Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Dark Heresy Character: Conversion

Remember me swearing off commission work for a while? Well, when a single-figure request came in, I really couldn't turn it down. Especially when I learned it was for a gentleman that is involved in a podcast called The Guildhall Podcast, and that the character wasn't for the tabletop at all, rather his Inquisitor character from the Dark Heresy game by Fantasy Flight.

After a few emails to get down exactly what he was looking for, I dug into my bits boxes and really went to town.

So Paul (my client) was very exact in what he was looking for:

"Garreth Kane is his name. He dons a robe over his power armor most times, wields a chain sword and a flamer, and has a servo skull companion. His color scheme in my head has always been that of the Inquisition: Red, a bit of yellow, and on his chest or back of his cowl is the glorious symbol of the Inquisition. Emperor's Aquila's, Purity seals, everything else I'll leave at your discretion. Personally, as long as the weapons are right and servo skull is present, and you enjoy making it, that's the best part!"

Remember some of my posts on bits, bits boxes and the like? Check out a few:

The Bitz Box, A hobbyist's Best Friend

The Great Re-Organization of 2012

How Many Bitz Does it Take?

In those, I stress the importance of a solid and extensive collection of bits for the serious converter, among other points. It was this organization as well as my bits collection that allowed me to create this conversion in a timely manner, with a great selection of bits to choose from, and create a highly unique figure to boot.

Here's a collection of bits that I just started pulling out to work with:

Now I didn't use all of them, but I did use a pretty hefty selection form it.

Next I began crafting the torso and the main body of the figure. As this was an Inquisitor, I wanted to have a human-height figure, but one that obviously still needed power armor and the like. Using some tank commander legs with a great coat to simulate robes, I topped it with a chaos marine torso (with the chaos star trimmed away of course) and a modified Grey Knights backpack.

Then I shaved down and reshaped two Blood Angels arms, one with a chainsword and the other with a hand flamer. The chainsword I wanted to make a little more ornate, so I shaved and filed away at the back lower portion to give it a sabre-style appearance. These then got pinned to the torso, and the left arm was topped with a plastic Deathwatch shoulder pad.

Not wanting to overpower the figure, I reshaped another plain shoulder pad to remove the trim and shorten it. After that, I added another chain mail bit to the rear, and topped the backpack with an old Inquisitor bit as well.

Finally it was time for a head and some bling. Of course he was going to get a leather-coifed Grey Knight head, and then seeing as he is an Ordos Xenos Inquisitor, a belt full of trophies was needed as well! I followed those up with some additional Inquisitor brass-etched symbols and purity seals.

Finally he was placed on what else but a broken Wraithbone base form the plastic Farseer!

All in all, I love the figure and can't wait to show everyone how the paint turned out!

Also, if you'd like to check out Paul's podcast, check out the links below!

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GuildhallPodcast

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-guildhall-podcast/id427584520?mt=2

Forums if you'd like to play: http://www.nerdbound.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=31

http://www.the-guildhall.net/

- Tim

 

7 comments:

  1. What a lovely kit bash. That's quite a piece. Basically creating a character from scratch!

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  2. Fits pretty well with the description you were given mate. I like him lots.

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  3. That is seriously cool - great build, man!

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  4. It was exactly like creating a character from scratch, and I loved it. Having as extensive of a bits collection as I do (thought I can't compete with Mordian), it really allows some freedom in what I can pick from :)

    Glad everyone likes it!! Wait til you see it with paint :)

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  5. What an excellent kitbash, Tim! If I have one - small - gripe, it's that I think you should have resisted using the Marine shoulder pad on the left shoulder, because the combination of a Space Marine torso and shoulder pad will always make a model look like an Astartes to some degree -- the image is just that iconic. You had exactly the right idea, shaving down the shoulder pad on the right, and I think you should have gone with something similar on the other side as well.

    That said, I still love the model and, if I may be so bold, it feels like this is exactly the spirit of adventuorousness that you should have shown on your own Inquisitor project a while ago: The beautiful thing about Inquisitorial retinues is that you basically get to do whatever you want, and this latest model shows that you'd be really awesome at it -- so maybe you should consider revisiting the Inquisition at some point -- just sayin'...

    Anyway, amazing work!

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    1. Darn you and you being right.

      Yes, I do indeed wish I had worked on my Inquisitorial retinue like I did this one. And yes, I do believe I'll be working more like this in the future :)

      I will agree as well that the HUGE shoulderpad on the left shoulder should have been carved down. It's something I really didn't think was a big issue until I painted him. I still think it works somewhat, but I know now for the future :)

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