The Warforge Miniature Modelling and Conversion

Even more lights!

I got to working on the staff a bit more yesterday and after hashing out a couple ideas, I think I have come up with something I like. On the new Ork Boyz sprue, there's an ork skull with the mouth open - with a bit of creative fiddling, I was able to fit an LED into there and rig it so that green light will emanate from the eye sockets and mouth

Now some of you might be saying 'Ein, I see what you're trying to do with this, but I can clearly see the LED in the mouth there'. You would be right, but I'd like to direct your attention to the fact that I have brownstuffed the skull closed from the back and underside. Why, you might ask?

It's simple! I have some Woodland Scenics Water Effects that I will be able to pour into the mouth - once it dries and hardens, it will become a clear 'lens' over the LED that fills the mouth up and diffuses the light so that you can't tell the LED's behind there. I did something similar on a Necron Lord I was prototyping and it worked out fairly well.

The nice thing about a weirdboy staff is that I don't have to go to any real, absurd lengths to cover the wires up. If you look at some of the concept art for Weirdboyz over at at Wargaiming.net, you'll see what I'm talking about.

Channeling Gork (or maybe Mork)

Yes, I know. It's not like I need more half-finished projects, but staring at a baneblade all day can get bothersome and this is one of those conversions where I just happened to find a bit and the idea started running on its own.

I found a mask from the fantasy orc model, Wurrzag Ud Ura Zazubu. I've been looking for a replacement head for the new weirdboy model for a little while now, and this fit the bill pretty well, I think - you'd have to be pretty weird to pull this look off.

Well, the good thing is that the head is easy as all hell to light, too, so off I went.

No fancy SMT LEDs in this - just a simple 3mm green. I had to do a bit of dremelling to the body to get the head to sit right, but I think it looks pretty good when it's all matched up.

 

I have a couple more ideas for this model. Instead of holding the staff overhead like on the new weirdboy, he's going to have it outstretched at his side. It'll be lit, as well - the nice thing about it is that I don't even have to hide the wires for it, because from what I've seen from the concept art weirdboys tend to wrap stuff in wire to try and keep their heads from exploding.

The pose I'm going for with this weirdboy is 'hanging in the air' - if I can figure out how, he's going to be posed about 30mm off the base in the air, suspended by Waaagh! energy, with a bunch of grots on the base holding chains trying to anchor him down. I think the new model's actually a pretty good base, as he's nearly in that kind of position to begin with if you cut away the terrain that's sculpted into his feet.

More to come whenever, this is just a kind of spur-of-the-moment thing.

As an aside, I didn't really have a name in mind for this guy yet, but 'Wurrzag' or 'Zazubu' isn't bad, based on the fantasy miniature's origins.