On the left I’m sketching some SF characters and on the right you have my giant mutant wielding a piece of a building to bash his foes. Next; the mutant leader!
Fast forward to 2015-ish and I feel like sketching my jolly mutant band again (on the left page you can see my Xeno-archaeologist examining an alien skull ). I’ve sketched the current bunch; the giant biffo mutie, the bald, pallid psychic mutant, the crazy clown-haired leader with his metal claw arm and various others.
This is my line-up of mutants; a mutie wide-faced woman with a scrap-shotgun, a melting-faced fat mutant with a giant crossbow, the mutant psychic (now a dwarf), the giant dude, the clown-haired leader and the berserker.
Round about a couple of years later I returned to these ideas as I felt I could do them a bit more justice. I started with the mutant berserker. I imagined he had found an electronic object that glowed a little when he discovered it in the filthy junk-heaps. He thinks it’s a refractor field so now believes he’s invulnerable to bullets.
I added a bit of acrylic white (probably Skull White!) to this version and some more crazy mutant gang territory symbols.
Here I’ve loosely sketched in a version in inks, acrylic white and a bit of watercolour wash. More next time!
One of my first attempts at digital painting (in 2002!) was a fight scene in a hive world setting between slightly medieval-garbed fanatical mutant-hating humans (a Venator gang) fighting a mutant slave gang.
Hive World Warhammer 40,000
I still like it, despite it being done ages ago and in Painter Classic (maybe having only one layer helped the image to be more coherent.)
Well a few years later, back in 2006 I wanted to revisit the image and began doodling and sketching these muties again. They’re not ‘Chaos mutants’, just unfortunate souls mutated by all the toxic pollution affecting generations of humans living in the Underhive.
Some of my mutant character’s are evolving on these pages; the gangly, goofy berserker and the guy with the blade on the end of his arm.
Here’s a very quick doodle on some lined paper of the mutant gang, the large mutant waving his trusty hitting pole in a threatening manner at the back! More of these sketches later.
These Outlander gang pencil drawings have the whole figure again (I like the Enforcer’s cyber-hound, I will return to this idea in some form!):
For completeness (and because I still like them) here are the original A3 pencil sketches for my sequence of Necromunda house gang portraits. I always tend to draw through the borders of the images, especially action scenes so I drew all of them full length. Notice the Orlock ganger’s stripey trousers!
Here are the last few pages of my Underhive sketchbook.
Some refinement of my human rebels logo, an idea for a Space Marine Chapter symbol and some Necromunda Outlander gang symbol thumbnails:
More Necromunda thumbnails, a Space Marine scout riding a lizard conversion idea and some Chaos Space Marine Renegade logos, avoiding the look of Toy Story’s Zurg of course:
The Redemptionists symbol is about right, still working on the Spyrers and Ratskins symbols with a dessicated Ripperjack as a gruesome option!
And here I’m working on a gladitorial Pit Slave gang symbol:
That’s all from my Underhive Sketchbook, though I have the original pencil character drawings of all the gangers to show.
As allways this is Games Workshop’s intellectual property, just ‘fan art’ and not intended to get up the noses of their legal team.
Continuing my Underhive sketches and doodles.
An Ash Wastes Nomad portrait and a doodle of a Deathclaw conversion plan (a mutant creature from the Fallout computer game)
My process for creating the symbols for all of the Necromunda gangs are next; font and colour ideas followed by thumbnail sketches.
Over the last couple of months Games Workshop have announced and shown their new version of the classic Necromunda Underhive game (which the Necromunda online community have been keeping alive for almost 20 years!):
Bell of Lost Souls Necromunda Underhive revealed
The miniatures look to be a larger scale than before and I wonder if many of the rest of the 40K range would be compatible. From this first look the game itself seems to be just a flat board game; completely ignoring the main reason people liked the Necromunda game in the first place: A fast competitive skirmish, with each side using under a dozen gangers a side and an vertical element to the gameplay and scenery.
What GW will bring out to support this remains to be seen; the pessismist in me says they will just ask you to buy the Adeptus Mechanicus scenery they brought out for Shadow War Armageddon. What I’d like to have seen is similar to the original set, with the new de-bossed cardboard for the flatter areas (as in the original game) with new plastic bulkheads, ladders and maybe some objectives and with a game-mat for the ground, all for under £150.
On that wishful note here are some more pages from my Necromunda Underhive sketchbook.
These are my first ideas for the symbols for the various house and gangs, with a Catoblepas riding beast conversion idea for a Rogue Trader’s entourage (Catoblepas entry on Wikipedia). There’s also a Scavvy Scaly with his scattergun.
Some ideas for a border for the Underhive website, some scenery and colour options to do for the Redemptionist portrait.
Nomad image plans and Ratskin portrait and weapons designs.
More underhive banner textures and my idea for an Enforcers symbol, with an Art Deco look based on the LAPD shield design.
On these pages I was doodling symbols for the human rebel force I was converting and painting. I wanted a design for humans rebelling against the fascist Imperium which was small enough and simple enough to paint on a 28mm miniature. More of this sketchbook tomorrow!
As always with these images, they’re fan art and not intended to breach Games Workshop’s intellectual property.
I promised a diversion but it’s really still following the same subject! I had this idea when Games Workshop brought out Shadow War:Armageddon a few months ago. The box contained some OK scenery (though pricey and rather heavy on the skulls and Adeptus Mechanicus symbols!), some Space Marine Scouts and Ork Boyz and the welcome return of the Necromunda rules. Now I suspect not many people bought it for the Scouts and Orks as these were kits that came out years ago, more wanted just the scenery and rules. There was an opportunity missed I feel to show the Imperial Guard (Astra Militarum) and Ork players that they haven’t been forgotten and bring out some plastic Armageddon Ork Hunters for the Imperial Guard and Ork Kommandos for the Orks. Here are my ideas for the Ork Hunters, they could have just been an upgrade sprue with a standard Cadian or Catachan Command sprue with few special characters in the same way they had in Deathwatch Overkill.
I looked at which Guard divisions served on Armageddon and created a motley bunch of expert Ork Hunters, kind of like a Warhammer 40,000 Bad Company (an old strip in 2000AD Bad Company comic on Wikipedia).
Again this is all fan art and not intended to breach Games Workshop intellectual property. Not many people look at this site anyway.
