On the bench - Imperial Guard Shadowsword #1

Another 40K Imperial Guard vehicle.  This time it's heavy...














So, I've taken the plunge and decide to build and paint one of the super-heavy tanks for the Imperial Guard.  This thing is a bit of a brute.

Building

Initially I toyed with the idea of magnetising and making the model interchangeable so you could deploy another version.  It's a nice idea but way more than I wanted to take on at the moment so I decided on a single configuration.  This way I can concentrate on the finish without any other extraneous headaches.

I'm glad I did because this isn't an easy build.  I know this kit is a few years old now but I found there's a 'lot' of cleaning mould lines and filling seams to be done quite aside from the unwieldy nature of the build and how it all fits together.  At this stage I'm relatively happy but it hasn't been a particularly enjoyable process.  Having said that, more and more I'm seeing the build as something that has to be endured before the gratification of the painting stage where I feel a lot more at home...

Painting

I'm using the new Vallejo AFV Painting System - Russian Green 4B0.  It's a colour modulation kit, very similar to AK Interactive's (which Vallejo helped to develop) and after my good experience with AK's Panzer grey kit I thought it would be worth a go.

The idea is exactly the same, build up successively lighter shades by airbrush to achieve greater depth and contrast.  The main difference with this Vallejo kit is that it comes in teeny 8ml bottles rather than the normal 17ml. Fine with me but if I was painting a lot of tanks, I'm not sure how far it would go.

In the box you get a primer (not used by me), 4 shades of colour and a satin varnish.

Below I show you the stages for each colour going from darkest to lightest.  Before I applied the first colour I'd already primed with a coat of Panzer Grey Primer and a thin coat of light grey primer.

After the 4 colours were airbrushed on I went in again with the darker shades to dial back some of the highlights.  I also brushed on the lightest colour onto any raised detail where I thought I could achieve more contrast.

Next steps...

I feel like I'm making real progress on this build and I really like the colour modulation I've achieved.  Next up I'm looking to brush in some shadow areas to the areas between armour plates and give the whole model an overall wash colour.

I also need to paint and glue on the tracks.  In the meantime the front and rear mudguards, the main gun and the sponson las cannons are all loose. I've also got a stub gun to add to the commanders cupola, so definitely lots still to do!

Hope you like so far.

cheers

Paul