Tiny T'au Fire Warrior (and more!)

[Will Vale]

This is tiny compared to Hunter Rose's sculpture - January's mini-of-the-month was a Fire Warrior and I got mine built and based a week or two ago, but didn't find time to paint until yesterday.

I primed it with decanted Mr. Surfacer 1000 Mahagony (dark brown) which was really nice, then drybrushed and shaded the cloth areas before painting in all the armour with 2-3 coats of white airbrush ink applied by brush. This gives a nice finish, albeit not a bright white, but because it's so runny it gets into the panel lines and fills them up really easily. I probably spent more time repainting lines than anything else!

After about 3 hours work I was a bit disheartened, but weathering and trying to sharpen up the details has helped and a couple of hours later I think it's not a bad effort for the time spent? The scruffiness certainly adds some texture to the white surfaces.




NB: The paint scheme is based on the current GW studio T'au army from Vior'la Sept, and goes with the small-scale aircraft I did last year.



They were painted down from light grey/white and ended up a lot tidier. I think the white/red is a really cool scheme and fits the sci-fi militarism of the T'au rather well.

Cheers,

Will

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Looks real good, all of it including the ships. 

[Andy Moore]

He looks great WIll. I like the little gold accents in particular.

 

Andy

[Hunter Rose]

13 hours ago, Will Vale said:

This is tiny compared to Hunter Rose's sculpture

 Yeah I think the minis come up to my guys ankle! 

 

Great paint job on him Will! I agree about the white/red scheme, I much prefer it to the classic orangey tan colour.

I like the base too

[Bertie McBoatface]

Cool work. I like the battered, war-weary appearance.

[Will Vale]

So the "first one's free" thing worked perfectly and here I am painting a T'au combat patrol box. I started with some Fire Warriors and drones, haven't finished the Fire Warriors yet but here are the drones plus a turret and homing beacon.

 

 

From left to right the drones are shield, guardian, missile, marker and a second shield. They're painted in a less impressionistic sloppy style than the Fire Warrior and are maybe a bit too clinical as a result? They match the aircraft quite well though, down to using Insignia White as the base.

 

I like the turret a lot, a little dustbin full of missiles with a beady eye peeking out under the rim.

 

The drones could do with bases, they're on flying stands at the moment which are a) wobbly and b) not very attractive. I think I'll probably end up using the flying stand stems with the standard 32mm bases (which have shoulders and aren't made of scratchy clear plastic.)

 

I'm not totally sure about the basing scheme, or at least the execution here - I think the teal-and-orange is a reliable enough idea, but the blue-green moss isn't amazing. Hopefully it'll look better on the figure bases.

Cheers,

Will

[Hunter Rose]

They look great Will, I really like the mid grey/light grey paint job. 

And actually I think the bases look nice too, with the moss and grass on the rocky ground as a nice organic contrast to the hi tech look

[ErikT]

Very nicely done.  I've always liked T'au, but I already have too many armies vying for my time and money.  Your paint jobs look terrific!

[Will Vale]

Thanks folks  I've admired them too, especially since the newer battlesuits came out. But I couldn't ever commit as my daughter is a big fan and I feel obliged to wind her up about the greater good being a propaganda job, etc. etc. Quite glad I finally took the plunge although she's been very smug about my conversion...

I know what you mean about too many armies, I wish GW would slow down a bit as I get tempted by almost everything they do.
 

Will 

[Will Vale]

Finished five Fire Warriors now, the style is a bit more like how I usually do things (matching the drones) rather than the fast-and-loose original subject of this thread.

 

Quite a lot of work in the end, the steps aren't that complicated but 5x anything always makes a difference. And then the Shas'ui's head and his glowing tricorder thing (full, no doubt, of widdly-wee) took a while on their own.

I've got some pictures of the individual figures but haven't processed them yet.

 

Cheers,

 

Will 

[Will Vale]

Herewith some closeups:

 

 

I still haven't figured out the best angle for "sarge"

 

W

[Will Vale]

Made some drone bases last night, gluing cut down flying stems onto normal 32mm bases.

 

W

[Yg Models]

nice Tau.

I also like Tau since its battle-suit has the feels of classic robot. e.g. battletech.