Tutorial: Converting a Death Korp Lasrifle

A Death Korp veteran with their trusty lasrifle.

After converting a better-scaled autorifle earlier this year, I decided to continue the series of true-scale 40k firearms with the humble lasrifle. While I have been meaning to convert a smaller lasrifle for some time, the recent release of the Death Korp of Krieg models for Kill Team gave me the perfect excuse. The official design of the new plastic Death Korp rifles are remarkably cumbersome.

28 Challenge: Iron Snake Female Space Marine painted

“If your life is given in service to the Emperor, your death shall not be in vain.”

Earlier this month I finished converting a female Space Marine from an old plastic Rogue Trader Space Marine. The model was created for 28’s most recent challenge, designed to explore what female Space Marines might look like. We at Between the Bolter and Me are of the mindset that female Space Marines would look largely identical to their male counterparts, as shown by the Dark Angel Space Marines we recently painted and the Rogue Trader conversion. Having finished the conversion, I needed to decide how to paint the model. Having painted an Iron Snake earlier last year, I decided she would look great in their livery!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 87: Thoughts Old Bale Eye and Warhammer+

The future of Games Workshop?

On the eve before Games Workshop releases their new streaming service Warhammer+, we talk about the quality of the animated Hammer and Bolter episode they played for free to promote the service, Old Bale Eye. We talk about the generally poor animation in the episode and what that might mean for the rest of the series. We talk at length about the other features included with the service and how they relate to services Games Workshop already provides via YouTube or other apps. We also discuss the inclusion of a model to encourage subscriptions and where we think the future of the service will be headed.

28 Challenge: Female Dark Angel Space Marines finished

Two Female Dark Angel Space Marines!

Last month I painted a lightly-converted female Dark Angel for 28’s current challenge. It was a fun process and one that pushed me to paint another immediately afterwards. Instead of painting it exactly like the first, using zenithal highlights, I decided to try a drybrushing/stippling method Richard Gray made some YouTube videos on. Although he used the method to paint an Ultramarine and an Imperial Fist Space Marine, I decided to adapt the method using the paints I had on my first Dark Angel.

28 Challenge: Female Space Marine Conversion Complete

The female Space Marine (center) is similar in height to a normal Space Marine (left), but is much more naturally proportioned. She is smaller than a Primaris scale Space Marine (right), however.

Over the last few months, we have been working on creating some female Space Marines for 28’s most recent challenge, which has a deadline coming up at the end of the month. While Eric recently painted a Dark Angel for the competition, I have been working on converting one using an old plastic Rogue Trader Space Marine. Although the model was largely finished in the last post, I decided to spend some additional time fine tuning the conversion, including adding additional equipment and modifying her boltgun. With the conversion finally finished, I wanted to share some pictures before I begin the painting process!

Zone Secundus: Church of the Red Athenæum halfling

We are so very worthless, and everything we do is meaningless.

Throughout the year, I have been converting new members for the Church of the Red Athenæum, a radical splinter of the Imperial Cult that believes suffering is the highest form of veneration of the God-Emperor. Although we originally created the Church for Iron Sleet’s the Pilgrym event, we wanted to start exploring the organization again, and realized K0rdhal’s community event/setting Zone Secundus was a great opportunity for it. Since creating the Church, we always imagined their organization had a favorable view towards mutants in their congregation, recognizing their devotion, even though they are often persecuted throughout most of the Imperium. And while we created one mutant for our original warband, we always wanted to create more, to make it a recognizable element of the group. The Hedonites of Slaanesh Blissbarb Archers set contains a wonderful halfling model holding a banner, which caught my eye and seemed like a great model to create a mutant for my new Church if the Red Athenæum!

28 Challenge: Female Dark Angel Space Marine

Two of the mightiest female warriors ready to purge heretics in the name of the Emperor!

A little while back, we converted a female Space Marine out of an original Rogue Trader plastic model for 28’s most recent challenge. Although the announcement of the challenge was largely well received, as anticipated there was a vocal minority who were upset by it, decrying cancel culture and other inane criticisms. Some “clever” commenters thought they were educating the 28 team by telling them that female Space Marines would look nigh identical to male ones, due to their bulky power armor. This point is self-evident, and to emphasize it, I thought it would be worthwhile to paint one of the Dark Angels I converted years back out of Primaris Space Marines for the challenge!

Games Workshop scale comparison: July 2021

The new Deathwalker Zombies (far right) are some of the smallest and least heroic-scale models Games Workshop has ever produced.

As a blog, we are very focused on creating models that are well-proportioned and consistently scaled. This can be difficult to do since Games Workshop favors heroic-scale for their models and is not very consistent with their design choices when it comes to scale. With this in mind, we decided it might be useful to take some comparative photos of a few of Games Workshop’s recent models. We hope it might serve as a reference point for kitbashers as they consider their next conversions! It is worth noting that some of the models pictured below are subtly converted to better adhere to our preferred true-scale aesthetic, namely smaller firearms, but we think it is still useful.

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 86: Thoughts on the upcoming edition of Kill Team

We hope the new edition of Kill Team will be great for Inq28 style games!

In this episode we are joined by our friend and fellow podcaster Scrap.code to discuss the newly revealed edition of Warhammer 40,000 Kill Team. We talk about the rules that have currently been shown via the Warhammer Community page, focusing on how the new edition appears to diverge from classic Warhammer 40k. We consider how much the miniature skirmish game landscape has expanded over the last few years and how important it is that Games Workshop is incorporating elements of modern game design to simplify and streamline gameplay.

Conversion Corner: Genestealer Cultist

"Man will always fail."

After creating a tutorial for converting a smaller autogun for the ubiquitous Genestealer Cultist models earlier this month, I wanted to finish the conversion work on the cultist model themselves, in time of the #junestealer community initiative. My goal was to keep the model as close to the original as possible, making sure it was easily recognizable. With the smaller rifle, the model’s heroic scaling became even more obvious, particularly with their gigantic feet. I decided to trim the feet down to minimize this, using green stuff and scribing in details to make them look more natural. I also replaced the model’s holstered pistol with a smaller one, and gave them an additional rucksack. Finally, to make the model really look beaten down and combat hardened, I carved in some scars on his head and sculpted some bandages. While these changes are small, I think they make for a better, more powerful looking model! Let me know what you think!

Painting: Ana Polanšćak Gargoyle

Gargoyle and Hess Poison-breath.

After a few months of little hobby activity, I finally convinced myself to get out some paints. To get back into the swing of painting again, I wanted to find a pretty simple model, one that I could finish in one or two painting sessions. In 2019, I had a great time testing out some GW Contrast paints on two of Ana Polanšćak’s models, a Blood Fiend and Skull Familiar. I realized I still had a diminutive Gargoyle she also designed for the Harwood Hobbies Kickstarter, and decided it would be a great model to get me excited about the painting process again!

Tutorial: Autogun

A Genestealer Cultist neophyte with an autorifle that looks a little like an FN SCAR.

I have slowly been creating tutorials showing how to convert better-scaled 40k weapons. Ever since the release of the Genestealer Cultist models, I have always wanted to modify their autoguns to be smaller and less of a focal point on the models. To celebrate Tyranids and Genestealer Cultist this month, Modern Synthesist started an initiative to convert any model in either of their model ranges, tagging them with #junestealer. This was the push I needed to finally get out the neophyte hybrid kit and convert one of their autoguns! Below are the steps I used to reduce the size of their autoguns; feel free to try it yourself!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 85: The evolution of orcs/orks/orruks: from Paul Bonner to Brian Nelson to the Kruleboyz

There are new Orruks in Age of Sigmar!

In this episode, we are joined by our long time friend and ork supporter, Brad Smith. With the recent reveal of the new Age of Sigmar edition (3rd), and the visual redesign of the included orruks, the Kruleboyz, we decided to talk about how Games Workshop’s orcs have changed over the years. We talk about the goofy looking Paul Bonner-style of orcs/orks that filled early editions of Warhammer and 40k, before talking about how Brian Nelson completely redesigned their look for GorkaMorka and 3rd edition 40k. Although Nelson’s designs have defined the orc look for over 20 years, their look has changed slightly, as designers struggle to capture the simple ferocity of his designs. Finally, we talk about how orcs changed for Age of Sigmar, becoming Orruks, and how divergent the Kruleboyz are from the previous Ironjawz models.

28 Challenge: Female Space Marine WIP

Female Space Marine WIP

It seems that no matter how hard I try to work on non-Space Marine models, I am always drawn back to them. This time, however, I had a better reason than normal: to make a female Space Marine! I was motivated to try my hand at representing one due to the recently revealed challenge sponsored by Helge Wilhelm Dahl and the digital magazine 28. The challenge is incredibly simple, just create your own interpretation of a female Space Marine in Warhammer 40k, using any medium you like, and send pictures of your entries to submissions@28-mag.com by August 31st.

Remembering Kentaro Miura's Legacy: Berserk

Guts surrounded by evil spirits.

Earlier this month the world suffered the tragic loss of one of its most talented visual storytellers, Kentaro Miura. He passed away at the age of 54, having suffered acute aortic dissection. Miura is best known for the creation of the seminal dark fantasy Berserk. Originally a manga series, it has spawned a host of animated series and films, covering various arcs of the expansive manga that was still being created by Miura and his team up until his death. Taking place in a medieval fantasy world, Berserk follows a battered mercenary named Guts who suffers unimaginable tragedy and betrayal and goes on a quest for vengeance, as he struggles against destiny. The world in Berserk is often oppressively dark and violent, befitting of its title and the rage that consumes its main character. It is not completely defined by action and bloodletting, however. I would go as far to say that the series’ greatest strength is its human element. It deftly tells a tale of loss and suffering, showing how its main character deals with this strain. It speaks to the concepts of hope and peoples’ ability to heal, as well as finding the willpower to move forward even when destiny seems against you. The original animated series, and more particularly the manga, was a great influence on the three of us, with it occupying much of our free time, along with Warhammer 40k, during our high school years. In this post, we wanted to talk a little about that inspiration and how Berserk fits into our miniature hobby.

Oldhammer: Oldenhammer 2021

A Rogue Trader era Imperial Guard model next to an ork of the same era.

Although we are usually quite focused on converting models to improve their proportions and improve their weaponry, it is fun to put that aside sometimes and just paint an old Games Workshop model, celebrating a time before digital sculpting. In 2017, we found a small game store selling blister packs of Rogue Trader models and purchased a bunch of them and have been slowly painting them. Last year, I painted Slambo, and last month I painted an old Imperial Guard model to honor Commissar Molotov. Towards this end, we saw that chilvers_industries was holding a painting competition again this year called Olden Demon 2021, that asks you to paint an old metal model with a green base (as was prevalent in the 90s). Having not participated last year, we were eager to this year, painting another one of our collection of forgotten metal models!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 84: Chatting with Ana Polanšćak about Gardens of Hecate and her new Kickstarter

Ana Polanšćak joined us on this episode to talk about Gardens of Hecate, her long term hobby project which has expanded into a painting studio. We discuss what the hobby community is like in Croatia and how she started in the hobby. We talk at length about how she found her distinctive macabre style of miniature creation and how she is unafraid to constantly try new things to achieve her visions. We also talk about her focus on creating immersive narratives with her games like Legen and Sunhold, and how she is using these games to create her own ruleset, Fabula. We move on to discuss her involvement in various community events like Tor Megiddo and Mordheim 2019, and their importance in expanding the community and pushing ourselves further creatively. Finally we talk about how she turned her blog Gardens of Hecate into a business and her Kickstarter with Dave Taylor.

Oldhammer: Commissar Molotov

The scale of models has changed a lot over the years!

Over the years, our blog has put a lot of focus on INQ28, from the Pilgrym to working on Zone Secundus. Its focus on creating characters and telling stories stands apart from the vapid battles that typify Warhammer 40,000. The INQ28 scene has been built and fostered by so many people since the release of Inquisitor some 20 years ago, but Commissar Molotov played a critical role in getting the idea to take root, with his forum presence and INQvitationals. He continues to be a huge proponent for INQ28, and in 2018 he started the #INQ28th initiative, where hobbyists share INQ28 models they are building on Instagram, using the aforementioned hashtag. Inquisitor_sharpe realized that on April 28th 2021, it would be the 28th month of the initiative, and reached out to us and others to help celebrate Commissar Molotov’s continued contributions to this dark corner of the miniature hobby. To do this, he suggested that people create miniature representations of Commissar Molotov himself. We thought this was a wonderful idea, and decided to paint an old Rogue Trader Imperial Guard/Commissar model in his honor!

Bishop: Between the Bolter and Me’s mascot

Bishop attempts the miniature hobby with the help of his two servo skull friends - by Pierre Mortel.

Longtime readers of this blog will know that it has had a frog on its logo since its foundation in 2013. As avid lovers of amphibians, we wanted to ensure that we incorporated a frog into the blog in some fashion, which resulted in Bishop the frog in our first logo, discarding one of Games Workshop’s useless bolt gun scopes (without having a proper stock on the bolt gun, it would be next to impossible to successfully use a scope). Over the years, Bishop has changed a little, namely he acquired some Adeptus Mechanicus approved bionics, and is now half mechanical! This change occurred in 2016, when we created a new logo for the blog along with one for our newly created podcast, Dragged into Turbolasers! In the last few years, we have started to design Christmas/holiday cards with Bishop and a frog servo skull doing various festive activities, developing the curious frog further. Most recently, however, we had the talented Pierre Mortel do some illustrations of Bishop doing various tasks and wanted to share them with everyone!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 83: Chatting with Pierre Mortel about digital art, Sadboy, and Neverchosen

In this episode we talk with Pierre Mortel about his artwork and how he has combined his love for comics and Games Workshop’s settings. We delve into his origins as an artist, and how he has turned his passion into a career. We discuss how he channeled his own emotions into creating his iconic Sadboy character and how he plans to continue to develop Sad City. We move on to talk about his comics in Games Workshop’s settings, leading to his creation of Neverchosen, with the affable and fun Blight Kings, Grotus and Molch. Additionally, he touches on how he renders Games Workshop designs down to readable shapes. Finally, we chat about some of his influences and current miniatures projects.

Zone Secundus: The Church of the Red Athenæum - Marcelo Lythgoe

By Endurance We Conquer.

After finishing converting two members for a new Church of the Red Athenæum warband for the Zone Secundus setting, it was time to paint one. I decided to start with the heavy weapon specialist, Marcelo Lythgoe, finally putting some paint on the BAR conversion I did years ago!

Dragged into Turbolasers Episode 82: Chatting with Lunax7070 about True-scale Space Marines

A selection of Lunax7070's models in all of their glory.

In this episode we are joined by one of our favorite creators of true-scale Space Marines, Lunax7070. We talk at length about how he started on his journey of adjusting the scale of all of his miniatures, particularly his Space Marines. We discuss how his process has changed over the years and how the release of Primaris Space Marines affected it. We also probe into his thoughts on 3d printing, and how he hopes to continue to create vehicles to accompany his models. We also discuss his involvement in the Salvatore28 project Abzu.

Zone Secundus: The Church of the Red Athenæum - Heavy Weapons Specialist

Army of Two

Last month we had the opportunity to talk to K0rdhal about his community event/setting Zone Secundus, which expands the lore on the radioactive waste of Hive Secundus, on the planet of Necromunda. Rather than creating an entirely new concept for a gang, we decided to use it to develop the Church of the Red Athenæum, a fanatical Imperial Cult we designed for Iron Sleet’s Pilgrym event back in 2016. Our first model for the new warband was a gunfigher with a score of autopistols. We wanted to create a second church member, this one a heavy weapons specialist, also using a model from the Scions of Flame Warcry warbands.

Into the Past: a look at some of our old artwork

Cadian vs. Blood Pact (circa 2004).

Although we started this blog in 2013, we have been involved in the hobby since around 1997 (when the Warhammer 40,000 Storm of Vengeance campaign was released, the Sisters of Battle got their first models, and Epic 40k and GorkaMorka were released). Being in grade school, we did not have the funds to purchase too many models, but that didn’t stop us from imagining the grim 40k setting in our heads. This often led to us sketching out our ideas, combining elements from whatever inspired us at the time (Dan Abnett novels, and Neon Genesis Evangelion come to mind). Sometimes these drawings led to building models, but more often than not, they never went further than the paper. It has been a long time since I did any significant drawings in the 40k setting, but when looking through some old files, I found a collection of old drawings from my early time in the hobby, and thought it would be fun to share a few, even if I cringe a little looking back at them.

28 Presents: International Women's Day

The first International Women’s Day issue of 28!

 

To celebrate International Women’s Day yesterday, as well as Women’s History month as a whole, the digital magazine 28 created its first special issues, in the form of 28 Presents: IWD2021 special. In this 55 page free magazine, they celebrate the incredibly talented women who take part in this miniature hobby. It features 23 remarkable hobbyists who excel at miniature painting, sculpting, illustration, game design, Twitch streaming, and cosplay. If you have not yet, we highly encourage you to take a look at this new issue of 28, and start to follow some of these incredible hobbyists!

Zone Secundus: The Church of the Red Athenæum - Gunfighter

A Genestealer Cultist next to a member of the Church of the Red Athenæum.

 

We recently had the pleasure of chatting with the prolific miniature artist K0rdhal about his community event/setting Zone Secundus. Building on Necromunda lore, it takes place in the radioactive waste of Hive Secundus, after the nuclear bombardment to rid the city of the Cult of the Second Son Genestealer Cult. The setting takes influence from books like Roadside Picnic and Metro 2033, as well as post apocalyptic video games like Stalker and Fallout. It is a claustrophobic, desolate setting, defined by radiation sickness and failing equipment. With such an evocative narrative setting, we could not help but get involved, and after some brainstorming, we realized it would be a great opportunity to revisit one of our favorite creations, the Church of the Red Athenæum. Designed for Iron Sleet’s Pilgrym event, the Church is a radical splinter of the Imperial Cult that believes suffering is the highest form of veneration of the God-Emperor. Wanting to share their enlightenment with the wider Imperium, they sent missionaries out to populated hive worlds, where their ideology took root. Being so close to Terra, Necromunda was one of the first worlds to be reached by the Red Church, where they built a bastion to their faith in the ill-fated Hive Secundus, which is now an irradiated sump of twisted metal. But their faith is strong. Vivere est Pati.

Dragged into Turbolasers episode 81: Zone Secundus with K0rdhal!

Enter Zone Secundus!

In this episode we are joined by the talented K0rdhal to talk about his community event/setting Zone Secundus. It takes place in the radioactive waste of Hive Secundus, after the nuclear bombardment to rid the city of Cult of the Second Son Genestealer Cult. Taking influence from books like Roadside Picnic and Metro 2033, as well as post apocalyptic video games like Stalker and Fallout, it is a claustrophobic, desolate setting, defined by radiation sickness and failing equipment. We talk about his vision for the setting, and what models he and others have created so far. We also discuss what we plan to make for the setting and how others can get involved in Zone Secundus too!

F28 War Always Changes: Impressions

F28 War Always Changes, core rulebook and Player’s Guide.

We at Between the Bolter and Me do not often get the opportunity to play miniature wargames, and tend to focus our energies on creating unique miniatures and defining our own niche of the Warhammer 40,000 setting. When we do get to play, however, our focus is not on careful rules analysis and list-building. Afterall, since we sometimes go years between games, the particulars of a rules system fade away. Instead, we focus on conveying narratives and creating interesting gameplay choices. When we participated in Iron Sleet’s Pilgrym event, no one was particularly concerned with the ruleset being used, with all of us using an amalgamation of different editions of Warhammer 40k and Necromunda, falling back on the foundation that a 4+ roll on a die is a good starting place for anything. Because of this, we are always excited to find new, intuitive rule systems that facilitate this style of gameplay, and ones that do not get in the way of narrative immersion. After reading a great article about incorporating a Games Master into Inq28 games in volume 3 of the digital magazine 28, we learned about a rule system developed by Karl Bergstrӧm that facilitates this sort of gameplay called F28. To our surprise, he contacted us asking if we would be interested in reading over the ruleset and sharing our thoughts. We jumped at this opportunity, and having had the chance to go over the rules a few times, wanted to give our thoughts.

Tutorial: Autopistol

A standard Sister of Battle bolt pistol (top) and a converted autopistol (bottom).

Last year I started a series of tutorials for creating smaller firearms for Warhammer 40k models, including a Sister of Battle Boltgun, a Space Marine plasma rifle, and a laspistol. This month, I wanted to create another human-scaled firearm to complement the laspistol, this time the ubiquitous autopistol! This tutorial is a little more advanced than some of the previous weapon conversion tutorials posted on this blog. Unlike previous tutorials, this one uses very few of the original weapon designs and contours to guide the initial cuts and to inform the final design.

Conversion Corner: Ork Nob

Nikkit and Gorzag Gitstompa

It has been many years since I converted an Ork model; 2014 was the last time, with a Burna Boy conversion, and before that a Grey Knightz purifier. And while I did paint an old Tin Boy a few years back, it has been a while since I really did much with the orks. Recently, Games Workshop released a reimagining of a classic Games Day promotional ork nob originally sculpted by Brian Nelson. The new version, still based on some old GorkaMorka artwork, is called Gorzag Gitstompa (and a grot Nikkit). Luckily, we were able to get a copy of the model, and decided it would be a great opportunity to convert him a little, ending this long streak of not working on a Space Ork!

A look back: Notable Hobbyists of 2020

Earlier this month, we looked back at all we accomplished in 2020. This is always a fun exercise, letting us consider how we evolved as hobbyists over the year. Even better, however, is to reflect on the hobbyists that inspired us during the strange and turbulent 2020. Like years past, we are always amazed by the quality of work being produced by the community, and wanted to showcase some that stood out to us. The sheer volume of impressive hobbyists makes it impossible for us to acknowledge everyone, but we wanted to focus on a few that really helped us through 2020. We intentionally did not choose hobbyists that we have featured in previous years, so we would encourage you to look back on our selections from years past, as many of them are still actively producing incredible work!

Building a RX-78-2 Gundam [Beyond Global]

The RX-78-2 [Beyond Global] HG 1/144

Last year I was reintroduced to the Gunpla hobby, partially due to discovering the Cutting Mat podcast. As a result, I ended up building a few Bandai plastic kits, including a Gouf and a Zaku II from the Gundam Universal Century, and Eva Unit 01 from Neon Genesis Evangelion. To celebrate the 40th anniversary of Gunpla, Bandai created a redesign of the original RX-78-2 Gundam, deemed the [Beyond Global], in their HG 1/144 scale. The model was intended to show how far Bandai has come since 1980 with their injection molding technology. For less than $25, it seemed like a great kit to build and see what Bandai could achieve for such a low price point!

Between the Bolter and Me: 2020, a year in review

A selection of models painted in 2020.

Although 2020 was a chaotic and traumatic year, it marked the 8th year of Between the Bolter and Me as a blog. Like with many others, the pandemic changed how we all interact with the hobby. It allowed us to focus more on our podcast Dragged into Turbolasers and develop a consistent, albeit small, streaming schedule! With this post, we wanted to recap the year as a whole, starting by examining the 3 most popular posts on each of our various platforms (blogger, podcast, instagram, etc.).