Digital Sculpting Sunflowers with Legs

I've had a nostalgic itch recently (which is funny because I didn't get into Warhammer 40k until like 2017), but I absolutely adore the camp, the kitsch, the genuineness of the older models. Unfortunately, they're insanely expensive, since, I don't know, they've been out of production for thirty years or whatever.

I picked Retro Tyranids especially, both because they're my faction (I love the space bugs. Grew up playing Zerg and watching Alien, and have some 650 points of modern Tyranids) and because they were so defined by the whims of whatever GW sculptors and artists worked on them at that particular moment. There wasn't a strong cohesive vision for the faction, which made them all look distinct and unique, suited to their role in the swarm hive fleet. Also they're goofy as fuck, which is wonderful.

I decided that my Bio-titan Heirophant was going to kick off a sub-brood of my Tyranid army - Retro nids! It's why I chose to redo it's weapons, in fact. But to go along with that, I'd need some mini-nids. What better than the coolest design (That even Games workshop seems to be returning to) for Tyranid heads ever put to pewter: The old "Sunflower" design.

So, I knew I don't have the fine motor skills and sculpting patience to make 28mm scale sculpts, especially not if I wanted three of them, all looking similar. So I opted for something I'm a little more practiced in, digital sculpting. I wanted to get them 3D printed, but that wasn't really figured out yet at this point. Instead, I just kind of went for it in Blender. I gathered a couple reference images from the web, including some very helpful (And not to scale) pictures of the unpainted parts from CCM. I sculpted the head in several different parts at high-poly, layering the outer crests onto a separate brain piece. I then sculpted one leg, one arm, one claw, and the body.

From there, I connected them together, adding material to joints and connection points so Blender's "Boolean" operation would connect them correctly. I also used the Mesh Deform tool to re-pose one of arms and legs, as if the creature was mid-stride. Or at least, not perching as awkwardly - but I also intentionally didn't want to make it too natural, since the original sculpts absolutely have an odd center of balance to them. I then decimated the sculpt in Blender to make it less high-poly, leaving me with my final sculpt.

From there, I wasn't sure how to print them. I knew I'd ideally want a resin print, since I've hear anecdotally that's better for miniatures. I looked tepidly at a few online services, but they were very expensive and focused way more on industrial fabrication, not 3 lil' guys. I also didn't want to put it on a storefront or have to upload it publicly, just in case. In the meantime, I made a few beauty renders of the model, attempting to make it look like the modern gray plastic, and the old-school pewter.

The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects.

But, fortunately at the same time, my local library was doing a demo of their brand-new maker space! I went and talked to some folks there about using their printers, and they were more than happy to help me out.

We plugged in a USB drive with the files (After a long search for one in my home - we just don't use those anymore) and uploaded and started printing. I was nervous, it was a 9 hour print and they told me to come back in a few days. It also cost me a grand total of... $4. Take that, GW price hikes.

And goodness, I don't think these could have come out any better! I had a couple thoughts about the sculpt itself, but the printer faithfully and in very high fidelity replicated my model! I think for my next digital sculpts, I really need to exaggerate details more; the subtle striations and armor panels didn't come through as strong as I'd like. And, I think more poses would be fun, even just mirroring the models so they're not quite so printed identical copies. But overall, a great success!

I've already got some more sculpts and models cooking up, as well as basing and painting these kitschy boys. Stay tuned for more sculpting, Warhammer and models!

- Miss Captain Bear