Alpha legion HQ conundrum and progress

So I've actually managed to do some more progress this year, will the everyday miracles ne'er end?

one of the first things i really wanted to get over and done with was doing some touch-up and finish the basing for my 2K points. Now this is the kind of thing that i usually put off forever, and it never get's done, but i recently had a couple of hours for myself, so i decided to touch up the the base rims with a black layer, and do some quick snow bases. below is the last veterans for my PoTL 2k list. I also got around to giving everyone a combat blade and pistol holster. So as to have WYSIWYG on them too. 

And with that in mind I've found a good way of really streamlining my snow basing, and i chose to put together a quick walkthrough.

Materials that you'll need 

So first up, try to get some cheap acryllic texture paint. I ised the "studio acryllics" brand from the closng sale of a crafts store, but you can use whatever. The concrete parts from Army painter and the GW mordheim work well so as to give the base some character when you spread the valhallan blizzard on it. But first things first. 

 Take the intended bases. Base them with a black color (whatever brand) to make sure that the texture paint sticks. Then liberally add the texture paint. You'll see why below

 This is when it dries up. As you can clearly see, it's pretty porous and as such you can see through it in places.

 After that you can just drybrush it what a grey colour. Do a light drybrush with the intended purpose of just showing some contrast. If you want to have a black sands base you can simply stop here.

Personally i did a light white drybrush. Then added some turf and or concrete with PVC. and when it dries, cover it with valhallan blizzard. And done. The end result is below

I have also gotten around to actually finish the Cataphractii i wanted for my army. They are intended to cruise around with my new Praetor in the land raider phobos i have since earlier. 

I decided to go with a pretty muted color scheme in contrast to the candy blue of the base layer from my airbrush. The black helmets gives a connection to the same scheme that i have on the veterans from the same detachment, which is my simple way of making sure that there is a coherent style for my army. And for the isolated 108'th Navigationary expedition. From there on out the scheme pretty much defined itself. I used mainly leadbelcher for rivets and details and silver highlight and some details. Since i was so happy with the basecoat i wanted to to use the details in dampened colors so as to draw attention to it, rather than detract from it. This was also why i went with the chain on the one pauldron and the double X on the other. I think the end result was pretty good actually.

and here is the entire squad in it's entirety. Three chainfists, one powerfist and one sword. As well as one combi-melta and a banner.

Since these are going to be a command squad i thought it best to have a mixed unit approach. So that i can chose what four models to use, and also have two "variants" of a sergeant or character, All in all i'm really satisfied with the way the squad worked out.

Mandatory pointy IC

Beyond that i also managed to finish up the contemptor mortis i had on the to do list. This will cover for my AA needs and also do support duty on light AV vechicles.

This is actually the first contemptor i ever assembled, and as such it was a rather static pose, so i tried to use the details and positioning of the head to get a hunting look to is, as if it was searching for targets. The shield is in place since it has a number of purity seals on it's left hand side, and i felt these were out of touch with the astethic of the army. lookign back i'm pretty happy wit the shield with the omega sign on it, it gives the models some character. That is actually the same reason as to why i had the cyclone missile launcher on top. Since the contemptor only get's a "havoc" launcher in Horus heresy, i doubt that it will do much but it did add to the look of the mini itself. 

And with that i now have a decent well rounded PoTL army that i can use in a couple of different configurations. The only issue remaining is sorting out my HQ's, which i'll cover next time.