As always I wanted to do something a little different with the model so I decided on building a cockpit. The standard model doesn't come with one so it was going to be scratch build. I used the cockpit built by John Stiening at his blog "40k Hobby Blog" as a reference. I noted that in his blog he appeared to have used the control console from a Space Marine Land Raider. I picked one up from Bullettbits55 on eBay. I then used some instantMold to make a press mold of the control console and monitors so that I could make some green stuff copies.
Additional details were added using the Green Stuff Industries tentacle maker, scratch styrene, and guitar string. Aside from the head, the pilot was sculpted out of procreate. I've done plenty of filing and detail sculpts but this was my first attempt at a sculpt of that size. The gears were from a pack I picked up at a craft store.
The cockpit was primed black and drybrushed with army painter gun metal mixed with black. A second dry brushing of pure gun metal was applied over that. I then drybrushed a coat of bronze over the consoles. The screens were all painted in blended shades of aqua and lagoon craft paints. The buttons were painted various bright colors and the entire cockpit received a gloss coat. I then applied a wash of brown, burnt sienna, and black oil paints to the 'metal' surfaces. After the oil paints had dried I applied dull coat to the cockpit and finished by applying gloss varnish to the screens.
The pilot chair received a similar treatment and the pilot's robes were painted in barn red, given a dark wash and highlighted with barn red with progressively more Army Painter red mixed in. Skin tones were completed using Army Painter Tan Flesh and a craft paint flesh color. A small amount of red was added to the flesh color around the points where the cables enter his skull.
With the cockpit completed it's on to the rest. Soon to come!