This is my entry for this month, a Stormraven, painted in my counts as Blood Angels chapter colours of Red with Turquoise highlights.

My other hobby is scale model airplane kits, so I approach any wargames vehicle as I would one of those, so I’ve included plenty of photos to hopefully show a few ways of doing things differently which someone may be inspired by.

First off the interior, I painted all the insides with a light grey paint, washed it with vallejo sepia wash (very much like devan mud) and picked out hoses and the like in various basic colours. The screens were picked out with Tamiya Clear Green, they do three or four different clear paints, they are great for this sort of thing, they have a gloss sheen and are slightly transparent, if you paint it over a metallic base , it gives a good impression of a working radar screen or the like.

I did all that before gluing anything together, it would be impossible to detail after the sides were all joined up.

Next the cockpit, I painted this the same light grey , picked out buttons in red/white/yellow and again, tamiya clear green on the screens.

During construction I didnt glue the wings on until after painting, this made masking up for the colourscheme much easier.

Once everything was assembled, the next step was priming, and then preshading. Preshading is a technique to darken areas before you put the main colour on, I used it on all the panel lines, vents, and anywhere else I thought there would be dirt or worn areas on the mode.

Once done, I masked up the wings and tailplane, and sparyed on the first colour, Vallejo Moidel color Turquoise, I use very light coats to build up colour so as not to lose the pre shading, once the desired effect is achieved, I then lighten the turquiose mic a little, and carefully spray the centers of panels, sharp edges etc with this lightened shade, to simulate bleaching and general aging of paintwork.

Once completely dry, i masked over the turquoise and repeated with the red areas, following the same steps, the colour used is Vallejo Model Air Italian Red.

Next its onto the engines and guns, these were primed in black and then sprayed with boltgun metal, for tonal variation , I used a mix od speia and dark blue wash to create an oily looking mix, and rather than just spread it all over, this was thinned and applied just to panel lines , capillary action draws it just along the line , leaving defined shadows but not losing the metallics elsewhere.
Chainmail, and later mithril silver, were then sprayed to edges and panels to highlight.

Once all that was dry, the next step is to put it all together, the pilot and gunner were painted as normal and installed, and the glass glued into the canopies, using gator glue(A type of pva) – a small tip, when glueing clear parts, always use a pva type glue, it drys clear and doesnt fog the parts like superglue or plastic solvent does.

The final step is weathering, doe the chips , I used a dray primer first, and then used chainmail silver inside the grey areas, leaving just a small bit of grey showing , I’ve seen plenty of these models with chips all over , which I dont like, so I tried to keep them to a minimum on this one. The final weathering effect is the exhaust residue from the engines , guns and thrusters, for this I used Tamiya Smoke , I thin it very heavily (about 80% thinners to 20% paint) and then gradually build up the effect in the areas chosen.

Overall I’m pleased with this one, the Stormraven can be an odd looking thing at times, but i tried to use a pattern on it to disguise some of the odd shapes at the back, hence using angles on the wings and tailplanes to divide colour, in the flesh, I think it works.

The other thing I did was magnetise the side panels, so I can have it with or without sponsons.