Whether to weather?

If you follow me on Twitter, or you caught my previous post, you may have noticed that I've started dabbling with my Warhammer 40,000 Enforcers again. My Adeptus Arbites sanctioned, Judge Dredd inspired Enforcers who police the mean streets of the hive city, Kruenta Karoliina Arx Rotunda.

I've started painting them, and have found myself tweaking the colour scheme in ways I didn't expect.

In the Judge Dredd comic, along with their red-rimmed helmets and gold shoulder pads, the Judges of Mega-City One sport several green items on their uniform – boots, gloves, knee pads, elbow pads and pouches. In the 2012 Carl Urban film they clearly felt this approach wasn't going to be gritty enough, so although they kept some of the green details, the colour was made so much darker that it was hardly noticeable in the final grade of the movie.

When I started on my troopers, I wanted them to look like the darker, almost entirely black-uniformed movie version, but decided to switch out the dark green altogether in favour of a dark tan leather colour that would probably make for a more easily identifiable texture in miniature form.

And with that I eventually got to the above stage where the test model is just about complete.

Or is he?

Originally, several years ago, when I first envisioned this project, my plan was to make my Enforcers look more worn. A little beaten up. Dusty, battered and generally in-use.

Like these guys

But now I've got this far, I'm not sure the model will really benefit from a lot of weathering. The dust might blur the already difficult to detect line between the harder body armour and the slightly softer black leather jacket and trousers. So I'm faced with a bit of a dilemma. Do I push ahead, sticking to the original plan, and run the risk of making an irreversible mistake, or just stick with what I've got, and let the weathering go the way of the green boots?

The answer is I'm just not sure yet.

ADDICTION CHALLENGE
REMAINING: 44 or 45?

Wheels of judgement

One hundred years ago, I pledged, on this blog, to build a couple of unique models. Ones that would combine a character from a film, with a vehicle from a comic, and infuse them both with a hint of WH40K flavour.

But only a mere few days into the project, I got to a stage that had me stumped. I put the fledgling models to one side, promising myself that I'd return to them soon, once I'd mulled over how to go about finishing them.

Fast forward those hundred years, and I was finally struck by the urge to complete them. In reality I was less driven by the desire to finish them that I was by the guilt of having abandoned them.

And today I think I'm finally at a place where I can share them.

Perps, jimps, futsies and stookie runners*, may I present to you the LexDominum urban patrol bike.

Although they don't look all that complicated, these bikes were a real headache to construct. I worked on them, on and off, for about two and half years, doing tiny, incremental stages every few weeks, then abandoning them for months on end. But I took a few photos along the way, so I can share some of the major leaps forward. 

Before I do that, I'll just share a quick reminder of my original brief. You can see it in full here, but quite simply it was as follows.

Start with this bike as the major ingredient...

... but add the lights from this design...

... to create something a little like this...

... then sprinkle in a hint of the armoured feel of these bikes...

... but base the whole thing on this model

This meant I was starting with two of the Space Marine Scout Bikes, which I cut at the join between the front forks and the main body of the bike.

I started by rearranging the angle and length of the front forks, using plasticard and putty...

... before smoothing off the putty and adding more plasticard to create the basic shape of the front fairing

I then added some simple detail to the reverse of the front section

The guns, rims, rivets, baggage and lights, came next, while I also brought the rider in line with the earlier troops

I bought the lights from Zinge Industries, who have an incredible range of tiny detailed parts for exactly this kind of conversion work (I think it was these ones). However, even though they seem to come in sets of five, and from looking at the photo below I clearly had at least six, I somehow didn't end up with enough to complete the job. So rather than risk interrupting my flow while I waited for a new order to arrive, I decided to cast the missing two with Instant Mold and green stuff. (I talked a bit more about that process when I created the Judges' shoulderpads here.)

Next up: repeat the previous stage on the other bike, but go for a different overall pose

Add the basic shape of a badge in plasticard

Then cut some details from Forge World brass etched eagles...

... to be glued to the front of the badge

Sculpt in the hint of some wings on the eagle badge

Then add final detail to the reverse of the bike

These two bikes finally complete the construction of my entire Judicial Enforcer Squad, a process I started back in the first post of this blog, nearly four years ago. That's slow, but its not my slowest project ever. Not by a long shot**. 

Besides, the real challenge is to see if I can get them painted a little bit quicker. So here's to hoping I can finish them before April 2023.

*For more information see over 40 years of Judge Dredd comics.
**Remind me to tell you about my converted Scout Titan at some point.