[Warhammer 40K] Dark Eldar

arborealkey · Apr 5, 2020

Hello !

I'm back in the game with another 40K build. This time, I'm going to try and portray Drazhar... My goal is to make him really different from my Visarch (you can see the build thread here) despite the similar designs.

Warning: my English is rubbish.

I started two days ago so there isn't much to see yet, but here we go anyway:

I wanted to build the base of the armour first in order to check the proportions and have everything fit together. The details (spikes, engravings etc...) would be added later, once I had the general shape of the armour. In order to avoid repeating my previous mistakes (especially on my Visarch and Baharroth builds), I started with the helmet.

DAY 1
I "built" half of the helmet out of paper scraps in order to get a flat pattern I could use on EVA foam.

After cutting my pieces out of foam and assembling them, I got this. The faceplate is magnetic, I would not be able to put the helmet on otherwise.

DAY 2
I knew I wanted horns on it, but I didn't really know how many (or where I wanted to put them). The most recent version of the mini has 6 of them, but I ended up building two large ones first:

To get the horn pattern, I made a small horn out of aluminium foil, turned it into a flat template by using the tape method, and then scaled the template up.

I decided to build a second set of horns and make them twist around the main ones, as a nod to an older artwork of the character. I took the aluminium horn I had made earlier, twisted it, and repeated the patterning process.

I used two different densities of foam. The grey one is 100kg/m3, whilst the black one is softer (45kg/m3). I used a lower density for the horn because they would have been too hard to shape out of harder foam.

I pinned the horns to the helmet to get an idea of the general look.

DAY 3
Now that the base of the helmet was ready, I could switch to another part and picked the legs. I don't have much to say about this, given that the parts have very basic shapes. I'll probably hide the heels in the sabatons I still have to build (eldars are elongated, and I'm a poor, short, mon-keigh).

The next part on my list is the "vanes" (I've seen those things called that way in an issue of White Dwarf). I'll try to draw them tomorrow.

arborealkey · Apr 6, 2020

DAY 4
I managed to draw some vanes (not sure about the spikes yet, but I'll think about it later). I added runes because I was interested in making them light up in green.

I placed some LED strips inside (perpendicular to the main surface). My goal is to get a breathing effect (fade in/fade out) but I do not currently have the required hardware, so I'll have to add the feature later.

That's all for today.

My goal for day 5: make these wearable.

arborealkey · Apr 7, 2020

DAY 5
The goal has been reached, they are wearable. I made the blades on top removable (magnetic) for easier storage.

This was a placement test, they could also be worn in "respect my personal space" mode (it does look ridiculous).

The runes are see-through when the lights are off. I might tint them green.

Goal for day 6: build a chestplate base

arborealkey · Apr 8, 2020

DAY 6
The goal has been reached, I have a base for the chest armour.

I added a few undercuts to make it less flat.

Goal for day 7: make the chest armour connect properly to the vanes

arborealkey · Apr 9, 2020

DAY 7
Not much to see, but I added something important: the chestplate can now cover the harness. I ended up adding some kind of...vents ? They could look interesting with lights and smoke inside.

The mannequin is too large for the armour, so it was sitting very awkwardly. The pictures was taken outside during the day, so the lights were barely visible.

Goal for day 8: make some tassets

arborealkey · Apr 10, 2020

DAY 7
I tried to draw some of the belt pieces on top of a progress picture. I'm terrible at this (especially on a mobile phone), but it gave me an idea of the kind of shape I wanted.

I also removed one of the abdominal pieces. It was too low (partially covering my crotch), which made movement harder, and would also have interfered with the belt pieces. I'll use it somewhere else.

I made a pattern for the tassets, cut the pieces, and assembled them.

I did a rough placement test.

I then built a...b******s protector, and slightly modified the shape of the chestplate.

Goal for day 9: build back pieces

sandbagger · Apr 11, 2020

Magnificent work.

arborealkey · Apr 11, 2020

sandbagger said:
Magnificent work.

Thanks a lot !

I had drawn some sort of "simulation" yesterday. I wanted the back to have a long spine-like piece for two main reasons:
-it could look interesting with plenty of spikes on it
-it's a nod to the "legend" among eldars that Drazhar could have been the Phoenix Lord of the Striking Scorpions. So I decided to give an arthropod-styled back piece with several articulated segments. Making it point up would have -in my opinion- broken the armour's silhouette (especially with the vanes already attached to the upper back), so I let it fall down instead, and follow my body shape.

I temporarily linked the segments with fabric scraps to try of few things. It's rubbish at the moment, but could work with the right placement.

arborealkey · Apr 11, 2020

DAY 9 (continued)
I tried everything on, and I noticed several things:
-my thigh armour needs to go higher, or the tassets to be larger
-the helmet is a bit large, for eldar standards (adding the pauldrons might help with that)
-the waist area is empty

With that in mind, I took decisions:
-I'll place the knee caps higher and make the thigh pieces longer. The chestplate and tassets were designed to make my legs look longer (and I'm wearing heeled boots as well). They sit rather high on my body, so the leg armour does not go high enough as a result. This will be easy to fix.
-I'll add some sort of sleeveless tunic, going very high on the hips, and slightly lower than the armour pieces on the front and back.
-I'm really considering turning the helmet into a mask (with a hood on top, and keep the horns, of course). It would make the head look smaller and could work well with the "tunic" mentioned above. However, as far as models go, hoods seem to be used exclusively by rangers and Harlequins. My fear is that I might get criticised for this choice, because it's not very dark eldar-like. On the other hand, he's a named character and they have to look distinctive, in my opinion.

Here is an awful simulation:

Goal for day 10: arm pieces (minus shoulders and gloves)

arborealkey · Apr 12, 2020

Day 10
Nothing interesting for today. Most pieces are a downscale version of the leg's. I probably need to add an extra plate to the upper arm.

Goal for day 11: pauldrons

arborealkey · Apr 13, 2020

DAY 11
I started with the "under-pauldrons".

I kept the same pattern, scaled it up (110%) and slightly modified it to build the main pauldrons.

With more context:

Goal for day 12: either build some gloves, or start modifying the pieces that need some tweaking. After that, the base build will be done, and I'll be able to move to the interesting part (details).

sandbagger · Apr 14, 2020

It's so clean, neat and crisp. How do you do that?

Baz.

arborealkey · Apr 15, 2020

sandbagger said:
It's so clean, neat and crisp. How do you do that?

Baz.

Thanks ! I don't do anything in particular (sharp blade, maybe ?)

I did some cleaning and organising yesterday, so there wasn't any progress on the outfit. Which means that day 12 ended up being today instead.

DAY 12
First test with all the pieces (well, most of them). It's a bit all over the place at the moment, especially the horns, but at least I have a base to work with.

honza1976 · Apr 15, 2020

excellent work
as always
I'm cheering

arborealkey · Apr 21, 2020

honza1976 said:
excellent work
as always
I'm cheering

Thanks a lot !

Part 1 of the making-of is finally online:

arborealkey · Apr 23, 2020

Now that part 1 is online, I can start detailing...

I picked the knee armour to start with. The small bevels are what I cut out from the engravings, the larger ones are from the undercuts.

arborealkey · Apr 28, 2020

The tassets are almost done.

I got the texture by pressing textured fabric against the warm foam.

I did similar work on the elbow and forearm.

arborealkey · May 4, 2020

I added a few details to the back. The black ones were 3D printed. I could have used foam (I've made smaller things out of it), but the weather was awful (I work outside) so I felt like doing a bit of 3D-modelling instead.

Some spikes have been added since, but I haven't taken a picture yet.

I also started modifying my helmet. I covered the horns with craft foam sections.