Gorkamorka kommishun - almost dere

Well, actually already dere as of the time I'm writing this post, but for the sake of chronology and stuff I'll split the remaining content between two posts. So yes, everything is 100% finished, and based. This post will be focused on the remaining boyz and grots, while the next one will have group beauty shots of the entire commission. Trukks, bikes, buggies and gits all together, with bases complete. I also want to include a short video showcase, for which I've already recorded a ton (~90 mins) of footage that I now have to cut down and edit into a short, presentable clip, max 10 minutes long. Once that is done, The post will go up, hopefully by the end of the week.

For now though, let's have a look at the remaining minis. There are sixteen in total: one nob I've finished up, two spannerz, three boyz and ten grots.

Gorkamorka kommishun - just end it already

Can't really find the energy to post an update, but it's been ages since I posted once more. Same old case of "K, I'll post an update on Sunday". Then Sunday comes round and I want to get one more detail finished, then that drags on over two days, then something else, so I move the goal to another day and bam, two months without posting. Probably gonna skip the usual neat post layout for this one. I'm absolutely worthless at everything that's related to making models except the part where you glue bits together. Self-discipline, deadlines, keeping stuff in order, actually working at an acceptable pace, and all that, I'm absolutely rubbish. That being said, pictures:

Got some stuff done, at a disgustingly slow pace, sadly. I hate to admit it, but most of the working time is actually spent sitting and staring at the models, wondering why is nothing going well. I probably have burned myself out on this project ages ago. I hate myself for how long it's taking.

Gorkamorka kommishun - enter da dakka

Yep, yep, it's finally here. As mentioned in the previous post, work has currently turned towards armaments and equipment for the vehicles. It seems I'm finally managing to find a decent approach to all this, resulting in less downtime and such. Summer heat has also backed down a bit, helping keep the progress going.

The results so far are all the four mounts and gunner bodies done and magnetised, which means I can now go on with building all the interchangeable weapon options, so that they can be freely swapped. As seen in the picture, so far I have (left to right) the 'eavy shoota, linked shootas, a spear chukka and a rough idea of a harpoon gun. All are still in need of some rivets and decoration, as per usual.

Gorkamorka kommishun - gettin' hot

Progress is happening at the usual steady pace. That's putting it in a positive way, as what I actually mean is that it's too slow. I've kind of managed to negate the part where I run out of ideas for a particular model and get stuck by jumping between different vehicles, but I'm afraid there's not much I can do against the blistering summer heat that's setting in just now. Temperatures reaching 30 degrees Celsius, with 35 prognosed for this weekend. It's not much cooler in my room, making it rather hard to find the will to do anything else than slowly decomposing on the bed with a book or something. Regardless, I've started on the last buggy and actually managed to get a decent chunk of it done. Mostly due to it being almost purely a kitbash. Eh.

That being said, I'm pretty happy with how it's turned out so far. On the other hand, now I find that it makes the trakk buggy look kinda meh in comparison, but it might be just me. Similar to the two trukks, this is the speedy counterpart to the heavy ruggedness of the trakk version.

Intermisshun - da uvver stuff

As I mentioned in the previous post, in the time between it and the previous post, I did make a thing or two outside of the Gorkamorka project. Since the last intro text was quite long, let's just jump right into it.

First up, the objective markers. Somewhere around September last year I was contacted by Kromlech, who asked if'd I'd be interested in making some models for them. It came as a bit of a surprise and I guess I was equal parts flattered and excited, so after a quick e-mail back-and-forth we've settled on a set of junkyard-themed markers.

Gorkamorka kommishun - ackshuly not ded yet

Eeh, I don't really know what to start with. Apart from the fact that I'm pretty pissed about taking three months since the last post and having almost no progress to show for it, when I actually wanted to be done with this project by the end of March. But I'm really bad at judging how much time stuff will take me to do. Finishing up my last semester of uni and my thesis paper afterwards took longer to wrap up than I thought. On the plus side, it means I am now done with school and in theory can focus all my time on hobby related stuff. What's more, it means I'm at that point in life where I should make a decision regarding my future plans. And I really would like to try and see if I could get anywhere with miniatures and related stuff. I feel like there's still a plenty of niches yet to be filled that I could tackle. As a result of entrepreneurship classes this semester we were supposed to write up a business plan and I unless I was way off, it seems like it could maybe work out. If it doesn't, there's not a ton of investment involved and I could simply proceed to apply for master's degree course of some sort next year. I just want a break after all the years of education to try and go for some of the many plans and ideas I kept having for the past year or two. However, while I think I'm capable of putting out quality stuff (mostly according to others, my self esteem isn't really that high in regard to anything) it's the pace at which I can do that that concerns me mostly. If it's gonna go anywhere near as good as this project, I might as well not bother at all.

But enough of that, let's cover the stuff I've done since last post. Starting with Gorkamorka, since that should be the focus right now, I might actually keep the rest for another post.

Yep, work has started on the second trukk. Actually, it did somewhere in January, when I laid out the wheels, flatbed and front bumper on the cutting mat and figured out the general layout of things. It then sat there and taunted me while I kept trying to get my thesis done as soon as possible.

Gorkamorka kommishun - an' dere wuz light...

...in more than just one way, actually. Glad I managed to get this post out in less than a month from the previous one. I was going to on Saturday/Monday, but there was a little delay and then stuff happened and I postponed it till today, for a very good reason, as you shall see. Also worth noting probably is that this is the 20th post on Da Wazgarg Rokkaz. A small anniversary, but an important one nonetheless. Somehow I'm able to keep cluttering this little corner of the interwarpz with my ramblings and pictures despite various swings in mood and resulting productive output. Over 3600 views were accumulated since I started in late May, which I have no idea if it's a significant number, considering I only applied to Natfka's banner roll. That's not important though. What's important, is that there seems to be a handful of people who like my work enough to keep checking back every once in a while. I would hereby like to thank you all for this silent encouragement. Furthermore, I would also like to thank Greg and Tim for not so silent encouragement by leaving feedback in my comment section, glad to have you guys here.

Okay, that seems to have turned into a bit of a summary post, which makes sense, seeing as I'm writing it on the last day of 2015. But enough's enough, time for the good stuff and pictures.

The big trukk is pretty much finished, as far as the major things go. I might add a separate reinforced ram, as the current one is attached permanently, but that's it. Finished the last of extra armour panels and added some chain to tie down the stowage. I might just be growing up to the decision to finally glue the engine on along with the exhaust stacks so I can add the mounting brackets and connect the driveshaft.

Gorkamorka kommishun - space created

I don't even know when a month has passed since the last post. Like, I was certain it's been two weeks or so since the last post until I checked. I'm actually disgusted by my atrociously slow work. Which gets me depressed. Which in turn makes it even harder to work on stuff. Vicious circle... There was some stuff accomplished since then though, so there's that. On both vehicles, but most importantly, my workplace. Let's get on to it then, shall we?

The big trukk had a bunch of stuff done, pushing her quite close to being completed, I think. First pair of extra armour was added, as well as a rollbar, and some stowage. The blue exhaust parts were finally glued to the engine block, and had some detailing, welds and damage done to them.

Gorkamorka kommishun - keeps bugging me

Ueeegh, I'm hardly in the mood to write anything extensive this update. It's way overdue I posted one, though. The secret project was finished, hopefully I will get to show it to you soon. This means I can get back to Gorkamorka full swing. Which at the moment isn't very swingy at all. No idea why, everything is just seems so difficult to work with and figure out and on top of that, I don't find any of my ideas satisfying enough. One good thing is that I finally got the first part of my new desk assembled and set up and it's pretty sweet. Finally I can have a dual screen setup. The workdesk will follow as soon as the store restocks the pipes and fittings I still need. But enough ranting. Picture time.

More work was done on the trakk buggy, all the suspension/wheels/treads is done. Also added a simple front bumper, extra armour and started on the driver's cab.

Gorkamorka kommishun - progress is buggy

Sorry to keep you waiting for another update. Originally I intended to post it last Sunday, but since I have Mondays free, I thought I could squeeze a bit more progress into it. But then I rushed back to the secret project, then it got dark and so eventually it kept getting postponed for the whole week.

As you can see, I started on the trakked buggy that was mocked up a while ago, as well as began building up the back of the trukk. That means I can finally have the tracks kept in place in a somewhat stable way. Same goes for the buggy, as soon as I copy it to the other side, I can start figuring out the body.

Gorkamorka kommishun - can't fix woz broken

Just take it apart and try again instead. I've had a small hiatus from the other secret project, so I went back to try and figure out the trukk and it's issues. I stripped the plating from the front only to discover that the problem lies even deeper. I kept trying to figure out just what is wrong until I took a look at my sketches and it finally clicked.

Front wheels were misplaced. Simple as that. Whereas in the sketch they were in line with the front engine, on the model they ended up in the middle between the two. The reason being there was a neat spot for top suspension mount. That in turn made the front feel unnaturally long and made it impossible to come up with anything decent looking.

Gorkamorka kommishun - late and exhausted

Ha! Puns. A very small update today, not a lot of progress to show due to various unforeseen circumstances. Did most of the work on exhausts of the 2nd engine, all the pipes, tubes, welds and all. Since that is done, I can proceed with figuring out the layout of the rollcage and integrating the front with the back in a more coherent flowy way.

Once again, apologies for mediocre photo quality.

Gorkamorka kommishun - goin' sumwere

Yes, that time of the week again. The time when I should have tons of stuff to post. Obviously I have nowhere near as much as I'd like to. Everything goes slower than I want it to, except for the moments when it stops going at all, like yesterday, when I spent the whole day banging my head against my desk trying to figure out what to do with the trakk's front. I did eventually figure something out today and made some meager progress. Still no idea if I like it or not, but if I keep going I'll eventually end up at the point where it's not really feasible to go back.

Here it is then, week's worth of progress on the trukk. Got most of the engine done, bar a ton of details, sorted out front frame and suspension and started on the bodywork of sorts. This thing turned out to be big. Like, really big, way bigger than a standard 40k trukk, it's at least battlewagon-sized. Which I'm overall happy with, as vehicles in 40k are smaller scale than the infantry, meaning this thing is reasonably close to how big an actual big Ork trukk should be in relation to the orkz themselves.

Gorkamorka kommishun - trukkin' on

Here it is, the second weekly self-motivational post. I did get something done, though of course nowhere near as much as I would've liked. Monday and Tuesday (or was it Tuesday and Wednesday?) were absolutely terrible. I absolutely couldn't get myself to do anything at all. Eventually I just gave up and decided to wait it out in my bed with a good book to kill the time. Downtime has passed at some point though and I did some minor progress on the boyz before finally starting on the vehicles.

As you can see on the group shot, there really isn't that much progress, and the vehicles are mostly just mock-ups to see how my sketched ideas hold up when smashed into the unyielding wall of reality. There's gonna be four of them, and I decided to split the variations evenly, so there's gonna be two trukks and two buggies, one wheeled and trakked of each kind.

Gorkamorka kommishun - wurkin' title

Okay, I'm really fed up with the atrocious rate at which I work. Because of that, I'm changing the way I'll be posting updates here. Instead of dropping one whenever enough content has built up, I'll be posting weekly, no matter if I blutacked one mock-up together, or built a whole army. Hopefully the fear of having nothing to post will motivate me enough to cease being an atrociously lazy git.

That being said, measly progress was made. First up, the spanna had his arm assembled and a blowtorch built. Needs a hose going to the button at his belt and a handgun.

Photo quality is slightly worse than usual since I forgot I have to post today and couldn't get enough daylight. Still have yet to buy a proper light setup.

Gorkamorka kommishun - 'alfway dere

As far as the boyz go, at least. Finished up another few boyz, bringing the completed total up to thirteen plus one in progress. Somehow got a tiny bit of a motivation spurt the last few days. Didn't even get stopped by the on/off switch in my mini-drill finally dying. Crawled out to the town in blistering heat and bought a replacement one, along with twenty new blades and a secret thingy. Glad my super basic soldering skills were enough to fix the damn thing, I can't imagine working without it. Neither can I be arsed to dump money on a new one. Anyways, group picture:

As you can see, the crossbow and kannon boyz got finished, and three new were completed, one with a flail and a choppa, another one with a shoota and what can pass as flak armour, I guess and a slaver with a whip, net and a slugga.

Gorkamorka kommishun - blunderin' about

Still trying to kick into a proper working pace, I'm slowly overcoming all the crappy moods and bouts of pessimism. I'm way behind the schedule I was hoping for. By now I'd wanted to have at least all 20 boyz done, and I'm just barely skirting half that number. Wonder if I can somehow get those done until the end of next week. I want to get on to the vehicles dammit.

Meanwhile, here's a group shot showing the boyz in their current state, all 10 of them, 7 of which are done. The shooty nob on the right needs minor work, while the two boyz in front were just test-fitted together and need gluing, filling and detailing.

Gorkamorka kommishun - sluggin' forward

Yeah, so after the last post things went rather unexpectedly downhill. Nothing serious really, just that I hit another one of those periods when there's no point to anything and I can't ever seem to get anything done. It went on for a week. Since I was completely unable to get any creative work done, I decided to settle on re-creative instead. I just sat comfortably in my bed, took out a sketchbook I got specifically to draw stuff for this project that sat unused so far, because I hate my drawing skills (or lack thereof) and went about sketching down all the gunz found in Gorkamorka rulebooks' illustrations. Well, almost all of them, there were a few designs I opted to skip (again, lazy days). A slow drawing session later, this was the result:

What it provides me with, is quick access to handy reference on a single piece of paper. Which is especially useful when trying to come up with my own designs. Not having to flip through the entire book every few minutes helps immensely and makes copypasting ideas way easier.

Gorkamorka - da kommishun projekt

'ere it is den! Da projekt wot I kept mentioning da 'ole time. Gorkamorka it is!

Why am I building stuff for Gorkamorka even though I don't really have a playable 40k army after two years? Well, I've accidentally been commissioned to build two Ork mobs for the game and after a bunch of emails being exchanged I decided to roll with it. I'm supposed to build 20 boyz (including nobz, spannerz and all that), 10 grots, 3 bikes and 4 vehicles (mix of trukks and buggies, 2 regular, 2 trakked) The picture below shows what I'm working with. Of course, my ridiculously large hoard of bits comes in handy every now and then.

I'm having quite a lof of fun with it so far. The range of options is naturally way better than your regular 40k boyz mob, which is pretty much all I've done so far and it's great to play around with. Also, since I'm mostly supposed to convert rather than scratchbuild, things are going faster than I'm used to, which is super nice as well. 

Rokk 'ard, ride free - Da biker nobz

Alright then! Last one of the catch-up posts is here. That means the next one will be of an ongoing project and it should hopefully continue like that. Those are the last minis that I've finished, a trio of nob bikerz that were painted together with the looted wagon.

Once upon a time I bought a box of bits and various crap that looked reasonably useful for its price, though later it turned out to be mostly crappy recasts of various ork parts and I kinda set it aside. Once I actually dug through it fully, I found about ten old ork warbikes, along with a bunch SM/CSM ones. Ended up trading the SM ones to my local crack dealer* buddy for some more ork bitz and decided to see what I can do with the rest. Since I usually tend to overcomplicate things on the first go, I went for nobz rather than regular bikerz, meaning I'd have to make sure they're bigger than regular warbikes.