“His Chest Cavity Is Stuffed With Various Corpses…”

“…That slowly fall from his exposed rib cage as he moves.”

This 32mm scale resin print of a Grave Gnasher is produced by "Rocket Pig Games", but actually 3D printed by “FullyCycled” over on “Etsy”. The model is one of several test prints I recently bought in order to see just how well such figures can currently be manufactured, and for a homemade project pitting the forces of a Clockwork Mage against those of the Natural World.

The figure comes on a pre-printed stand which contains a handful of smooth rocks, and is the only place where the tell-tale striation signs of a 3D print are visible. Unfortunately, this part of the model was also disappointing as it was neither flat, nor thin enough to allow me to safely reduce its thickness without considerable fear of irreversibly damaging its rather brittle material.

"Battletech" WIPs - A (Luftwaffe) Valkyrie, a (Soviet) Wasp and a (Wehrmacht) Mist Lynx Prime

As a result I ended up attaching the Undead ghoul onto a “Citadel” 40mm circular base simply so I had some space with which to use a little green-stuff to build a slope around its steep edge, and then mask the two elements together with a layer grit and ultimately grass flock. The figure itself was primed using a couple of coats of “Vallejo” Earth and washed with “Citadel” Agrax Earthshade.

I then applied a dry-brush of (more) “Vallejo” Earth over the creature with a soft make-up brush. Ordinarily, this technique has served me well as a super-quick way of providing a model with some basic highlights. However, for the Grave Gnasher, the sculpt was understandably smooth in many places so as to project the earth-based composition of its physical form.

After a little thought, I therefore decided to spread essentially a glaze of heavily watered-down “Vallejo” Heavy Sienna over much of the miniature, coupled with some sporadic applications of both “Citadel” Biel-Tan Green and Agrax Earthshade. This gave the monster a suitably mud-like palette, albeit I did give its gaping belly-maw a couple of coats of “Citadel” Nuln Oil in order to better darken its grisly interior workings.

"Battletech" WIPs - This (American) Stinger has been primed, washed and dry-brushed

I treated the creature’s ghastly stomach teeth and spinal cord with a combination of “Vallejo” Iraqi Sand and “Citadel” Agrax Earthshade, before adding a little “Vallejo” White to its fearsome fangs at their very tips. Finally, I went with a coat of “Vallejo” Gunmetal for its wrist bracelets and hammerhead and shaded these areas with a splash of trusty “Citadel” Nuln Oil.

Alongside my Grave Gnasher I have also managed to get a little bit more work done on the first of four plastic “Battletech” robots I recently received by “Catalyst Games Labs”. These pre-built 6mm scale (1:285) models are going to be repurposed as Weird War Two mechs and have now all been re-based, primed and shaded using various “Vallejo” and “Citadel” paints and washes…