Attention! Officer on the Deck!

Well not really, just a painter actually.  With this post I continue the current theme of my AADD focus on Stargrave.  Here are some shots of another project I'm working simultaneously, Reaper Bones IMEF figures from their Chronoscope line.  I liked them in their metal form and had to pick them up in the Bones form, just too darn cheap to pass up!  One advantage to the Bones material is the reduction in cost for figures, especially the large ones like the Cthulhu figure.  The IMEF marines are $6.79 for the metal version and $2.99 for the Bones version.  By my math that is about 56% savings.  And I didn't pay the $2.99 I think I got a 10% discount on top of that so $2.79 each.  Well worth giving them a try.  To date I have only painted one Bones miniature, the werewolf in a previous post.  I didn't have any issues with it so I decided to give the Marines a go.

 

Mins still in blisters, along with a couple of metal Chronoscope metal figures thrown in as well.  I really like the variety of this line by Reaper.  You can get cowboys, Victorian era figures, steampunk, Sci-Fi, aliens, scenery, etc... 

I really like the Illyian Scout figure and that alien look, they remind me of the Dralasites from Star Frontiers.  I did a little web searching and found that Patrick Keith the sculptor for the Reaper min has also done 5 of them for Bombshell Miniatures which happens to be his personal miniature line.  I picked up a crew pack on sale that included the plugger figure below.  I plan to get a few more, especially the ranger and sentry models in full space suits with clear helmets!  I foresee an all Illyian Stargrave crew taking shape.

To go along with the Marines and the Illyians I also picked up the Blackstar Privateer with chaingun to act as heavy support for the team.  Given the size of the min and my dislike of the 3 heads provided I decided to do a simple conversion and make it an alien recruit.

My first thought was a plastic Kroot head that I have from some previous conversions.  As you can see the hair/spines on the back of the Kroot were an issue with the high collar of the body.  I decided to remove them and give it a try.  Not too bad a fit.  I thought about reworking some green stuff and recreating the spines but my green stuff was old and hard as a rock.  Besides it actually looks pretty good without them.  Now for the painting. 

Here is a crew picture pre- paint.

Here are the first few painting steps.  I decided to go with a grey paint scheme with bits of color here and there.  I used a couple Vallejo colors, Field Grey and Prussian Blue, and mixed some darker colors in to give me a base to highlight from.  I haven't tried the new citadel color contrast paints but from what I have seen these white bones figures seem to be a perfect match.  They are already white which seems to be a requirement for the paints so no priming just straight to painting.  I'll have to get some and give it a try.

Color Blocking

 First Wash, went with brown instead of black. (Sorry poor quality pictures on my part)

Some Highlights 

I decided to leave the marines on their integrated bases most were circular and fit perfectly on the round bases.  a few were more oval, I decided the heck with it and left the as is.  For the metal figures  I covered the bases with a variety of materials to get them to blend in with the marine bases.