[Planetfall] At long last...

... the ground will tremble, as my fully painted El-Shami Leviathan strides forth!

It's been a long time coming, not helped by the summer vacations and family visits.

The model itself is a very nice looking piece, and will probably remain the centerpiece for my Aquan Army for quite some time. I've also tried a few new things, with conversions, a fairly detailed modelled base, and my first actualy experiment with dry pigments!
More on the last part later, I've learned a lesson or two...



Lets recap this whole experience:

This spring saw the first renders of what is currently the tallest model in the Planetfall range.
I immediately knew I had to have one, if nothing else to scratch my old Epic Titan itch...
One thing bothered me though, the mechanical hinges on the feet.

Once my copy of the massive chunk of resin turned up, I got to work with cutting up some old Mk2 Aquan cruiser bits to produce the replacements for the removed hinges, creating a foot with three .."toes"..., somewhat inspired by the foot of an elephant.

Moving forward to early summer, where I'd gotten a bit further with blending the new pieces into the leg, and also added some Khitary infantry, mostly for scale, and an old Firestorm Invasion Stormcaller APC, with a drilled out hole in the front, and cracked wheels.



The painting process did not go as smooth as I hoped, it took quite some time to get it all settled into a decent scheme (I blame unfamiliarity with such large model... It's been a while since I painted anything as large).

But in the end I got it in a decent shape, and decided to push my boundaries yet a little further, by adding some dust and sand, with the help of some dry weathering pigments.

Reading online, I saw some recommendations to varnish the model once before starting, and then once again after finishing. Taking this to heart I varnished just the feet with some brush-on Vallejo Gloss Varnish, the result can be seen to the left.

After adding the pigments, and spraying the entire model with my usual GW Purity Seal, I discovered that the parts I'd previously coated with gloss varnish turned a little bit cloudy, like you can get when varnishing in high humidity. An effect of the gloss varnish, or some reaction to the Gloss Varnish?
Not sure, and not really a problem in this case (the photo above exaggerates the effect) , as I wanted a bit dusty appearance, but worth keeping in mind for any future pigment/varnish projects: use a layer of regular spray-on matt as paint sealer, and another layer to fix the pigments. As I usually spray two thin layers anyway, it's not really a problem... 

The Stormcaller turned out all right, though...
And it looks decently weathered to have been driving around in the desert for quite some time, before meeting its just end at the hands of a Pinpoint(3) laser!



So, with the large gal out of the way, what is next? I've till got an Aquan and a Terquai Recon Helix laying around, and soon my Interceptors will turn up...
I've started on the APCs though, so that will probably be next, and at least enough upgrades to field all four squads of Khitary infantry I usually use with this setup.
I guess I could do the full squads, with all 18 regulars and 21 upgrade bases I've currently got in backlog, but I'd prefer to know that I'd field them all sooner or later...


So, now to find some time to game as well...