Convergence of Cyriss

(Originally posted 10/3013) In my last post I mentioned that I had started a new project that was a little more to my liking after finishing the nightmare that was Scyrah (and fear not, I'll be moving back to 40k for a bit before you know it). For now, though I'm involved in a slow-grow league with some of my gaming buddies, meaning that each month we increase our army size by a certain amount every month while at the same time playing against one another gaining points via pre-planned rules. It's really enjoyable, especially with a game like Warmachine where one model can cover your month of work. Anyway, the army I really wanted to play was Cyriss and after finishing Scyrah it was time to work into them. Below is how I went about making these guys my own, but I must warn you that after a new-camera mishap, over half of the pictures I took have been lost. I'll try and fill in the gaps, though.

First was the setup. Pinning models and bits to corks and sprue is how I do things, especially with me using my airbrush more and more. Below is pretty much my only picture for this process:

As for the actual painting, I found an old article by Dave Taylor where he wrote out a short how-to on a bronze-like paint scheme. This really caught my eye as Cyriss is very clockwork/steampunk and bronze will compliment that style well. So I picked up what I needed for the project:

• Vallejo 'Israeli Sand Grey' airbrush primer
• Vallejo 'Tinny Tin' game color
• Vallejo 'Brassy Brass' game color
• Vallejo 'Charred Brown' game color
• Vallejo Lavado 'Black Shade' wash
• Secret Weapon Miniature 'Algae' wash
• Secret Weapon Miniature 'Storm Cloud' wash

So again, I lost way more than half of the pictures I took for this tutorial, but I'll list what I did either way and anyone attempting the same thing will have to follow my advice blindly as I differentiate from Dave Taylor's method slightly. So first up was some very light priming with the listed primer above via airbrush:

Next is to basecoat with Tinny Tin. I wanted a little more worn/grimey look so I started that process early with a medium coat of Tinny Tin rather than a light coat. Then, just like Dave I mixed equal parts Tinny Tin and Brassy Brass and highlighted. Next I used just Brassy Brass and did some more extreme highlighting on parts I really wanted to stick out like in the picture below:

This will help create some contrast from my bases which you'll see in a bit. Next I did a thick wash of some watered down mix of Charred Brown and Black Shade wash (more watered down than Dave's mix I would guess, but that's because the recesses of my models are much smaller than his Monstrous Creature's). Finally I ran a thick wash of equal parts Algae and Storm Cloud washes. You'll see the effect this has in a bit.

Next I wanted a representation of my warcaster's auto-repair power he bestows on the battlegroup around him. To do this I wanted a conjured, floating, arcane gear surrounding his body. Time for the airbrush! My first attempt at "arcane gear magic" I wasn't pleased with. Having diluted my white Privateer Paint myself and attempting the right mix several times, I just wasn't getting it right. This essentially made my layering splattered and not very arcane looking. Also, I decided I wanted my blues to be brighter than what it was on the first attempt seen below:

So after a lot of testing/playing around with different blues...

I settled on what I wanted.

And the next day bought some white airbrush paint instead of attempting to mix my own...

Seriously, I'm cursed when it comes to any white paint. Anywho, the end result was much better:

With the models themselves close to completion, it was time to work on the bases; something that was merely in my imagination at this point. What I wanted was a kind of old, scrap yard for old clock-work robot parts. Problem is, my models are old clock-work robots and I needed contrast or the whole project wouldn't look right. What this meant was going more dark and rusted with the bases and more shine/no rust with the models themselves.

First up, however, was the basing materials themselves which I found on eBay (after spending way too much for less clock pieces on another site):

Again, pictures have been lost, but essentially I laid down a thin layer of Elmer's glue on the base, dumped a bunch of clock pieces on it, carefully shook the excess off, let it dry and finally picked off some of the less secure pieces. Then I ran a thick coat of Tinny Tin over the whole base followed by a very thick wash of Nuln Oil:

Now that I had the darkness I wanted, it was time to get the old and rusted look to complete the process. With this I went very simple (I want the models to be far more elaborate than the bases as I'm playing a dangerous game here with their similar styles and colors). Essentially a wash of Agrax Earthshade for the old and a touch of Red Brick pigment for the rust. I was pleased with the result:

With the bases complete it was time for assembly which oddly enough proved to be a bit of a challenge with this group and all of their similar parts. Luckily, Privateer Press rocks and they listed instructions on their blog. You can find them here.

After construction of the models I worked in some detail work with their opticals, but nothing that would be drastic enough to take any attention away from the bronze. Some light lighting effects via careful dry brushing were added as well:

For the warcaster, I had to move back and forth between positioning the gear where I wanted it and removing it from the model to get lighting effects from the gear correct:

After drilling/pinning the models to their bases, the end result made me delighted:

Galvanizer

Mitigator

Cipher

Forge Master Syntherion

And a shot of the whole battlegroup:

I ran them with some sprue creations the other night (a lot of the models for this faction aren't out, yet) and they did quite well:

That's all for now, folks. There's probably more Warmachine for my future posts at least until December. At that point it's a little up in the air what project I'll be moving to, so stay tuned.