"Blackstone, White Cells" - Spindle Drones

The origin of Spindle Drones remains mysterious,
save that they are native to the Blackstone Fortress.
When destroyed, their bodies are reabsorbed
into the interior of the Fortress.
Transportation craft are rendered inert
when a Spindle Drone corpse is brought on board.

- Blackstone Fortress Rule Book

Hello friends of the Caesura!

After a few weeks of meandering through some recent Warhammer video games, it is time to return once again to the cyclopean vaults of the Blackstone Fortress.

Today we have some of the models that most attracted me to the setting when I first saw them: The Spindle Drones.

When I first saw them, I was really taken aback - they are so unlike anything we were previously used to in the 40k setting.

They also painted up really fast - almost too fast! They are a great example of models that I was so enjoying painting that I wanted to keep adding more and more, but I had to stop myself, because some of the power of these models is their simplicity.

On the right is just Grey Seer, the left one has a coat of Vallejo's Metal Medium

I wanted to keep their alien look with the paint scheme, making it so that you can't really tell what they are made out of. In the Blackstone Fortress novel they are described as being like the immune system of the Blackstone Fortress and there are some really horrifying scenes involving them.

From a Grey Seer undercoat, I gave them an all-over coat of Vallejo's Metal Medium. Because it is a medium, it is much more translucent than regular acrylic paint - perfect for this subtle, eerie look.

I then took a mix of 1:2 Contrast Black Templar : Contrast Medium and coated the whole model, being careful to move the paint around on their upper carapace so that it didn't pool awkwardly. On the lower body (legs and underside of the carapace) I then gave another coat but at a less diluted (1:1) mix.

I then went back and repainted the "eye", wires under their carapace and the little "eye-things" on their knees with Grey Seer and then white. These areas were then given multiple very thin washes of Druchii Violet, with intentional spillover onto adjoining areas for a touch of OSL.

I highlighted the carapace back with the metal medium and highlighted the centre of the eye with heavily thinned white.

There are two slightly different poses (most noticeable in the positioning of the cables) hence all these pictures of seemingly (but not quite) the same model:

I think the black background in my photos really emphasizes how otherworldly they are; hovering out of the blackness with their glowing cyclopean eye.