Project 365: Day 11 - Miniatures - Assembling Megalith Part 3

Check out  Part 1 and Part 2

Greenstuff-a-go-go!

So last stretch of assembly and this probably involved more greenstuff than I have worked it to date. Since I had to reposition the arms I had to replicate the "wood" sculpt on the shoulder joint to cover up the flat mating point of the original sculpt.

Again this was easier than I had anticipated. Using an Xacto knife lubed with petroleum jelly I was able to texture the greenstuff into a good approximation of the bark. I was also able to copy the sculpting of the rope by starting with putty sausages. And no, I did not sculpt with my drill bit :P

Once that was dry I pinned the arms into the shoulders at an angle seen below:

Come at me bro!

I think I managed to repose the arms into a less awkward pose and more of a "welcome to the gun show" pose. I felt this helped emphasize his size more. Anyhoo feel free to let me know what you think. At this point though I wasnt done with him. I had to replace the dinky shrub on his back with something more befitting a character woldwarden.

I took some wire and some of my paperclips. With a little twisting and bending I had the beginnings of an armature for his tree. After attaching it to Megalith via the pinhole in his back I them repositioned the branches till I was happy with how they were placed and started wrapping greenstuff around the armature to make it look like bark.

While wrapping the armature in greenstuff I had some problems with the putty shifting and moving in ways I didnt want it to. In hindsight, I couldve made my life a lot easier by smearing superglue to the armature and letting it dry and thus giving the greenstuff a rougher surface to cling on.

Here's the final assembled Megalith. I really wish i took more backshots of him because I had to sculpt the tree into his torso in a way that made it look like the tree was sprouting from him, like it was a part of him.

This is what happens when you swallow seeds...

One other regret I had with this is I wish I had also taken pics of megalith during the painting stage. I will be posting a pic of Megalith painted in the future. That should be the first thing i do once i find my charger or secure another digicam.

Tell me what you think.

Project 365: Day 10 - Miniatures - Assembling Megalith Part 2

From the ground up :)

if you haven't yet, please check out Part 1

I like my warbeasts to be on a scenic base as this makes an already large warbeast all the more impressive. During the dryfitting stage for my large warbeasts I take the base into account for the final pose. My material of choice is cork :) specifically cork board. I like cork because it's easy to work with, letting you carve, cut and tear it into natural looking shapes that look like convincing scale rock when painted.

A medium base, a large base some corkboard and an Xacto knife. Pay no attention to the stray hair. I command it!

One thing I noticed is that a medium base fits onto a large base almost perfectly. I used the medium base as a template and scored into the board with an Xacto knife. I didnt cut all the way through so I can get a slightly ragged edge. Viola!

During the dry-fitting stage I noticed the gap in Megalith's torso. After scoring the mating areas with an Xacto knife I then lined it with greenstuff.

I used some petroleum jelly on the end of my brush as a smoothing tool

I also attached the legs. The sculptors were kind enough to have the legs attach to posts like an action figure but this made some new problems as just attaching the legs would make it pivot. To fix this i put in a little greenstuff for the legs to stick to

Any excess greenstuff was either trimmed off or sculpted like vines

Once the bond was solid I attached the head with some greenstuff and angled it so that Megalith was looking slightly to the side

Once everything was dry I started drilling my pinning holes. Those were located on the foot, Megalith's back where the twig was supposed to be and finally under the shoulders. The shoulders had tabs where the arms were supposed to slot into. i wouldnt be needing those so I had to slice and file them off. It was easier than I expected. Just remember to cut away from you at all times. With the plan I had in mind I decided to drill into an angle into the shoulder

I then also drilled straight through the base and cork to fit a paperclip through. I used a fairly large paperclip that I roughed up a bit with a file.

Trimming the excess. I have since dubbed my clipper "Lord Tetanus". Obviously I made sure to not cut in this position as thats a perfect way to take an eye out. Protect yourself from flying bits please.

If you'll notice I carved a step into the cork for the foot to rest on.

I then mounted everything with a lot of superglue. The cork soaks up a lot of the superglue and in the process hardens the cork nicely :)

With the upper legs and torso resting on the base to dry I then proceeded to sculpt the arms.

Watch out for part 3.

Project 365: Day 9 - Miniatures - Assembling Megalith Part 1

I still cant find the charger for the digicam :|

Luckily I was able to find some old pics from way back when I initially wanted to start this blog.

Megalith is part of Privateer Press's Hordes line and belongs to the Circle of Orboros faction. It's a unique character beast and a very cool one basing it on the fluff and the illustration.
 

Megalith, Kaya and Laris. Andrea Uderzo is a god!

The figure itself, however ...was a bit "meh"

Hooray!!

While the sculptor was able to to translate from image to mini beautifully, the pose itself left a lot to be desired. The pose didn't convery "hulking rock with regenerative abilities" very well at all.

The thing is the sculpt was halfway there and his stats meant that he would be something i would like to field on the table from time to time. I had to do something about that pose.

The Plan:

After the standard cleaning and filing , which I had to do very little of for this figure, I dryfitted the parts to see where everything went and set about my plan. The arms had to be reposed for sure, which had its set of problems since I had to trim pieces off and resculpt some areas. I also needed to do something about this:

if you notice on the official illustration for megalith, he was a hunk of stone with some tree branches growing from his back. The part that he came with can be charitably called twig :P. I needed to build and sculpt something a lot more fitting for Megsy.

While I was doing this I noticed I used the word "sculpt" about twice now. By that time I new I was in for a bit of trouble as I have very little skill and experience working with greenstuff.

Click here for part 2: Bases and assembly!