Building it up..

 This weekend I got pretty much most of the work done I wanted. The second landing platform is now wired up and working. While Scott was working on the wiring I was getting the LEDs attached and painting/weathering the pieces to get them ready.

 Here's a pic of the LED mounts on the main bunker and the road side lights. One side is wired and working but the other side is only attached. I didn't get a chance to take a pic of the actual structure but I got it all glued together as well. I used construction adhesive and wooden pins to hold it together. Even without the bunker and other buildings glued in the structure is very sturdy. I'll be trenching out foam this week so I can get the wires run.

 Here's one of the side bunker buildings. I went with a weathered metal top with a streaked concrete sides. They will get rings around the front to hide the connectors and make them just look over all cleaner (still dirty but cleaner lines haha).

And here are the dice I ordered.. 20 Ivory and 20 Black.. they were made by Chessex and came out looking awesome! It's less then a month to Nova now and I'm getting pretty excited for it. I can't to hang out with peeps and throw some dice...  I've said it before but it's funny that I'll see people that I only see at Nova .. once a year. But it's like no time has passed .. BS about models and games and getting some grub. I'm ready!

Nova Countdown - One Month to go

Alriiiiightieeee ... Well it's the final countdown now .. One month to go, .. yikes. Well, I figured it was now a good time to post a group line up.. as the army as a whole is done! Some touch ups yes but done haha... 

 Don't mind the pink foam.. that will be the underlayment for the display board. I did get some of the main section painted as well 8) ..

I'm really liking the over all look and cohesion of the army. I've never painted an entire army at one sitting so it's a new one for me.. I usually jump around but for the last 6 months it's been all Raven Guard all the time!

So.. now on to the display board... or the crusher of my soul as I'm fondly starting to refer to it as.. I wanted to make a bunker for the Raven as they would be holed up and seeking to build up their strength after Isstvan.

 So this is what I'll be working on for the next month.. it's way big .. 36" x 24" and will be about 20" high. I have everything broken down and I'm painting the pieces at the moment. The pink foam boards will be trenched out in areas to run the wires for the lights. I cut the plywood that will be the base but forgot to pick up the construction adhesive I need. back to Home Depot I go ..

 The gantry pieces aren't designed completely and are just pieces from my gantry set. I have the design started and after I get it all glued together I'll get the final measurements and finish it up. There will also be some valances and battlements that I'll be cutting but again they will be the final bits.

 I was thinking about adding a gantry to connect the two pads together (again the one shown is part of the Gantry system) but sadly it blocks out the main bunker too much. I have all the focus setup to point to the center and this would break that up sadly. It's all about focus..

The main section base is now painted .. I will have to grime and rust it up but I at least have part of it based out. So... this weekend I want to get the other Landing Pad completely lit and ready plus have the frame of the display completely glued so I can start to build the pieces and attach them. I also need to measure out the sections of the back wall as they will be getting a rock fascia and I need to know how much I'll be making. It's coming together and hopefully it will all be done to the level I want!.. haha.. So much left to do!

Fire it up, fire it up..

 Last night I finished up getting one of the landing pads wired up and working. Which is pretty cool and a relief for what I need to get finished. There is still painting that needs to be done but the wiring for these things has taken a long time. Not a surprise and I can't even tell you how much wire is in this one area. Each landing pad has 25 LEDs. 6 white lights on the top of the door, 1 red and 1 green door switch lights. The landing pad itself has 16 blue lights that light in sequence and the bottom generator has a purple LED to backlight the area. Still working on the sequences so they aren't set in stone. Here are 2 of the videos of the sequence, the LEDs are so intense the phone had issues haha.

Landing Sequence Dark
Landing Sequence Light

Right now I have it running on batteries to see how long they will last. It's looking pretty good so far as it's been running for hours and hasn't dimmed.

 The lights will be running of a Arduino Microprocessor to power them and run the sequences.

 My friend Scott helped out and wired up all of the lights on the Landing Pad which took about 5 hours. Crazy haha .. doesn't seem like it should but doing 2 of them and us testing them it took awhile.

 I then started to wire the wall section for the pad, I'll be tightening and cleaning up the wires before the section gets attached to the full display board. I don't have a pic of the control board I attached everything to and ran the feeds. This whole process took me another 5 hours or so to attach the LEDs and wires .. the second pad is halfway done. Sadly I still need to finish the board, the resisters are attached but I have to connect all the wires.

I also got the second Rhino done. Well 99% complete, I'm going to tone down some of the streaks as they are very strong. Thankfully the oils can still be worked and I'll be adding a little grim to blend them in.

 But I think the tank came out looking good and I like the spare track strap and front chain.

 I had totally forgot this guy had to be finished up. If I have time I'll wrap him up tonight.

 The claws and pistol fades need to be finished out plus the details.

He looks cool by himself but the scale is off to me and he looks so small haha.. so he looks squat.

I'm pretty happy with the progress and if I keep at it I shouldn't have an issue getting done. There are still some large sections of the display board I still need to figure out but I'll figure them out haha..  I hope. Tomorrow it's basically one month to Nova and I'll post up the rough pics of the display board as a whole. I took them last week as right now everything is broken down and base sprayed.

I'll also be taking a group shot of the entire army!.. I'm pretty happy with them and there are a few things I'll be touching up before they roll out but they are as a whole done. If I can get it all done in time I may work on a Knight but I don't see that being a thing but it's still a might haha..  I have some stuff for the Big Blam but a Knight would be a nice add. I just don't want to rush it and not do it justice.

Rambling along..

 This weekend  I got a lot of work done on the Rhino plus my friend Scott came over and worked on the wiring for the two landing platforms. I should have some pics and maybe videos this week sometime. But ... the Rhino is getting pretty close to done...  I only have a few more layers of grime to apply and the final streaking. Lights and lens also need to be done but that really only takes a few minutes to crank out.

 I'm pretty happy with how the spare tread strap came out.I'm going to done the rust done some but otherwise looking pretty solid. I wasn't expecting it to come along so quickly but that's a big help as I need to dive deep into the display board.

I think the chain also came out looking pretty good.

On another note the Chessex RG dice I ordered came in and they look awesome! This morning I was in a rush and meant to take a picture but forgot.. the pictures above were quick snaps on my phone.

I picked up the wood for the base of the display board so hopefully I can get it cut and start to mount the foam on it so I can give a complete picture of it.. the bones of it are there but I have a bunch of building, painting, plastering and wiring to do. I knew it was going to be big but when I laid everything out on it I was completely surprised with how big it really was .. haha... The Fellblade will be driving out of the main doors and they actually make the tank look small. I think it will look cool though 8)..

Front Line Assembly

 Well.. I'm down to the final model I "have" to get done for Nova. And since it's the last one I wanted to put a little extra love into it and little did I know that yes this one would require it. The resin was crazy warped and even heat treating it didn't help as much as I would like. So I had to hit up some of the areas with putty. I thought I was on the last coat but looking at it now I'm going to need one more to be completely smooth.

 I played around with it on a Death Company Rhino and I liked the look so I added some chain to the cow catcher 8). I wanted this Rhino to look like a work horse and adding some chain in made sense. Sadly the back of a Rhino isn't the best to add hooks so they might go on the front. I just don't want to add too much and junk it up.

 I also wanted to add some xtra track sections. Most WWII tanks would carry spares for repair so I figured that would still be a good idea in the future. I got some spare track bits off a buddy and started to build a strapping setup. Last night during the Hobby Hangout I showed it to John for his opinion and he recommended adding some more to it... sadly ... **Side note >>> He also called me out for the OSL on the inside of the Drop Pod which I knew was mediocre but I have time constraints. So now I'm thinking about going back into the guts of the Drop Pod some .. grumble.<<<  Anyway... I also used some tank bits to add as restraints and ends of flamer cables as pin caps... took awhile but I think it looks decent....Thanks John ... sort of...... 8P

Right now it's just held on by Blu Tac, I'll have to paint some of the bone sections and will glue it on once I have that section painted.

Progress seems to be on track and I'm pretty optimistic about my time frame. Scott is heading over tomorrow to help with wiring (SO MANY Wires) for the Display Board so hopefully that goes well. The Display Board buildings are almost all cut and correct. I need to get a piece of particle board as a base then I'll start to get the foam and pieces in place plus the wire trenches cut out. Tonight I just need to get the second landing pad based out like the other in case we make a lot of progress with the wiring tomorrow. 8) .. I can always hope haha

Triple Play

 I wrapped up the three pieces I've been working on lately.. Which is nice as I really only have 1 Rhino and the display board. So I feel like my progress is on track which is nice haha.. As long as the display board goes well I'll get it all done 8)

 I mucked up the top mech area by the turbine and took the purple OSL back a slight bit. I built it separately so wasn't exactly sure how far to do out. Was a little too far out so cleaned it up a bit. I also added a few scratches to the platforms.

 On the outside I added a good but of soot streaking .. with it ripping through the atmo I figure it would have a solid amount on it ..

 I cleaned up some of the small areas on Corax..  Honestly he needs more work to be high level but as I have other bits to get done so I have to call it and say good enough.

 The missile platform is also done, I have one more and a Sat Comm to get done as well. I broke one out to see how I wanted to paint them. They aren't for the army itself but for the display board..  I also ordered a pipe which should be in next week.

Getting closer to being done.

On Display

 This weekend I got some solid work on the Raven Guard Display Board done. I needed to get this mocked up so I whew how high to make another section of the display. It's still far from done but it's built and mostly figured out. I'll have two of these on the display, one for each flyer. Yes... this display board will be big .. maybe too big haha

 This section of the display board is a landing platform with a hanger style door. If all goes well I'll be lighting up all of the white chevrons on the landing pad. There will also be some lights on the wall section. I think this display board will have about 100 LEDs if I can get it finished.

 One of the secret weapon generators sits on the base..  I'm thinking about getting some of the GW pipelines to add on.. I think it might be a cool addition.

 There's a section under the door that will be added to hold the circuit board that will connect the wires. And sadly it will be a lot of wires. A lot.

 Right now it's just the base colors colors on the platform, it will get a bit more details and a lot more grime.

 I'm pretty happy with it so far..  this week I'm going to cut the other landing pad and get it started.

 The platform has guards for the side but sadly last night I wasn't feeling so good and was rushing to get them built only to realize this morning that I glued the wrong vertical supports on the wrong pieces haha..   When it's time to go to bed ..  just go to bed 8)

 Did the chipping and grime (hard to see in the picture) on the first missile platform. Just needs the gems and missile tips painted. Not too much.

I also added the RG symbols to the pod and added two more layers of grime. I'll be adding some soot streaks to the bottom of the pod and a little more grime to the turbine then calling it done.