Heresy & Heroes

This Sunday was a rare one for me in that I actually had nothing on. No meeting friends or family, no tasks or chores that needed completing; I was free. I could do whatever I wanted for the first time in ages and, like any good hobbyist, I elected to spend said Sunday sat at my desk, painting and modelling away.

Then, perhaps in an effort to undermine my day of freedom, I came across the kit that I needed to get to work on and I have to confess, it’s one of my least favourite kits from GW (more on that later) and it has been sat undercoated and mocking me for months. I speak of the Stormraven.

You see, having seen Forge World’s ‘now available for pre-order’ Xiphon Pattern Interceptor and realising that I want two of those, I couldn’t bear the thought of having a grey tide with three flyers in it even for a moment, so I’ve pledged to myself that I won’t be buying those Xiphons until this Stormraven is done. That’s what Sunday was for, and this is how I started my day…

9:39 AM

Ah, the fresh and empty desk. A verdant land full of promise. A new space where new ideas can be chopped up, glued together again and slathered in Abaddon Black. I cleaned up a bunch of paints, sprues and empty fizzy drinks cans before enjoying a light breakfast and taking a bath. I then sat down to begin a day of pure hobby pleasures.

11:02 AM

I really do hate this kit. It took ages to get to this stage and that’s barely anything. I sealed up the interior at this point because I realised I could get some good bits for the bits box from it and I was never going to have any reason to have those doors open so why not. What’s more, it means one less thing to paint. With this kit, getting the tail on is the first moment where you think ‘Oh yeah, it looks like something’ so this was kind of a nice moment. Kind of.

11:35 AM

Right. Time to get the paints out for the first time today. Having worked on this kit previously (I have a Grey Knights Stormraven somewhere) i know that not an awful lot gets seen when this is done, so this isn’t going to be the best paint job ever. It won’t be sloppy but there won’t be much in the way of embellishments either. Let’s get brushing.

12:27 PM

Cockpit complete! And work on fixing the horrendous panel gaps with green stuff under way.

14:31 PM

Ok, cockpit actually complete now. My Techmarine pilot is done and the panel gaps have been properly fixed now. It should also be noted that I had lunch around this time – a goats cheese and red onion marmalade sandwich which was very pleasant. And as you can tell, to break up the silence, I started watching Adventure Time too. Mathematical.

14:46 PM

Well, that was pointless. At least the panel gap is fixed, and it now comes with added missiles.

16:30 PM

The main body is almost complete now. I had to have a few breaks in between this post and the previous one due to my work stool becoming somewhat uncomfortable. I think I was numb from the waist down at one point.

As you can see, I’m having to fix another panel gap here with green stuff. This is why I loathe this kit, and some other big kits too. If you don’t get everything dead on straight, you end up with gaps or things at weird angles. I measured, remeasured and placed calmly but to no avail. Maybe it’s just me (I’m almost certainly part of the problem here) but this is part of what I have been dreading about this kit. Green stuff has got me covered though, so I can make do with these mends.

17:56 PM

Next up was the little servitor weapons pod. Going for Lascannons for tank-hunting power. The servitor himself got a considerably quicker paint-job than the Techmarine – you can see how little clear glass is available to show him off and no-one’ll be looking at him anyway. I know that’s a lazy attitude but by this point in the day, I was fine with it.

20:20 PM

After doing a bit more work on that cockpit and painting a black layer all over the Stormraven itself, I went for a little walk and then stopped in at the pub for a couple of pints to see off the weekend. I can’t stay indoors without break for a whole day – I just can’t, and it was a nice way to end the weekend and a day of modelling and painting.

22:34 PM

So there we have it. The whole kit is now ready for some attentive painting which will come over the next couple of weeks hopefully. I’ll have those Xiphons in no time! What’s more, I can throw away a load of sprues that have been bugging me for months. Winning. And at least, by this stage, I had the Naked Gun to keep me company (I miss Leslie Nielsen).

I’ll keep you posted of course as this thing develops and more work gets done on it. It does look cool when it’s done, but I still hate putting this thing together. Still, it’s done now. Onwards!