strips are more equally attached to the wall. The first iteration has some problems here and the strips came away in places. The paint rack is still sturdy and attached to the wall but I ended up using a little bit of glue to make sure it stays that way.

The obvious change to make for a third iteration of the design is that the rows are still further apart than they need to be. They were so far apart before because of the airbrush paint bottles, but now that's not really needed. I think I can squeeze one more row in if I lower each by about 15mm. One row would be shorter than the others, but I don't think that matters overly much. It does mean that the size of paint rack no longer aligns nicely with the lengths of wood I'm purchasing, but right now I have a couple of spare rows anyway and want to make two more racks, so it will even out in the end.

The dimensions I'm using are:

• 2.4m lengths of strip wood.
• L-shaped is 34mm x 34mm preferably. Shorter on one side if desired.
• Rough cut is 15mm thickness, 40mm width.
• Each row approx 40cm in width (I make the frame wood 41cm because I can).
• Height of 60cm.
• "Brackets" about about 20mm cuts from the rough cut strip.

Each row is angled such that the front is 1cm lower than the back. Not much, just enough to make it easier sit the paints in without them falling the wrong way by accident.

Guess I'd better measure up and cut more lengths the next time the weather permits.

-- silly painter.

Blood Angels Furioso Dreadnought - Part VI (Showcase)

 

"That one. I want to crush that one."

The last of the old school dreadnoughts in my collection is now done. I say that, but it's taking a lot of effort to not put some wear & tear on those power fists - but I'm concerned that if I start there then I won't know where to stop.

There's nothing new painting-wise. It's just edge highlighting over the matt varnish, some metallic highlights to bring back shine there, and a little gloss varnish in places. The edge highlights on the armour were not done with my good brushes and I needed to be more careful after some early mistakes. I've intentionally left the feet without much in the way of edge highlights to make sure most of the attention is drawn to the upper area, predominantly the torso.

Interestingly enough the one part I like the least is the searchlight on the right shoulder. It's just yellow and boring. I don't go back over these sorts of things and instead let them serve as a reminder of what to avoid for future models - really I should just use an orange contrast or something to darken that area and give it some depth.

Some of the decals didn't work as nicely as I would have liked. That's just cheap decals more than anything else. The older ones are susceptible to this kind of thing, and it would've taken a lot more effort to get rid of the translucent outline, so I'm just leaving it. My own printed decal however fits in perfect, and once painted over really does make up for poor free-hand writing skills. Only downside is that I actually need to print them out - and I didn't have "FURY" available, making that a rather poor effort. Maybe I was just wanting the model done my now instead of doing everything proper - there appear to be a lot of "this should have been better" in this reflection.

Some things did turn out rather nicely in the end. The white wings are white, and the contrast paints did their job perfectly. Whether or not it fits in the general aesthetic (generally in my opinion: yes), they turned out just as I wanted them. Scroll colouring was the best I've ever done on the left leg. Experimenting with metallics also worked out nicely - I still have some mastering to do there, but I think an overall improvement compared to just shiny and silver. I also think the colour and value of base balances nicely against the the dreadnought and still looks different enough compared to his brothers. Oh, and there's a little blue gemstone that turned out really well. It just about glows. I like that bit.

-- silly painter.

Paint Rack

 

Rack 'em.

This post is a little different but still related to the hobby: paint storage racks. I'm once again needing to change around my work area and after looking around quite a lot for something suitable to use as paint storage thought I'd give it a go at making my own. This has been on my mind for quite some time, but now that there's only wall space available to help tidy up it became a bit of a necessity to try.

I had some specific requirements:

• Adaptable to different paint bottle sizes.
• Stable (either attach to a wall, or anchor to a desk).
• Low cost.
• Vertical stacking (flat surface space is at a premium on the painting desk).

None of the options I was looking at quite matched up. Originally I was going to anchor the paint rack to a desk up against a wall, but as the photo shows I eventually decided to attach it directly to the wall. As everything was going to be vertical I also wanted some kind of design to help keep the paint bottles on the paint rack: there needs to be a front rail to stop paint bottles toppling out, and I prefer a slight slope to each row to stop them from tumbling backwards. A slope also means the vertical height between rows can be reduced (even if only by 10mm) as an added bonus, and it's easier to take bottles out or put them back.

Walking through a hardware store one day I noticed L-shaped skirting boards. These are very nearly perfect for what I wanted to serve a each row, but are thin so I needed a way to attach them to a lightweight (i.e pine) frame. I reasoned that cutting small blocks to act as brackets would do the trick: I could screw them in as needed (spoiler: no screws required). For the frame I simply used a length of pine rough cut strip wood because it was cheap.

I should probably write down dimensions of all the wood and measurements of cuts, however part of this project is customisation: measure and cut to what is needed for the paints, not what someone else writes.

To start with I cut lengths for the frame (I already have a hand saw), and smaller blocks as brackets from the same length of strip wood. The blocks are angled such that the back marking on the frame is 10mm higher than the front marking. Clamps and wood glue (both of which I already had) and the brackets for each row were in place. As always: measure twice, cut once. Very sound advice. I did buy some screws (sold in boxes of 100, so plenty to spare) to put the frame together (I already have a drill and wood drill bits to make guide holes), but good wood glue would work if necessary.

After the frame and brackets were assembled, it was just a matter of cutting the L-shaped skirting to size and gluing that down. No screws were needed on the brackets or rows, I only did so on the frame for extra strength for the shape. I was originally going to add smaller rows on top, but decided against it at the last moment: there are two brackets in the way as a result.

All of this is stuck to the wall with Command picture hanging strips (large size, possibly overkill but I wanted to be sure). There are, so far, no problems. There are enough screws plastered over in the walls here that I didn't want to add any more holes and one day they'll need to be moved - thus ideal for those removable hanging strips.

With all of that done (much easier than I thought it might be) then I can already see room for improvement. An extra few centimetres on the vertical length is possible: there's just enough strip wood left that I could've added 50mm, maybe 100mm each side. Enough to squeeze in an extra row. Additionally I could get away with 10mm less between each row, particularly for future paints (which are shorter than the twist caps on display), and the bottom of the frame could be angled (with careful screwing) to act as the bracket for the bottom row. I figure for the same amount of material I could get two extra rows in (which is the amount of L-shaped skirting I have remaining as it turns out). The hanging strips should be able to easily handle all of this. It's also worth mentioning that the brackets could easily be from other strip wood of half the thickness; part of the reason for using the wood blocks was an intention to screw them in place, but the glue has proven up to the task and so screws weren't needed. The only other mention is that the L-shaped skirting doesn't need the "rail" to be quite so high, and it might be easier to move paints about when the rows are more compressed if I adjust that in future.

And there we have it, a low cost and easily customisable paint storage rack. Yes I already had a saw, wood glue, and clamps, but even if they needed to be bought then they aren't that expensive and are reusable across more projects.

-- silly painter

Blood Angels Furioso Dreadnought - Part V

 

Frag it.

This won't be a long post; mostly this is just to show the frag cannon.

The alternate arm has been painted in line with everything else, but I'm still not sure how to attach it. I could just leave it be: the arms fit snugly together as it is, but there's still that pesky matter of storage. The only real thing stopping me from adding magnets is that I'm not sure how to attach them reliably here; the arms don't have slots for magnets and I would need to build up something with putty - itself would have been more suitable during initial assembly.

There's nothing particularly out of the ordinary for painting the frag cannon arm. Reliable, trustworthy painting already achieved elsewhere, although I'm not sure about the targeting lens. It might look better after varnishing. The ammo feed was actually painted before assembly just to make it easier to reach the storage bin (even if it makes virtually no sense to externally feed the ammo to begin with). The arm is rather surprisingly far more simplistic than it otherwise might seem, and was much easier to paint then anything else. It doesn't hurt that I'm not trying to paint every little rivet a different colour.

This last of the Furioso series that I'm painting is not far off from being done now. There still needs to be a matt varnish over everything, followed by final metallic highlights to restore shine, and final armour edge highlights for definition. I'm sure a few minor details later too (gloss varnish across gemstones and lenses comes to mind). I just need to find the spare time to actually finish everything - and spare time is in very short supply right now.

-- silly painter.

Blood Angels Furioso Dreadnought - Part IV

 

"I am their doom."

Next on the list of models started long ago but not yet finished is the Furioso Dreadnought. There hasn't been a whole lot new on the legs and torso, so instead this will focus on the arms.

Even then there isn't much to really say. I'm painting the arms. I'm also trying to figure the best way for at least the right arm to be removable and a frag cannon used (the alternate arm that I'm also painting up). It will no doubt involve magnets, but the arms are hollow and I need to figure out the best way to secure them. Unless I simply stick with using the push-fit nature of the arm connectors to hold everything and not worry about ease of swapping things out. Much thought to be had.

Most of the metallics on the arms are so far:

• Doom Metal
• Iron Warriors
• Iron Hands

I think this works better than simply sticking to a wash for definition, but the blending can be hit & miss. I'll keep at it. Still undecided on what I'll do after varnishing - re-highlight with Iron Hands, or edge highlights with Ironbreaker.

The melta gun received the same yellow and white treatment prior to Blood Angels Red as was used on the boarding actions terrain. I was curious how it might look in a different setting - if it might look like the glow of a heat based weapon, or just like a bit of warning light. While I'm not sure I achieved the hot glow effect (a little more white in the middle perhaps - or yellow), it does look nice either way. Not that it makes sense for such a glow to be coming from the sides of the barrel. On the notes of barrels of meltaguns, flamers, and heat weapons: very thin layers (almost glazing) of any bronze or brass metallic separates them from grey metals while still leaning into the bronze/brass look I give fuel canisters for such weapons. Never underestimate glazing with metallics - it's surprisingly more useful that one might think.

I made a very small blue gemstone on the right arm to break the monotony of red everywhere. It's just a little visual interest. The surrounding ones I suppose I should do purple - but there still remains some others that I'll be painting up as red (again notably on the right arm).

Some of the cabling is Incubi Darkness with Black Templar over the top, using water on the brush to thin it ever so slightly and settle further off raised edges. Another way of giving subtle rubberised colour to "black" cables.

Some smaller details remain, the base needs a little more work (even if it's just a wash between stones), and then the varnish stage. How quickly I get it done depends on other matters, but I'm hoping it won't be too long before this dreadnought joins his brothers in the fight.

-- silly painter.