Spring and early Summer, 2026
I’m writing a short story about two giant Imperial Knights, from Warhammer 40k – basically, giant robots battling bad guys. It’s gonna be awesome.
Where’d I get the idea, you may ask? Well. A while back (2023, I believe) I made an Imperial Knight from Warhammer 40k. It was fun, it took me a few months, and I still have the model here in Dublin.
It was relaxing, and I have very fond memories of the time spent meticulously assembling and painting that model in my apartment in Wilsonville. The calm, the quiet, the focus and step-by-step nature of the project… though I maybe don’t miss the back pain from hunching over a tiny little fiddly bit, trying to get the paint to do exactly what I want.
I’ve needed that focus and serenity here, in Dublin. It’s been a tough few months, fully of chaos and anxiety, and so – I came up with an idea for a new Knight. A more audacious idea, one where I’d modify a kit to make exactly what I wanted.
I bought the kit, got the paints, and started into the project.
Andrea joined me for some parts, and just observed for others.
Over months, from March through June, I worked. One step at a time, one piece after another. I assembled, I glued, I primed, and I painted. One stage at a time.
My idea was to basically use the entire kit – each box comes with options to make three or four different knight variants… but that seems silly to just waste them all, right? My goal was to use them all – Make a super-knight out of everything.
I like to think I succeeded.
And seeing the two knights next to each other… well. They’ve inspired me quite a bit – not only to start writing a short story (omg what am I getting myself into?) but also to simply appreciate the work I did, and enjoy the process of creation yet again.
So let’s talk about what went right, and what went wrong.
What went right was my first usage of the modeling clay “green stuff”! This was my first foray into true kit-bashing / sculpting, and I’m quite happy with how it turned out. Making a sword out of a chainsaw arm worked beautifully, and attaching the arm-cannons to the shoulder armor worked like a dream.
The main top-coat painting went cleanly too, thankfully, with minimal reworks and issues… good brush control and thinned out paints carried the day!
Now, what went wrong was the primer. I bought “wraithbone” primer, which is an off-white… and it turns out that off-white primers are rather tough to get right. Especially if you try to spray them when it’s below the minimum recommended temperature. The primer went on FAR too thick, and it dried absolutely disgustingly… which meant that I had to buy a 5 liter bottle of isopropyl alcohol, along with a toothbrush, and make an absolute mess of the kitchen trying to remove as much of the slopped-on paint as I could.
Thankfully, the iso was able to melt the paint and not the plastic, and so the day was saved yet again by slow and methodical work.
