As is becoming usual for me, i’ve been sitting on these projects for a while, waiting to have something clever to say about them.
Turns out i don’t have a lot to say, except i made two warbands inspired by the manga Blame! from Tsutomu Nihei, that they were really fun to make, that i’m kinda happy with the off white i painted but unhappy with the black weirdly, and that i made a newish box (stared in stories on instagram during what already feels like a life ago) that i should have built differently because i can’t take pictures of what is inside.
So instead of waiting longer and pressuring myself into an unnecessary hassle, here’s the stuff!
While i’m still taking some time to delay my inevitable leave from instagram, i thought i’d keep a trace of a few things that will disappear when i delete my account.
Amongst those, the stories i shared when a project i worked on during my time as a concept artist at Games Workshop was released felt like meaningful snapshots of these moments.
I’m still puzzled, and somehow affected by the time i spent in Nottingham, so many things changed since. And i have to say i’m a bit scared this was my main artistic achievement.
I hope not, and i will try my best to keep doing things as much as i can!
I know of one miniatures i worked on that should still be released at some point, and keep hoping some of the concepts i made and mock-ups i saw from these concepts will make their way into miniature form! I’ll make a post here when it happens. For now, here they are in the order in which i shared them.
Here’s a kit bash of a space marine from last year!
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I was thinking about doing something for quite a while, watching my indomitus starter box with a bit of guilt and a lot of ideas.
The big necron character seemed like a fantastic base for weird mechanical character, and my first obvious idea was to turn him into an admech character. Then i thought that i explored the faction quite a bit already, and i’ve been anxious for a while to try something different for space marines.
I had a big iron hands army 10-15 years ago when we were playing regularly with a friend, and it’s always been a faction i wanted to dive into as i did with others. I also wanted to look at, from a concept art point of view, how we could break and change the space marine silhouette and still feel like, yeah, this is a space marine.
And that’s what i wanna talk about here a bit.
I really liked how the first wave of primaris brought a lot of diversity of silhouettes within the old space marine range. We had the basic ones, the lighter infiltration ones, the super heavy ones, the flying ones. All with very different armours, different silhouettes. They had the feeling, when you opened a box, that you had a whole squad of very specialised space knights whose form would indicate the function, which is something that i really like about other ranges that have a lot of diversity in shapes, like tyrannids, the newer necrons and some others.
The ones bringing different shapes, although the centurion is an older one.
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The next wave dived deeper into the space knight fantasy, with very decorated marines wielding shields and trophies, new armours, fitted between the basic and heavier ones, which i really loved! They felt like the proper exploration of the archetype.
Recently though, with the exception of faction specific ranges like the black templars and dark angels which explore well and fully the more gothic aspect of the space knight archetype, the space marine range seem to stagnate a bit in my opinion, iterating within the limits of giving new weapons to the basic marines.
Faction speficics, lots of characters though.
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We’ve had basic marines with rifles and close combat weapons, basic marines with plasma weapons, basic marines with huge (and a bit silly in my opinion) missile launchers, and with the new edition, basic marines with flamers, jump packs and tabards.
The “give them a new weapon/backpack” syndrome. Also for the units players tend to have the most i guess? Lots of samey samey then. And i forgot the close combat ones!
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The very creative exploration of what shapes the space marines could have seems to be forgotten and i think that’s a lot of missed opportunities.
Flamers could have had more armour to protect them against their own weapons, or leather tabards, or flame and fire based decorations to hammer the motif down.
Space marines are hard to draw though.
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The missile launchers could have been a part of the armour suit, which could have stabilisers, an exoskeleton and bits on the boots to anchor them in the ground when firing their mighty weapons, quadrupedal centurion style armours fitted for primaris.
Big robots, but make them space marines
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The jump packs ones could have been hinting at flying mechas, having more prominent wings or aerodynamic shapes?
Bit too much mecha? Too much tau? But with different shapes, new bits of armours!
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In the end, creativity is the best kind of critic, i’ve heard, so i tried myself at some quick concept art to show what I’m trying to say, although I still struggle a lot with drawing space marines, so really no one should listen to what I have to say anyway!
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So I started this character, with a challenge i gave myself to see how much i could break the space marine silhouette and proportions and still read the mini as a space marine.
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Keeping the shoulder pads and torso felt quite obvious, as is the back pack. Since the base body of the necron is a very different shape from the space marine ones, i played a bit around to find where the exhaust vents of the back pack would fit best to fit with the classic space marine silhouette, while still having the space to add the servo arms that would help tell it’s an iron hands character.
The necron torso is also a lot bigger. So i had to make the arms themselves a bit longer in order for the proportions to feel right.
For the head i was curious to add more neck, as much to fit the proportions of the rest of the torso, and also to play with a trick that From Software seems to love on their enemy design in their videogames, which is elongating a bit of everything, and the neck a bit more, which to me adds a lot of creepiness to the silhouette.
If you follow us on instagram, you might have seen the concepts i did for Shane/Voices on silent exploring the genestealer cults with a souls borne aesthetic twist, were i used this a lot.
Something i wasn’t expecting while working on this miniature is how much the knee pads helped to read the mini as a space marine in contrast with keeping the necron legs as they were. So i tried to sculpt knee pads that would fit the weird articulation, with admittedly limited success.
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Anyway, i think that as busy the end mini is, and as messy the paint job is, it still reads more like a demented space marine that a necron character now?
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I’d be curious to read about your opinions, how i could have made things differently, better, and how we could add more of the appropriate warhammer madness to the classic space marine shape, but outside of the obvious chaos space marines body horror.
If I was one of those individual driven and influential enough to start a kind of movement consciously, it could be a challenge to the community? Make the weirdest possible loyalist space marine to bend the visual language and body shapes to its limits and prove that you can have as much fun with the most popular faction of 40k than with the most niche?
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Anyway, I hope this article in the serie of “old woman screams at the sky about plastic toys” was of some interest to you!
Thanks for reading, take care and have fun with your minis!
– This post is a copy of a tutorial I made in march 2023 and put somewhere else on my website. Now it’s on the blog thing and i feel like it makes more sense! That’s it! –
After more than 20 years in the warhammer hobby, and around 10 head deep into the niche inq28 community, i recently realised that i never properly made an inquisitor miniature.
I’ve collected a few models during the years, and would have enough to make a pretty big warband from unmodified model, but that’s not where i find the fun in miniatures.
So i set myself a small challenge, of making several small warbands around a strong archetype, focusing on a specific theme, and limiting myself to 4 or 5 miniature per band. And because i’m all over the place, i make no promises, and we’ll see how it goes.
These articles will probably be all over the place as well. As i was starting to build a few miniatures, i noticed i was about to use the same old tricks, and probably make the same models i’ve been doing for a while, and that’s not fun either. So i started to consider this as i would if i was doing concept art.
So hopefully, you’ll find here rough sketches, notes and ideas i have while thinking about a theme, and hopefully, it will kind of make sense.
Concepting the Grey Knight and their followers.
This feels weird to start wanting to explore inquisitors by making a space marine.
At first, i thought i could make a grey knight as the muscle of the one team i wanted to make. An issue often brought up with space marines is that they should be a rarity. A stuff of legend, that the drunk shady character talk about at the corner of the bar, without anyone really believing they actually met one. So having one just as a sidekick felt wrong. But making only a space marine would also be a bit boring. I wanted to make small teams and explore stuff. So, this grey knight will be at the head of a team.
As a lonesome knight, i thought it would not be followers they chose specifically to accompany them, because they would probably do the job better on their own, or he would choose other space marines. They would probably be the kind of weird mix of servitors, serfs, fanatics in robes we can see in the illustrations. I would imagine them as local people that chose to devote their life to this son of the emperor, this demi god here to save all humanity.
I imagined the space marine trying to keep a low profile, failing totally, and not being able to shake off the people gathering around them in devotion. They would not be warriors, but very religious people wanting to give their life to this angel of death.
I started drawing a few hunched robed characters carrying a shield, and quickly realised this could probably be the followers of a black templar, or a dark angel. What would make them stand appart as the followers of a grey knight? What is specific to grey knights, opposed to other space marines, outside of their colors and base equipment?
I was a to younger when the demon hunter codex was released with new grey knights and inquisitor models. I really like this book, along with the inquisitor rule book that was released some time before i think. I tried to remember what then made these character stand out to me from the rest of the space marines of 40k.
To me, a key element is that they fight demons, psykers, possessed. The stories around the ordo malleus give me a similar feeling as watching a movie about exorcism, which is probably no coincidence. There’s a strong element of faith and religion, but it has another flavour to it. It’s not just mass, preach, sermons, rituals in churches and processions of devoted people. There’s an idea of dark small rooms, flickering lights, black magic, forbidden words. I have not studied religions, but to me this has an ancient feeling, something more primal, maybe even pagan?
At least, that’s the idea.
You can see here more sketches i did looking for ideas.
If i liked a few of them, most gave too much agency to the followers. A bigger influence in the team than i wish they had. So, exit the ones carrying shields or scabbard, books or stuff for rituals.
I did like the one carrying ammo though. At first i thought they would be carrying holy ammunition, but then it occurred to me. Without an idea of how weapons work, they could be carrying a lot of different bullets, even empty used shells, and carrying them around the big knight for them to use. In the end, a bit useless.
A model i already started to build to carry those ammunitions felt better carrying skulls, and i figured, seeing that the knight has several ones on their armour, and without knowledge of what is sacred or holy, they would try to offer them the ones they found in their life.
I tried to make a model like the one that seems to be praying to a higher power, with incense sticks in their eyes, and it turned out to be a better base for the ammunition carrying one, so i went that way.
An element that is to me key to warhammer is the absurdity. Things don’t make sense. Don’t make a hammer, lobotomise a human instead, put it on mechanised tracks, and swap their head for a hammer. Then add a cohort of priest behind them to make sure they hammer the correct nail and pray that the machines works as intended because they have no idea how it actually works. Absurd ❤ And don’t tell me warhammer is not a satyr of our world!..
Before assuming fully the absurdity of the followers in the warband, i started assembling one model intended to carry the scabbard of the sword, but put it on the side when the idea of the warband became clearer. It will be useful for another warband i’m sure.
I made another model following the idea of the one carrying ammo, but this one felt too martial, probably because of the posing. And i thought that having four minis would make taking pictures of the warband more complicated, with such a big character at the center. So i decided it would only be three minis, and that will be another character for another warband, or as a flavour in the background.
The space marines is not mind breaking. It turns out that old terminator bits work quite nicely on primaris proportions!
Even if i don’t play the games, i enjoy thinking about how the miniature would behave on the table top.
I thought that since space marines are supposed to be over powerful, the weird useless followers would act as a hinderance for the knight. Each would be a kind of debuff for the space marine, and every time one would be killed, it would make the space marine stronger, since they would not get in the way anymore. That would create tricky choices for the adversary: endure this mostly harmless annoyance or get rid of them and unshackle the space marine.
With that, i realize now that my first goal to make a ritualistic kind of warband derailed a bit, but i think that’s ok. I like the idea of the powerful knight surrounded by idiots. I’ll make a ritual based team later, probably for a proper inquisition one.
Here are the painted miniatures in universe, with a couple of blurry pictures.
My thanks if you spent some of your time reading this here. I hope this was on some interest to you, and let me know if you’d like more of the same, or if you’d like for me to talk more about some specific aspect of it.
If you want to support my work, check my shop page on this website! There’s places for prints and t-shirts, or original work, were I sometimes put miniatures and boxes, if you’d like some of them for yourself.
To catch up a bit with what i’ve been showing on instagram, here are a few miniatures i’ve been working on.
First is the Grey Knight i started a few months ago, while i was actually trying to make a small inquisitorial warband and got derailed a bit. You can see more of the process in a kind of tutorial i made (2024 edit: the tutorial is now on my blog page!) . He’s followed by two weird civilians, in the atmosphere of my old Vox Populii exploration.
I also took some time exploring the genestealer cults a bit more, and made some of these kitbash live on instagram during the month of june. I took a lot of liberties with what the faction is and with the genestealer form, diving more into body horror tyranid. I hope to paint them some time this decade!..
I need to make more blogs entries showing all my previous miniatures work, so here’s one about the Eolles, a gang for Necromunda i started thinking about with the new edition of the game. It was featured in the 1st issue of the 28 mag alongside some concept drawings i made before starting building the team, and a box i made to transport them.
The last couple of miniatures were made a few years alter when i was joining a necromunda campaign in the GW studio. I wanted to use some old miniatures and tie them with this faction with new ones. I’m still quite happy with those two!
Here’s more of the same on black background.
And here are some recent pictures of the box i made at the same time. You can see a short stop motion video of the opening on my instagram account.
At the time i wrote a few things about their setting in the underhive, i’ll add them just here!
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The lore
The Eolles are a sorority of under hive gangers living in the depths of the 26th spire of the hive known by its initials: I.B.
This spire, half-hanging on a cliff over a giant waste see, is known by the inhabitants of the other spires for the strange events that started to appear after a earthquake that they called the Shiver. Pits of gravity, tears of reality, sound aberrations, the very fabric of reality seems to be eroding. The events are at the worst in the depths, were whole areas were flooded during centuries. Now that the level of the waste see has diminished, strange stories ascend from the belly of the world.
After the disaster, most of the city was deserted, and the main imperial instances left just a few volunteers in a meagre attempt avoid any unnecessary riots from the survivors not fortunate enough to escape.
On their own, these survivors gathered in different communities, each trying their best to survive in their world. Some joined cults venerating some deities from the depths or became corpse eaters, fully accepting the deformities created by the events. Others founded an armed militia and spread their own version of order.
In a distance, inside the gigantic aeration system of the spire, protected by the huge ventilation blades from a core machinery, the warm and sterilised atmosphere and the dangerous accessibility, a town grew. The Ring, named after the shape of the walls around it, was first created a short time after the Shiver. With the centuries, what was firstly a camp became a full community, gathered around a council of ancient caretakers of the old machineries hidden inside the walls.
Believing that the work of the council was of the first importance, the Eolles swore to protect the town, to hunt any ressources that would be necessary for their sacred work, and fight anyone who threatens to jeopardise the plan.
But recently, the core machinery protecting the town started to fail, and what once was a warm and gentle breeze alternates now between a piercing cold storm and a much more dangerous silence, bringing ideas of terrors.
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The Hag
Listen to me. I was there when the Shiver happened. I was already old and wise and knowing, and i tried to warn them, but no one ever listens to me.
So you better listen. I will tell you what happened.
When i was one of them, i learned that here, so near to the sea, the ground was so unstable that the First People built ancient and sage machines so they could raise the world around them. Give me a listen for once.
The world grew big, and there were a lot of people in it. Some were poor, and lived in shantytowns near the walls keeping the sea away from the streets. Some were rich, and lived in other places of the world, past the concrete sky.
Yes, you’re right! The concrete sky is still here. Though if you traveled as much as i did, you would know that in some places, the sky fell with the rest.
Do you want to know what is on the other side of the sky? On the other side of the place the rich people used to live?
Another sky. Different, but the same. You just have to climb more to reach it, but once you touch it it’s the same concrete.
Of course you don’t believe me, are you even trying to listen to me?
I was a servant of the Gyrochoir, so i know things! It’s just been too long. My memory has been affected by the Shiver like most other machines. But i remember the Seer that told me. I was evaluating the work that would have to be done in the section 32 – or was it the 75th – of the Cable Maze near the Great Wall, when i heard her. She was there since the beginning of the world, plugged in the wall under eons of wires and holy seals. She said to me that the world machines would soon fail. That the world would die. And that THEY will be born from its corpse.
Who are « THEY »? Oh, you are listening now? Well that’s what i asked her! But when she was beginning to answer, something strange happened. I was a servant of the Gyrochoir, and i was trained to understand things. This, i didn’t. Her face showed a thing most peculiar for such a holy being. She was experimenting emotions. She shut down, and i couldn’t find her memory drive. Too many cables could have bring me to it.
So i went back to the temple, seeking advices from my pairs, telling them about the holy encounter i had been chosen to be a witness of. But they discarded me. They said such things were non computable, and that i would be treated for heresy against the Holy Machine.
But i’m still here. Most of them died during the Shiver. I found some other during the year following the aftermath. A few of them were looking for penance, for they didn’t believe me. Yes, they are the Council now. You’re a good listener. The other flew to the upper skies, and they call me their enemy when i face them.
I’m glad you chose to listen to me. It’s very wise from you. It just make me more sorry for what i will have to do to you. Maybe inside your own machinery will i find a piece of the memory drive i’ve been looking for all this time. I assure you, this will serve a cause. You were a good listener.
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The Ring
What are you looking at kid?
Oh you noticed her? Yeah she’s weird for sure, but don’t be afraid. She often finds herself back here, but she never stays long. The elders tell us that we have nothing to fear. And for now, they are right.
You want to know who she is? Grab me a drink kid, and I’ll tell you.
The ancients of the council tell us that she was the first of them. She gathered the original council, and rumour has it she created the town. Yeah the whole ring is her doing. Not the Ring itself, it has been created along with the world. But everything that took place in it. The town, the streets, the houses, the power towers.
She started to gather stuff here, when she was alone. The Ring was her responsibility before the Shiver, and because she did a good job, it’s one of the few place in the world that is safe. None of the weird things that happens when you scavenge too far.
You are from there, you know what i’m talking about. The density of the air changing, shadows acting in an impossible way, sounds echoing backward and such. I heard once of a place where the water falls upward. Crazy right?
It was her job to repair and built stuff as I understand. An ancient machine cult of some sort. Many of the council are from it. So she built a place for her in the only safe place she new, at the center of the Ring. The wind made sure the air was fresh, and if it’s cold, at least it keeps away the danger, and the wind machine makes it hard to get here from another path. One have to built resilient stuff to stay here.
And she did. And she found survivors, and took care of them. She was built like that. To repair and take care.
With the time, rumour started to talk about this place. After the Shiver, everyone that survived where looking for one. Fleeing the eaters and the looters, the cults and the rumours of the ancient things waking up in the depths, and the crazy things happening. And the city grew.
Her, she still does that, rescuing and repairing. She knows lost ways. There’s a good chance she built them.
I heard that she’s trying to fix the damages caused by the Shiver.
I think she’s mad.
But after all the madness i went through outside of the Ring, mad like her is the closest thing to beauty i can imagine.
Thank you for passing by, and congrats to the ones who read all that broken english nonsense 🙂
For this second post of the new blog, I finally finished a small band of Genestealer Cultists.
With them, I really wanted focus on the religious aspect of the Cult, instead of the civilian militia. I struggled a bit with the colours, and tried stuff a bit outside of my comfort zone first, and going back to it after a terrible fail! I also started sculpting more during the making of this team, so the quality is a bit uneven.
I’ll link here again the fantastic videos by Modern Synthesist that really helped me make what feels like a big leap in progress in using greenstuff!
There will probably be more of them at some point, I feel that there is a lot to explore on this subject!
Nicky Grillet 