Star Wars Imperial Assault: AT-ST (Jewel of July)

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A few days ago, Pandora’s Bitz Box painted up an AT-ST. Deciding immediately to rip him off, I quickly cleaned, assembled, sprayed and painted my own AT-ST.

Well, that’s not entirely true. In fact, it’s a load of bollocks. I cleaned up the sculpt over a couple of weeks at work during my breaks, assembled it a week or so ago. Attempted to murder my gaming group via poison gas (so I’m told) 2 weeks ago by spraying it in the yard while they were in The War Room, setting up an IA game, and then painted it over the course of the following 2 weeks, forcing myself to complete it last Saturday morning. With both Marouda’s model as well as my own for Morikun’s contest needing to go up before the end of July, and my own challenge being about completion rather than posting (and a rather well-received rant, inspired by IRO), the AT-ST got bumped – and then Pandora’s AT-ST appeared!

As with a lot of the Star Wars stuff I’ve been painting recently, I looked over Sorastro’s YouTube guide for ideas before getting fully stuck in. I’ve never met or interacted with the man, but he’s a talented painter and an amazing resource for anyone planning to paint Imperial Assault, or any of several other board games’ figures.

I kept my walker a bit lighter and not as heavily weathered as Sorastro, but there’s still a fair bit of weathering, muck and grime across the model, with more concentrated on the feet, legs and undercarriage as well as the back and underside of the “head”.

Now that I’ve finished this one, I need to paint up the General Weiss AT-ST, which I just finished cleaning at work a couple of days ago (somehow, I missed one of the legs!) And then get started on the AT-DP from Heart of the Empire..

As I haven’t yet started on a single Stormtrooper at this stage (WOTC Prepaints are doing the job nicely while I work through other models), it’s left to the Emperor’s Royal Guard to provide scale and ground-level security to the Empire’s Light Walker. I should paint some Adeptus Custodes next to a Sentinel and have them do a face-off!

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie – Heidi Sigrsdotter (Jewel of July ’18, The Temple of Morikun Painting Competition)

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Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

This statuesque lass represents two things – firstly, my own participation for Morikun’s Competition celebrating the 1,000,000th visit to The Temple of Morikun blog. As well as (obviously) another Jewel of July for my own painting challenge. Now I’m not usually one for painting competitions these days. I have actually won a couple in the (distant) past, but the quality of competition these days is through the roof – and I’m rather pragmatic about painting competitions. If I don’t think I have a chance of winning, I don’t bother entering. I’m also realistic. I ain’t winning no Golden Demon or Crystal Brush. And so I don’t enter competitions. And I’m perfectly okay with all of that.

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

Morikun’s one is a little different, in that there are roughly one billion prizes, so rather than feeling like it’s unpossible, it is actually quite possible to win some small thing. And with that, it feels more relaxed, more like a painting challenge – and as any reader of this blog knows, I’m definitely up for a painting challenge. There are other very cool challenges and competitions out there right now, with some bloody amazing work towards them, but I don’t feel that I have the time for complex kitbashes and conversions right now or anytime soon, so my participation in those is limited to just enjoying the posts and photos that they’re composed of.

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

A bit annoying that the highlights and shading on the red of the cape haven’t turned out fully in the photos, but such is life. Anyway, the theme of Morikun’s competition is that of Ms. Morikun, represented by a feminine figure. I can get behind that, though I’d personally be dedicating my own model more towards Marouda, but like is like. Anyway, the best figures I could find for my oan aesthetic were some of my unpainted metal Adepta Sororitas, or a Shieldmaiden/Valkyrie. I went through my stash of Norsewomen, and decided to go big, picking out this model, Valkyrie – Heidi Sigrsdotter from Heresy Miniatures that I picked up with my last order to Andy.

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

The colour scheme was something that developed pretty much organically, with no planning – I just went entirely by “feel” on this one. My only real concern was to ensure that the colours were in keeping with my actual viking models. The very “Thor” colour scheme was simply how it all turned out, which I noticed about 3/4 of the way through the model. Given the nature of the model, this was fine by me.

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

One small painted change from the intent of the original sculpt I (sort of) made, was the upper chest. I genuinely thought that the breastplate continued up to under the model’s neck, where the cloak’s neck chain is. It wasn’t until partway through painting when I realised that it was meant to be a kind of comic book superheroine cleavage. So naturally I left it in the metallic colours I’d painted it in to represent armour. She doesn’t need a spear under the collarbone!

Heresy Miniatures Valkyrie - Heidi Sigrsdotter

So here we are – my submission to the Temple of Morikun and also another Jewel of July. July ends in a few hours, but the next couple of posts will be the remaining figures I finished over the final weekend in July, plus anything I manage to complete tonight before midnight.