Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Renegade Ogryn Transport

How six Ogryn will fit in a standard Chimera is anyone's guess.  I wanted my own transport to have a little extra leg room...
When I look at the Forgeworld Renegade Ogryn models,  I see bloodthirsty, chemically enraged berserkers.  The idea that these monsters would line up nicely, and sit in the back of a transport vehicle, seemed a bit silly to me.  I decided that my Ogryn transport would not only be larger, but appear to be the kind of vehicle that the Militiamen could pull up to the enemy lines, drop open a back hatch, and dump out the Ogryn, implying the Militiamen themselves were terrified of them.  Again, narrative in modeling: I dig it.


The picture above is a bit off, color-wise, as I am still tweaking my photo taking process.  However, I didn't want to post pics of my Ogryn, then have tons of time pass before I could share their transport as well.  That being said, let's talk about the conversion base:

I started with the chassis for an Ork Battlewagon.  As you can see, I used two sets of tank treads, clipped and modded together to give the vehicle treads that ran the entire length of the body.  Next, I attached the rear portion of a Baneblade turret to the front of the cab, in an effort to break up the profile of the original Ork Battlewagon, and hide my handiwork.  To this newly extended "hood", I pinned the grill from the engine hatches to a Baneblade.  Next, I carefully cut lots plastic card  to "plate" the entire vehicle with.  While it is true that this addition bulked-out some portions of the frame, I was ok with this effect.  Again, I was hoping to make something that could actually fit six Ogryn inside.  I also wanted to cover as much of the "Ork Ramshackle Welded Plates" as I could, to make the model more unique.  After these cards were glued in place, I used light weight spackle to fill in all cracks and crevices.  I like light weight spackle, as you can sand and mold the material with your bare fingers.

Once the body of the vehicle had been established, I began adding bits.  I added a defiler's twin-linked autocannon in a turret, much the same as my Chimera turrets.  To the hull, in the "windshield" area, I added a heavy flamer and a chaos vehicle turret hatch.  Along the sides of the vehicle, I added fuel tanks, etched brass chaos icons, industrial components and instruments.  On the far side of the model, I even added a ladder leading up to a "feeding hatch" for the Ogryn.  The top of the Ogryn container was built with a "window" of sorts, to which I added some mesh screen, to reinforce the idea of a cage full of destructive psychopaths.  Lastly, I added a large "dump-truck" door to the rear of the vehicle, to represent the hatch from which the beasts would be released.

While not a perfectly illustrated walk-through of my conversion, I hope that this at least gives you a good idea of my vision.  While the finished product is far larger than a standard Chimera, and certainly appears to be more heavily armored than the usual model, I think that the model is a success.  Sure, it isn't as easy to hide on the battlefield, but then as you know, for me, the appearance of a unit is far more important than it's tactical viability.  After all, we are talking about transporting Ogryn; one of the "worst units in 40k".

Thanks for stopping by, and thank you for overlooking my ongoing photography issues.  I hope you all have a nice Thanksgiving holiday, unless you are outside of the US, in which case just have a normal Thursday.  Maybe just eat a turkey sandwich.

11 comments:

  1. Beautiful, and great idea for a conversion. I hope at some point you can put up a rear shot showing the hatch as well.

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  2. I actually think the color is lovely- just a bit washed out and grungy; implying how rarely Militiamen might go near it (even for maintenance) out of fear and revulsion.

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  3. Spot on job.

    I'm with sonoftaurus though. We need some more photographs of this monster transport.

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  4. It would be a funny addition to add flashing LED yellow lights to let others know the Ogryns are being released.
    Great model love to see the progress. I have seen other conversions that have bashed the sides out around the Ogryn compartment showing them trying to escape.
    I hope you have some good ideas for the inside compartment. Trophies of battle, chaos runes, big LCD telly showing cartoons to keep them tranquil.

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  5. The conversion is great but I think the paint job needs more. Perhaps some freehand chaos symbols or an additional colour. Just something to make it pop.

    Don't take my opinion the wrong way, its a great model.

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  6. That is awesome. It reminds of those harvesters from the Dune movie (and books, and video games). The conversion works is pretty sweet and it's very functional for a gaming piece too.

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  7. Thanks for the input, all!

    If you look at my other Vraksian vehicles, this is painted in the exact same color scheme. On my title splash banner, if you look at the Vendetta in the background, you will see the treatment I use. What I am complaining about here, is that the camera and photo development process altered the colors. Alas!

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  8. I agree with what muz said- warning lights or even yellow/black caution tape would be awesome on there.

    Great conversion overall!

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  9. Wonderful! This is a fantastic conversion and an awesome looking model, one that actually looks like it could transport a squad of Renegade Ogryn. Very cool!

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