A while ago, I was given the opportunity to build and paint a Sable Sword Terminator Captain. No problem I thought... until I saw what my Client had in mind for some of the conversions.
Looking at the sketch he sent me, I knew I was in for some work.
A custom head piece and helmet, resculpted forearms to create a different look to the armour, a little bit of freehand combined with some sculpted iconography, all the usual suspects and then some.
His sword is actually an Empire sword. It gave the model a subtle but important change in his look. He wasn't holding yet another "power sword."
I cleaned the iconography off the Empire sword, extended the handle to give it some weight and added a small icon to the side of his storm bolter. Being the Captain, he's allowed to wear his personal heraldry which happens to be a chalice in this case.
And here are both arms with their resculpted forearms. You can see that I repeated the small chalice icon on the sword as well. That actually played an important part when it came time to paint the blade later on.
The head piece is made of plasticard and greenstuff. This picture was taken before I sculpted the chapter symbol onto it. At first, I wasn't sure if I could fit them on there at this scale but ended up being able to do it.
You can see the conversion work done to the helmet as well. It's the "Grey Knight" conversion with an extra face plate bolted on. I added a small tab at the top to bulk it out visually.
And my single most favorite part of the whole project. The conversion work I did to the crux. I cut away the bones and replaced them with crossed swords. How perfect is that? You can't beat that for tying the chapter icon into the model. And then I realiZed I'd done it all to a regular crux and not a Sergeant one so I had to sculpt the lower portion and add a gem to it.
And a quick mock up of his pose. Sword pointed, gun at rest, foot up on object, all the essential elements for a nice Commander model. He was a blast to paint as well. The last picture doesn't show the half tabard added to him or give you a good look at the chalice sculpted on his right shoulder. You'll get to see all that when I post the finished pics of him.
Here's the finished model.
