Painting Tallarn Desert Raiders

The list of paints used for my desert raiders, written down for future reference, VJ = Vallejo GW = Games Workshop.

BASE COAT:

VJ Green Ochre - tunic 

GW Tallarn flesh - flesh

VJ Camouflage Olive Green - trousers

VJ Flat Earth - boots and puttees

VJ USA Uniform - weapons

VJ Flat Brown - Pauldrons equipment

GW Deneb Stone - Shemagh

VJ Offwhite - Headress, plasma glow

VJ Turquoise - Knife handle

VJ Sky Blue - Headress edging

VJ Gunmetal Grey - gunmetal

VJ Bronze - Knife hilt scabard

GW WASHES:

Brown wash - Equipment, trousers and footware eyes/face

Thinned Blue - Headress

Thinned Black - Equipment, Lasgun

Sepia - Tunic, lasgun casing

Flesh - arms, possibly face

HIGHLIGHT:

Tau sept Ochre - Tunic

VJ Tan Yellow - 2nd Tunic

VJ Cam Olive Green - Trousers

VJ Russian Uniform - 2nd Trousers

VJ Flat Earth - Boots & Puttees

VJ Biege Brown - 2nd Puttees

VJ Thinned USA Uniform - Weapon casing

VJ Thinned USA Uniform + VJ Dark Yellow 50/50 - 2nd Weapons casing

VJ Green Blue - Knife handle

VJ Flat Brown - Pauldrons, straps & Equipment

VJ Mahogany Sand - 2nd Pauldrons, straps & Equipment

VJ Bronze - Knife hilt, scabbard

VJ Old Gold - 2nd Knife hilt scabbard

GW Tallarn Flesh - Flesh

GW Thinned Elf Flesh - face

VJ Off White - Shemagh

PLASMA OSL:

VJ Turquoise - raised parts of ribs

Mix of sky blue and white watered down - this also is used to highlight the area around the ribbed area on the plasma gun and area the light hits from the guns glow.

Watered down white - inbetween ribs

Note: posted late as it seems to have slipped through the net. This suggests I had yet to add some comments, long forgotten!

Tallarn Desert Raiders

Taking a bit of a break from the Ancient Mediterranean and took a nostalgic trip to the Dark Millennium of Warhammer 40,000 with these classic Imperial Guard Tallarn Desert Raiders or Astra Militarum as they go by now.

I enjoyed experimenting with colours and I'll post my colours in a seperate post so I don't forget when I pick the project back up. It was also my first attempt at object source lighting (OSL) technique for the plasma gun glow which youtube provided tutorials for.

I may slowly expand this Tallarn army but I am back to painting ancients for now attempting to clear the backlog of Thracians and a couple of cavalry units. Also have some part rebased units to finish too!

Hadria Line Infantry Imperial Guard

Continuing on with the 40k and abandoned project theme I took a few snaps of a prototype Imperial Guardsman or Astra Militarum as they go by nowadays. When I was procuring the plastic Cadians along with some plastic heavy weapons and command sets I had wanted to base their uniforms on German Fallschimjagres. I painted this model up based on the Italeri 1/72 Fallschrimjager art work.

I was a fan of the original Cadian shock troops miniatures in the 90s but I still can not get away with the redesigned helmet on the plastic set. Also, I later decided to have a self intervention, with the 1/72 and 20mm collections becoming out of control, I had now convinced myself to not by any Imperial Guard tanks.

So now the Guardsmen were to be an infantry only force depending on waves of troops and basic heavy weapon support. With this in mind I wanted to change the appearance to fit the theme of such a force. If I could find a historical themed seperate head I could convert the cadians into a rustic looking regiment like the Mordians or Praetorians. 

I discovered on Arcane Scenery's webshop Trent miniatures AWI range which includes seperate heads.  They seemed perfect, spare heads in Tarletons! Giving the guardsman a horse and musket era feel, then repainting them based on 19th century Prussians, with the armour painted in a silver metal inspired by Napoleonic French Cuirassiers. I did have to snip the ponytail but other than that the head fit like a dream. 

I was planning on squeezing as much as I could out if the heavy weapon set by attempting to mount the bolter, autocannon and lascannon onto napoleonic artillery carriages, like the carriage mounted Gatling guns of the 19th century. However, that hasn't advanced any further than the hairbrain stage yet. 

I do have a sentenel walker burried somewhere which was included in a battleforce set and I have a few Tallarn Desert Raiders. This detachmet would provide an irregular contrast to the ridgedly drilled and diciplined force.

Like the Eldar I would love to continue this project but it resides way down the list of priorities at this time. One day! I keep telling myself.

Eldar Guardians

I have recently been having a sort out of my miniatures to clear some space for a nursery. Most of my Citadel miniatures have now been put in the loft but I left out the painted ones and took the opportunity to get some snaps.  

These Eldar Guardians were painted about 11 years ago now I believe, I was in the process of collecting, or more like re-collecting, some 40k stuff. I have always loved the miniatures that the Games Workshop sold and at that time decided to get an Eldar army on which I hit on a redesign of the Aspect Warriors and some new vehicles. Anyway I painted up quite a lot of Guardians  (40ish I think), a few Warlocks and a Farseer along with a couple of Banshee squads (I will need to get them photographed too). 

I was big fan of the plastic Guardian set when they were released in the late '90s, the parts allow quite a few different poses between the Guardians and they look cool and are still some of my favorite miniatures. My first collection of 40k stuff I had gathered back then was conveniently disposed of when I left home, hence the requirement to start again in '07. 

I could not however continue to resist the pull of historical miniatures and between Napoleonic and Ancient offerings from Hat along with the glossy release of the Field of Glory army books, which fueled my collecting of Ancients into an obsession. Since then I have barely painted a Citadel miniature but I will keep the eternal hope that I will get around to painting them, even if it is pure fantasy!  

At the time of painting these I had bought a then new army box which included a Codex so I was following the army lists and restrictions. One of the rules that came in was that each squad required a heavy weapon platform, the sprues came with 1 platform and all the weapon options. I made them up with a pin on the base of the weapon and a slot on the platform (or vice-versa) to allow me to change the weapon depending on the required firepower of the day. These rules and codices chop and change all the time so I am not too fussed about 40k rules but it would be great to game with the miniatures one day.