Dark Lord and Governor
A deviation from my usually rigid adherence to the Ursa Miners palette today. I figured that using a specific set of colours was appropriate for these two models under the circumstances . Va’Durr is simply too recognisable a figure for any other colour to be worth painting on him anyway.
The not-Vader is Dark Dwarf Lord Va’Durr from Heresy miniatures. The other figure is Col. Hogan from Hasslefrees “Grymn Air Support” range and is a Battlestar Galactica homage I think. I decided to paint Hogan like the type of governor that you might expect to find holding Va’Durrs leash. The uniform is far from a perfect match of course and obviously the hair and eypatch have nothing Tarkin-y about them either, but with those colours in that context I think that its easy to spot the intent.
Both miniatures are good sculpts, with the fine detail on Hogans face being extra nice. I dont like Hogans crumpled trousers though. The great pose and expression suggest the sort of trouser crease that you could set your watch by, but Hogan looks like he slept in those. Its rare that I have any complaints about Hasslefree figure designs, but the sloppy trousers mar the figures look I think.
Goverenor Cushing
Im still undecided about Va’Durrs energy weapon. Because lightsabres are made of, y’know, light, its hard to represent them in 3D. In the movies and comics they are shown to be a white “rod” of light with a halo of the appropriate colour. The WotC prepaints use translucent plastic of the appropriate colour, but that doesnt looks right to me, although its a pretty decent option.
Dark Lord Prowse
I considered lopping Va’Durrs blade off and adding a translucent rod or something that I could paint red, but again that wouldnt look right either. So I left the model as supplied and painted the blade white and the “swoosh” red like the halo. It works to an extent, but its not perfect. I prefer it to a red rod though.
For my own games I plan to christen these guys Prowse and Cushing. Regardless of what David Prowse thinks, I am pretty certain that Peter Cushing would approve. Check this out for proof:
Filed under: Miniatures | Tagged: 2013, 40K, 40K Skirmish, Grymn, Sci-fi, Space Dwarfs, Ursa Miners |
sho3box 
Quite an apt command section for your brand of space dwarf. I had no idea the Vader dwarf existed, he is very cute with those pointy shoulders. The two models work well together. Actually, do you know of any good Boba-fett tribute models?
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A fun, nerdy quote prompting duo for sure.
There are (pricey) official Star Wars miniatures available, but if you mean a dwarf Boba Fett tribute model then I am unaware of any. Its a pretty boutique desire I guess 😀
If there was a short Boba Fett available then I would probably buy it and add it to this force of course, but I dont really have an urge to Lucasfilm (or Disney) up the Ursa Miners any further. The miniatures above presented a fun opportunity that I couldnt ignore though.
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Your post got me thinking about doing an ork stromboy up in the style of Mr. Fett. It goes without saying that I have the perfect set of parts to make an awesome one. The question is can I find them in my mountain of ork bitz any time this decade! I had started to mutate the theme of my orkses away from the Wermacht and towards a storm/clone trooper inspired look as I wanted to make more heavily armored ones when last I worked on them and a Bobba Fett ork would sit well with this direction as well as give me an ork based mercenary character who works alone for the highest bidder (and so can fight for an inquisitor plausibly).
Twin Sluggas, web gun and a jumppack sound about right?
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I love the idea of a helmeted ork in an Inquisitorial retinue. Presumably he would raise his voice to a falsetto in order to keep his species secret from casual observers, leading to much hilarity. I imagine that he would think that the illusion that he creates is foolproof, while most casual observers would see through his kunnin’ disguise in moments 🙂
While I have no doubt that the end result would be great, I hope that you maintain your resolve and stick with the 1989th until the ogryns are finished at least. They deserve it 🙂
But a Boba Fett inquisitorial retinue stormboy isnt an idea that should be forgotten about, thats for sure. Just dont lose focus on the guard just yet if you can help it.
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“I IZ LOIKING DIS…ehem…I means i iz loiking dis bakstoree”. Have no fear, the main focus is going to be on the 1989th and the heroes who get will surely lead them to an early grave. I may just have to get high as a giddy monkey in front of a pile of ork bits the weekend all the same.
😉
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I like those a lot, great stuff.
On the light sabre, and I know this is after fact, but did you look at how Knight Models did their?
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Thanks Leon! I find it harder to get my paint jobs to look like the colour scheme on a movie character than I do to come up with original schemes: its a colour match thing. Initially I wasnt sure if these two would match up sufficiently well, but I am pleased with the end result.
I considered an approach to painting the sabre a bit like that in the weapons shown in the BoW link, but decided against it. That approach only looks right when the model is viewed from a specific direction, which puts me off a bit. Also the spectacular and frankly almost unattainable paint jobs on the Knight Models ranges tends to put me off too 😦
That said, the approach on Mauls blade, while similar to the other Knight Model blades probably works better when viewed top-down on the table than it does in that photo. It did make me think that white at the hilt end of the blade blended to the appropriate colour at the tip (possibly with a white “edge” added along the length) might be a way to go if I ever paint another.
In the end, using the model as supplied forced me to go in the direction that I did because of the sculpted “swoosh”. I think that its still works well enough, largely because the I kept the red very red, rather than turn it too orange or yellow and make it look like flame (the picture is bit more washed out that I would like. The red is more vibrant in-hand).
Thanks for the links. They are interesting in that they are beautifully painted and yet also imperfect solutions.
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[…] model is a bit too Victorian to easily slot into my sci-fi miniature collection. Then I painted Governor Cushing for my Ursa Miners a month or two ago and I decided to continue the Star Wars Imperial officer […]
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[…] of like a red LED, like a lot of the techie trim on my Ursa Miner models. It also ties them to Dark Lord Prowse a little more, although that is more of a happy coincidence than anything […]
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