Nearing the end of last year, the move of my hobby gear to the (then) new room was in full swing, and in the process, I had the opportunity (or chore, depending on your angel of attack), to see my entire collection pass through my hands several times, as I had decided that this was also an opportune time to sort everything.
One of the items that floated to the top was my very modest Dark Eldar project, which I had started on somewhere in 2004 or 2005 (probably). At any rate; I had a squad of 10 Warriors, an Archon, a Talos and a squad of 5 converted Scourges (from Warriors and Reaver bike parts).
The Archon and Warriors had a black undercoat, and two or three Warriors had some very dark purple applied to the armour plates, but that's where the project had stalled, and they had been languishing in a box for well over a decade.
So, as an interesting side project, I decided I would finish them. But I could not even remember my original vision for these guys, so I got to think up a completely new paint scheme. And after a while, I did a colour test on two surplus Warriors; one with a light blue, washed with purple, and the other a light blue, washed with green.
It was no contest; the blue-green was the clear winner, and so I set out to paint the entire squad. I opted to use a hot pink as the contrast colour, and this seemed to fit quite well. It's also the reason I have already dubbed this force as my CGA army
And obviously, I painted the Archon mini in the same colour scheme:
In the meantime however, I had been asking around the Bazaar for some more 3rd ed. Dark Eldar, as my collection at the time was basically what I laid out before, plus quite some loose Warrior bits (probably enough to build another 20 or 30 or so). Several helpful members came through, and before long, I was the owner of several Raiders still on the sprue, and three built and painted ones, in various states of repair. Also a bucket load of Reaver Jetbikes, Wyches, Mandrakes, Incubi and much more.
So when the squad was finished, and I was pretty pleased with the end result, I decided to tackle their ride. After all, I had most likely built the unit to be a Raider Squad, as they numbered 10, and were accordingly armed.
Interesting side note: no matter how I have tried, I have been completely unsuccesful in capturing the greenish tint of the armour. In all pictures they look positively blue, but in reality, they're a very nicely (I would say that, obviously
) blended turquoise, with dark blue in the recesses, highlighted up to a subtle blueish light green. No matter what camera I used, or what lighting conditions, the green hue has remained elusive. Trust me on this though; they're not at all as blue in real life. The best option was in real sunlight, against a grey background, using my work phone.
Is it just me, or are digital camera's becoming more unforgiving for this kind of work, with their ever advancing colour- and contrastcorrection algorithms? I find that, especialy with colour blends and transitions, modern camera's seem to produce unnecessarily harsh results, completely washing out any subtle blending, or transitions. Case in point these guys; I am almost embarrassed to show these pics, as in some my painting looks downright hamfisted and crude, whilst in reality there are none of the stark layer borders at all!
Anyway; I took one of the previously built Raiders, and looked at what I could do with it. I did not much like the hooked fin with barbed stabilisers that sat over the pilot originally, so I took the saw to it, and started moving bits around until I had a shape that still flowed pretty organically, but was distinctly different from the original layout.
And because I remembered a converted Raider in White Dwarf, I just knew I wanted to have those Eldar solar(?) sails that a lot of the Epic and Battlefleet Gothic vehicles were sporting back in the day. The conversion I remember (but can't find anywhere anymore, obviously
) had such a mast and sail, very much like the new model line now has, and I can't help but thinking that this conversion must have somehow influenced the creation of the new model.
So there I was, creating a sail and mast, plus a way of connecting it to the superstructure. I went with some square tubing, with a portion of the mast construction fitting inside, with a magnet to hold it in place, while making for easy removal (for transport). The crew manned weapon, for which there are two options, I also magnetized.
In the same line, I made my own flight stand, although I ended up refining that when doing up my second Raider.
And then, because I'm apparently just like that, I added a piece of 1mm thick steel sheet on top of both decks, which I then prettified by adding a pattern on top made from some adhesive, metallic decorations normally used for scrapbooking and crafting postcards. They make the decks look almost stock again, and I'm pretty happy with how they ended up looking.
And with some magnets under the squad's bases, they can now actually ride their Raider into battle, instead of pretending to. Well, partly that, as I found out that a Raider will hold 6 miniatures on 25mm bases, not 10...
Here they are, hanging on for dear life. Don't worry; I tilted the Raider a bit for better visibility, and it sits quite sturdily on its magnetized flying stand.
If that will also be the case when 6 metal Wyches are up there, we'll have to wait and see...
The first Raider, I painted up in the same colours as my Warriors, as it's the property of their Cabal, but the second one, I painted up much darker (using the darkest shade used on the Cabal as the base colour), as it is destined to go with the first Wych squad. Wyches have their own Cults, but I wanted to still visually tie them in with the Cabal, so their armour would be the same turquoise tint, but a way darker shade.
This Raider went much faster, because I already had templates for the sail and deck, and I was able to convert and paint one of the other previously built Raiders in just one weekend.
In the queu right now is said squad of Wyches, plus the converted Wych Raider crew (made from Wych torsos and Warrior legs and some ProCreate).
Then I will have to finish converting the squad of Mandrakes I have in the works, a couple of Talos, and, and...
Yeah; this army will keep me busy for the foreseeable future, as I now own at least one of each unit in the codex, plus all the characters. So far, these guys are fun though!