Iron hill Dwarf - Scratch built sculpt

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

Hello all! Just recently found this page after being continuously sent to other One ring sites.
I have only been on The Last Alliance forums for a week or two now and been sharing this progress on my Middle earth sculpts.
Since GW like to mess folk around in all respects, I decided to do some of my own Iron Hill Dwarves as close as possible to the current range of miniatures in scale (in particular - plastic Grimhammers)
Maybe some day getting around to moulding/casting them.
Also, the prospect of having to pay £15 for three line troops makes me want walk away from the hobby, but that is a mother topic entirely.

So! At the moment I have one Dwarf pike/spearmen close to completion and two others at various stages of completion.
Below are some images of WIP on the near completed one.
More images will follow when each stage I'm satisfied with is completed.

Hope you guys like them!

Ukfreddybear · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 11:24 am

This is shaping up nicely. Perhaps you should enter him in the Sculpting challenge for Battle of the Five Armies.
http://www.one-ring.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=96&t=29875

Gandlaf the Grey · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 12:03 pm

What's not to like ? They are wonderful.

Crucium Giger · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 12:52 pm

Shaping up very nicely

JamesR · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 1:58 pm

I'm a fan! Looks great

GothmogtheWerewolf · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 3:42 pm

Fantastic sculpt, very professional-looking and fits in well with Games Workshop sculpts and Middle-Earth in general.

Hats off to you Ser! :yay:

Oropher · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 4:59 pm

Good effort! I am always amazed by people that can do stuff like this.
Much respect! Can't wait to see more!

Isilduhrr · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 6:25 pm

Looks beautiful. Now make another 23 for a game

Grungehog · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 6:32 pm

When you have finished you model make a cheap quick and easy bunch of them by making a press mould out of instant mould, you could make a few 2 part moulds and then cast them in pro-create or milliput
easy way of having lots of them quickly if you don't want to make loads of different positions

Éomund · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 7:06 pm

wow he looks very nice!

Wise Old Elf · **Posted:** Mon Jan 05, 2015 11:12 pm

Frankly, that's astonishing! :shock:

I'd buy a plastic pack of 12 of these in an instant!

Looking forward to see the finished result, and will you be painting him up too?

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

Thanks everyone for the very motivating comments!!!
Surely going to be on my toes to finish these guys, shall have to start another thread at some point to show my other Middle Earth Dwarves too. =)

Thanks for the challenge invite @ukfreddybear, replied in kind in that linked thread.

@grungehog, I've tried using epoxies with two part press moulds made out of Oyumarau, great for icons, shields and the like; but can never get a good full miniature copy without it looking messy. Lol
May have another go using apoxie sculpt (a more softer to touch & harder drying than greenstuff)
Will let you know if that idea turns out well - or not.

@Wise old elf - Thanks for the comment! I do intend moulding/casting these guys when I'm happy I've got four of these guys that look very uniformed together. The main concern is the very slight helmet size being a little bit bigger than the plastic Grimhammers. (Heads)
I bought another box of Grimhammers today to test my liquid silicone/resin I bought to see if I can get the hang of that process of model making.
Will certainly let you know how that project comes about.

Sneakily without you all knowing I had been trying out sculpting some gundabads and an armoured woodelf in between working on my iron hill dwarves.
Became horrified the size/scale of mine were off be a surprising margin after looking in my local GW store.
So will have to get some plastic elves to use my scaling other races I try sculpt.
A shame the new Gundabads/Mirkwood armoured elves are resin though.

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

I'm back!
Took a little longer to get things done than planned, got myself into a bit of a dialema.
I like the current style I've done on the Iron hill dwarf shown, but it is admittedly difficult to accurately replicate him in a way I'm satisfied.

So as you can see, this guy is turning out rather well.

But this guy I need to reshape the helmet a bit more and other parts like his boots.

He's looking "fixable", but means a lot of messing around to correct pieces I'm not happy with.

Now out of merely a test of sorts, I came out doing another sculpt as a one piece sculpt to see how quickly I could do it. As in one piece of greenstuff (well technically two) spread out over the armature that shockingly felt easier to work from and more accurate in size to the plastic GW Grimhammers than the other two above.
In total, this one took me around two hours & 30 mins including the armature.
So thinking of now doing all other Iron hill dwarves in this manner. Then adding other layers/details at a later stage.
Also note the edging in the armour that gives it more details, also something I could learn to do more precise and neat too.

What do you think? Would appreciate the feedback.

Gandlaf the Grey · **Posted:** Thu Jan 08, 2015 10:33 am

He looks great, now this may be due to having no arms but is he too thick on his lower half ? He seems to get thicker as you work down the figure.

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

Gandlaf the Grey wrote:

He looks great, now this may be due to having no arms but is he too thick on his lower half ? He seems to get thicker as you work down the figure.

Which one sorry? Lol
If you mean the last one, the mail skirt is a little mishped an sized. That is likely due to the camera angle as well.
But I was thinking of going back and redoing the mail skirt since it was meant to look less bellshaped.
I'll be trying my hand at another Iron hill dwarf in this quick sculpt fashion later and then likely see how I can go about altering the mail skirt/or redoing it all to save a messy finish.
An thanks you!.

Gandlaf the Grey · **Posted:** Thu Jan 08, 2015 3:06 pm

It was the last one, it just looks bigger the more you work down.

Lord Hurin · **Posted:** Thu Jan 08, 2015 4:12 pm

That is shaping up very nicely!

Dead Marsh Spectre · **Posted:** Thu Jan 08, 2015 4:32 pm

Great sculpting, Only one thing is the shape of the shield doesn't work for me. I don't know why either. Rest of the sculpt is outstanding!

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

Gandlaf the Grey wrote:

It was the last one, it just looks bigger the more you work down.

Ah I thought so, this is the rushed sculpt I've done, I need to had some more details to his armour and helmet anyway so that should bulk him out a bit.
Then if he's looking a bit too bottom heavy still, I'll likely redo it.
Thanks for the feedback!

SON OF DURIN · **Joined:** Sat Jan 03, 2015 11:20 pm **Posts:** 20

Lord Hurin wrote:

That is shaping up very nicely!

Thank you! Hoping to getmore progress done on these soon.

Dead Marsh Spectre wrote:

Great sculpting, Only one thing is the shape of the shield doesn't work for me. I don't know why either. Rest of the sculpt is outstanding!

Thank you! Ye I'm only doing the same shield the iron hill dwarves used in the movie, I admittedly prefer the Erebor shields, but it seems weta gave them the knight looking shields because of the particular five foot shield wall they make in the Battle of the five armies.

Iron hill Dwarf - Scratch built sculpt

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