Servitor Scribes

**hwd** · 14-07-2011, 10:54 AM

Servitor-Scribes Objective Markers

I made these objective markers for my Space Wolf force and I reckon they are pretty cool, so I though I’d shared their construction process with all the other marine players out there who are in need of themed objective markers…

Bits

- Space Marine Ventilator Head
- Space Marine Torso
- Boltgun – I’ve chosen a space wolf one as these are to go with a space wolf force
- Space Marine devastator Heavy Bolter Backpack
- Chaos Space Marine smoke launcher
- Some thin wire (mine is from an old mobile phone charger)
- some paper
- paperclips
- thin (0.25mm) plasticard – not pictured

Tools

- clippers
- craft knife
- files
- drill with a 1mm drill bit for paperclips and another big enough to make holes for the wire to fit into
- superglue
- ruler
- and of course a cup of tea (the most essential bit)

STEP 1 – Prep
Very simple; remove the bits from sprues and clean up mould lines. Take a sip of tea

STEP 2 – The Torso

Stick the SM torso together as normal and clean up the join
Cut off the locating lug for the backpack and clean up the cut
Remove the belt buckle – no need to be too clean here, its going to get covered up in a tick.
So far so simple

STEP 3 – The Printer
The printer is made from the devastator backpack.

Firstly cut off the ammo belt and the bit of wire at the bottom. I found it easiest to carefully use clippers for this as they are quite chunky bits

Next we need to cut off where the ammo boxes meet the base bit – it is the base bit that will be the printer so be more careful with this bit! Clean up any rough cuts with a craft knife and files.

Now comes a slightly more difficult part of the stage. The inside of the ‘printer’ needs carving out so that it sits flush with the marine torso

See how before it won’t sit flush but after carving out it will.

Glue the printer to the front of the torso trying to keep it parallel with the line of the shoulders

STEP 4 – The Engine
The engine is made from the Chaos Space Marine smoke launcher.

Start by cutting off the triangle bit which makes up the support for the smoke launcher. On the back end of the launcher there are six raised dots, cut off all but the outermost two of these.

The smoke launcher now gets glued underneath the torso and behind the ‘printer’. The two small dots you left on should sit outside the belt on the torso towards the back.

At this point I drilled up from underneath into the torso to provide somewhere to insert a paperclip to use as a ‘flying stand’ ready for painting and basing later on.

STEP 5 – Armaments

Take the bolt gun and remove from the marine arm is necessary (wasn’t for me but I believe some bolters come attached to arms?)

Drill two small holes big enough for the wire where the hand should be up into the body of the bolter

Drill another hole in the left hand side of the boltgun if the barrel is facing away from you. This hole should be about 1mm in diameter as this is where the pin will go to attach the gun to the torso.

Drill a corresponding hole into the torso and glue in a bit of paperclip so it protrudes about 1mm from the torso.

Drill a hole into the back of the torso, for the end of one of the wires to attach to.

Stick the boltgun and a length of wire about 2cm long into place. The wire should go from the torso to the front hole in the bottom of the gun.

HINT – I learned this the hard way, it is far easier to glue the wire in place before attaching the boltgun to the body! Wires can bend, use this to your advantage!
For extra detail here I have added a few extra wires going between the ‘arm’ attachment and the gun where the gun is pointing out from the body to improve the look of the joint.

STEP 6 – Heads
A nice and simple stage this one, you ready…
Glue the head in place.

NOTE – I found that by this stage my cup of tea had run out and so I took advantage of the natural ease of this stage and made myself a nice fresh cup.

STEP 7 – The Paper
Cut a long strip from the thin plasticard. This strip should be less than a milimeter wide. Cut this into pieces about 2cm in length.
It is far easier to cut plasticard this thinly with a very sharp blade and a very good hard edged ruler. Make numerous low pressure passes at the cut rather than trying to do it in one go. This will give a much cleaner cut with a straighter edge.

Cut a paper strip about 8mm wide and not less than 3cm long. By handy coincidence, the lined paper I use has the lines about 8mm apart!

Glue the end of the piece of paper in the middle of one of the 2cm plasticard strips, then glue another strip of plasticard on top of the paper.
The overhang of the plasticard need trimming down at this point to just a 1mm either side of the paper. Smooth the plasticard off and to the bottom of the printer so the paper is hanging down.

The final stage in the modelling process is to curl the paper into an interesting shape and coat with superglue. This will harden and seal the paper to stop it creasing in a case and making it easier to paint.

I found the easiest way to do this was to put a healthy dollop of superglue on the paper and to smooth it out with an unbent paper clip. I suppose if you use superglue with a brush applicator then using the brush would be even simpler

STAGE 8 – Painting and Basing

Once the glue on the paper has dried all that is left is to paint and base your servitor-scribe.

I have painted them in the same way as my space wolves and based them using my urban basing method.