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Greetings all,

I have been reading this forum for a while and decided to take the plunge and add my attempt at building a Middenheim themed army. I needed a new burst of motivation and thought i'd give writing an army/painting blog a try, nothing like bouncing ideas around and comments with fellow enthusiasts.

Its only my second army after "finishing"  a Greenskin Army. I chose to theme it upon Middenheim as the fluff allows a bit of moding and kit bashing opportunities that should make the army stand out a bit on the table, or atleast attempt to stand out.

Anyway onto some pics of what has been finished so far;

Detachment of Halberdiers





Detachement of Hand Gunners (Forgeworld Bodies)





Hunters (Markus Wulfhart is still a work in progress)






The one area that I will be tweaking is the faces, still trying to get to grips not paining everything green 

And now for the start of some heavier kit bashing. I personally, and this is just my opinion do not really like the Demigryph models. They strike me as being on a parade ground not in the middle of a battle. As such one of the barriers to starting an Empire army was for me to find a way around this and found it in the Middenheim fluff. I decided to reincarnate my version of the Winterwolves of Middenheim in the following way:





The models are based on the 40K Space Wolves Thunderwold Cavalry, the riders are from the Demigryph set and the hammers are from Space wolf terminators if I remember correctly.

After completing the models I decided a block of 6 would be better, but I did not want two of the same ranks and decided to build the following (still a work in progress)



The 4 Wolves on the side are obviously 40K Fenrisian Wolves, the main character is a bit bash between Canis Wolfborn (removed his legs and all 40K bits), Demigryph knight legs transplanted onto the model with the sword arm and  the other pointing arm comes from a High Elf White Lions of Charce Champion. Will update as it nears completion.

For the rest I find the Great Cannon a bit on the small side. As such I dug in my bitz box as I did a kit bash to make a beefy Orc Boar chariot by adapting an Ogre Kingdoms Ironblaster. As such the Cannon was still left untouchedand and begged to be used especially since the marks on it clearly show it was at one point an Empire cannon. As the fluff states that the Empire when in dire need will use battlement guns in battle I imagined my Great Cannon being removed from the city walls to join the army on campaign and came up with this (Again work in progress):



"I think he needs a bigger packing tool for the cannon though  "

Anyway let me know what you think so far, still a lot of work to do before finishing the army.

Greetz

I'm a bit disappointed you decided to scrape off the detail on the ogre cannon. I found those details were what really brought this cannon to life.
great start on your army though, and some nice big wolfs

So many great things in this log! The giant wolves are awesome, the cannon is really cool and the handgunner detachment looks great. Well done Sir!

Thanks for the comments so far.

I'm a bit disappointed you decided to scrape off the detail on the ogre cannon. I found those details were what really brought this cannon to life.
great start on your army though, and some nice big wolfs

I agree, at the time I started this conversion I was planning on removing the Ogre markings and keeping the rest, but it soon became clear that skill levels and equipment were not at the level that would satisfy me. So I changed tack and covered it up, it is still a work in progress and my Empire Bitz Box is filling up nicely and I will be adding things to the cannon to make it stand out in its own right, well in my head atleast lets see whether my hands can match my imagination...

As someone who has recently got some thunder wolves to do the same thing - thanks for the inspiration!
A great start to the army 

The Thunder Wolves are great fun to convert, the Space Wolves sprues give a lot of bitz you can use in Fantasy conversions with a little adjusting, and they are comically oversized which I think add to the flare of the models. Anyway have fun with the conversion.

Great looking Winter Wolves! I've got two sets of Demigryph Knights and Space Wolf Thunderwolf Cavalry waiting to be kit-bashed. Your pics and progress on the matter really inspires. Great work mate, thanks for sharing

- Loran

I really like how those hunters are looking!

The cannon is going to be impressive. I really like the size of it.

Great looking Winter Wolves! I've got two sets of Demigryph Knights and Space Wolf Thunderwolf Cavalry waiting to be kit-bashed. Your pics and progress on the matter really inspires. Great work mate, thanks for sharing

- Loran

Cheers for that, I'm really pleased its encouraging you and hopefully gives you food for thought and new ideas, in any case enjoy the bit bash there are so many ways to personalise it.

Great to have you on here!
Its always good to have another Middenheimer join our ranks. For Ulric!

The Forgeworld handgunners look great and I like what you did with the cannon. Makes sense to me that Middenheimers would prefer a bigger cannon with more 'boom' than the puny cannons those 'Southlanders' use.

The conversion you did with the Thunderwolves is one that we have seen very often (on this forum as well as in general) now, but I like how everybody's version is slightly different and even though everybody uses the same base models it's easy to put your own spin on it.
It's definitely a conversion I'll be posting myself when I get my own blog up and running on here.

I wish you the best of luck with your army and continue to keep us updated

Cheers for the welcome, I finished the front rank of DemiWolves about a year ago, been to busy with work to get the rest of the army together. I have more time on my hands now and with the encouragement and pressure from this blog I'm hoping to push through. I used to live in Amsterdam and the GW there is a great place to come up with new ideas. In Dubai now and need a new channel to bounce ideas off and receive critique. Anyway will keep you updated on my progress.

Grtz

Evening all,

Its been tough finding time to paint the last few days but I am happy to report progress has been booked. Finished the DemiWolves. You can see the front rank earlier in this painting blog and now I have finished the second rank;






Still working on the Stank and Markus, both are about 2/3 done. Hope to finish them tomorrow and then on to a block of 40 Swordmen me thinks...or canon...or General...or knights...or mortar...or... ahhhh too much to do....

Mate I love your demi wolves, indeed your whole army is awesome.
If by inspire you mean feel free to blatantly steal your ideas than I feel "inspired" 
can't wait for your winter steamtank.

Haha, Nicolas as far as I am concerned any ideas that I have and post about can be copied by anyone. It seems the perfect measure of doing something well if other people start to build along the same lines, and as far as I can tell there is no trademark on my pics   

Anyway comments as always welcome and hope to have an update tomorrow with the Stank.

Grtz

 

the wolves look really good, colour scheme etc, but they are missing the depth that a wash brings,

it's like you have stopped at base coat stage,

if it was me, i would be getting a big brush and washing all over with brown and blue several layers,

then on to highlights

good work all the same

Thanks Chumley for the honest critic. The pictures dont really show how they were painted, the white balance has overexposed a bit I think and hides a bit of the detail.

They are actually based in white, then I take a very light grey and water it down heavily so that the previous colour still comes through on the raised areas when applied to the model and then work my way up to black. Its almost reverse highlighting. Obviously flat areas come out in a relatively flat colour. The pictures I admit do not show this at all, I checked the model and it looks much softer blending in real life. I experimented a bit with washes but they are too heavy handed even when watered down, especially on the white it makes it very dirty very quickly and I wanted to be crisp not weathered.

Regarding washes I am bumping more and more often with washes leaving an unwanted high gloss finish when its dry leaving me the choice of redoing the effected area in base colors or trying to soften the effect. It seems to happen most with the Citadel brown and blue washes. What am I doing wrong? Is it that I am using a too much wash in one go or is it the fact that it is drying to quickly/slowly? Any advice much appreciated.

In other news, Stank main body is almost done, need to start the turret and then I will post some pics.

Grtz

It is the Purity Seal / Dulcote / other varnish stage which is vital. Various techniques with various paints lead to a variety of textures and finishes on a model; a coat of something flat and clear harmonizes all that (as well as protecting the models).

Unless you have a lot of models you tend to move around

Gunlines are so outdated!

Welcome to the forums, very nice work. I especially like the demiwolf 'swarms' you made, I might have to attempt that myself....

Your painting is excellent, and I look forward to more.

Looks really good to me - very nice indeed. Might suggest dulling down the spokes of the rear wheels - they are very bright indeed. Maybe just a simple wash of brown or mud or gray.