Heresy Era Thousand Sons – Primaris Lightning Fighter painted

Been cranking along on the bolter and chainsword painting challenge and recently finished the paint job on the Lightning fighter that will accompany the Prospero Spireguard contingent of the Thousand Sons army.

I have to say that while I really dug the old Lightning (and am bummed that FW has apparently discontinued it), I absolutely love this model even more! It definitely is more stylistically related to the Thunderbolt, and has a much more menacing look overall. I tried to mimic the blended red that I did on the Crimson Hunter from a while back - it ended up being a little more streaky than I hoped, but it sort of gives the model a sense of motion.


I went with a blue/grey underside, to help the plane blend into the sky from the ground, and absolutely not because I royally screwed up the blend on the bottom when I was originally painting it red. No sir!


The pilot, while cool, didn't really fit in with the rest of the infantry style so I tried my hand at the artificial horizon look. In the heresy rules, the lightning has the option of taking either a regular pilot or a battle servitor so the opaque canopy lets me choose whichever one strikes my fancy at the time.

Still have to work out the waterslide transfers and freehand work, but at this point it's painted, sealed and ready to receive!