Imperial Fists: Part 1: The Fistening Begins

We are the Sons of Dorn! NO! Not Michael Dorn. Rogal Dorn!!!

After getting the new Dark Imperium box set, I started sticking together the newest incarnations of the Space Marines; the Primaris Marines. They were great kits to put together, and I like a lot of the design beats that went into them. They manage to feel like classic Space Marines while also moving the story of the Space Marine and Warhammer 40,000 forward. The only thing I was a little surprised by was that the shoulder pads on these kits were moulded directly on - I had assumed that the they would be separate so that Forge World or current Marine shoulder pads would fit on. I'm guessing we'll still see that in a future "basic" kit for the Primaris, so I can wait.

When trying to decide on a color scheme, I knew I wanted something I haven't really done or done a lot of in the past - blacks, blues, greens were all out for me. I had considered doing the Imperial Fists - yellow can be such a striking scheme, but has a reputation as such a pain in the ass to do. Unfortunately, I shared the idea of doing Imperial Fists with some friends who then proceeded to shame me into doing them! So here we are.

I tested out my color scheme and process on one of the Primaris Lieutenant models first. My thought was that if I screwed him up, I had another that came in the set. In the end, I was really happy with my yellow method and decided to try it out on a squad.

I decided on a black and yellow scheme. It had a lot of buzz around it.
Cue trombone...

My recipe was simple. Prime White. Then spray with
Krylon Sun Yellow. I much prefer spray paints to using an
 airbrush - mostly because I don't have the personal discipline to keep
an airbrush clean the way it should be.

The whole model is washed with thinned down GW Trollslayer
Orange.

After the orange dries, wash the whole model with
Army Painter Strong Tone Ink.

The broader areas are then worked back up using GW Yriel Yellow.
Final highlights are a 50/50 mix of Yriel Yellow and
Ushabti Bone.
Grime and nicks are then added with Vallejo Beasty Brown (
the grime) and Vallejo Dark Flesh (the nicks).
All in all, a pretty easy system. Waiting for the washes to dry is
the longest part.

The Primaris Intercessors were first on deck for tackling a squad. These are pretty dope models - they really exemplify the Marine archetype for me. I also decided to go slightly nuts on the bases - creating some cracked stone out of cork for each one. The cork bases are pretty easy to do, in fact I think it took longer for me to buy some cork from Staples than it did to actually build them.

"Where should we Intercede, Brother Sergeant?" "Uhhhh… THAT WAY!"

Next, I'll probably do the standard bearer guy from Dark Imperium as a "treat yoself" model. I find breaking projects up this way makes me more motivated and able to keep up a decent velocity.

Cheers!