Daboarder's How To's: DIY! SPORE MINES!

[daboarder]

Hey all,

With the advent of the new codex, and the still awesome biovores, combined with the even more awesome Spore mines clusters (great way of forcing your opponent out of an area, or forcing them to dedicate units to shooting them) I've been wondering how to get my mitts on LOTS of the funky things (I'm a big fan of spawn swarm lists).

We had that article recently and it sorts seemed redundant given that you still required a spore mine to do the conversion, so I sat down the other day and mucked around, ended up with a nice little method of banging our lots of nice unique sporemines quickly and cheaply.

It's so easy, and I'm so happy with the results that I figured I had to share.


STEP 1
Roll some greenstuff into a small ball, the sizes are up to you but I'd recommend to aim for approximately the size of a SM helmet. Allow it to dry for around 30-40 minshttp://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_180824_zpse990e0c7.jpg

STEP 2
Next roll out a number of long sausages of greensstuff, tapper the ends off to form long thin cones, they should aim to be around 2-3 mm thick at widest points and as long you want, varying between SM height and shorter.
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_180924_zps048b3e9a.jpg

STEP 3
Glue a piece of wire to the original ball, then take the "tentacles" one at a time and stick them to the underside of the balls. Twirl and arrange them around the supporting wire.

http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_181018_zps3e227b14.jpg
STEP 4
Using a pointed tool, press it gently into the base of each tentacle and drag them down and out, creating a stretched effect.http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_181510_zps24731c53.jpg

[daboarder]

STEP 5

Roll out a very long thin piece of greenstuff,
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_181628_zpsdf3bdd7e.jpg

STEP 6
Wrap the thin piece around the base of the ball where the tentacles meet, then using your tool press the outside edge of the roll down and smooth it into the ball, disguising the joint. Then gently tap the inside edges of the line, creating some indentation and character to the area.
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_182408_zps23242ecd.jpg

STEP 7
After gluing the wire onto an appropriate base, take another small green stuff sausage (a slightly thicker one) and press it flat against the top of the ball, ensure the material stays smooth.http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_185942_zps071766b3.jpg

STEP 8
Taking a edged tool cut an angled V shape into the greenstuff.
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190020_zps69fd688d.jpg

[daboarder]

STEP 9
Continue this up the roll of greenstuff until you have 5 "plates" (Because nids all have 5 head plates)
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190158_zps0b23dd68.jpg

STEP 10
Using your edged tool cleen up the first and last plate buy cutting the edges, if needed trim the edges of the inside plates.http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190329_zpsdaf01fdd.jpg

STEP 11
Taking a small ball of greenstuff stick it onto the side of the larger ball.
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190416_zpsc880f694.jpg

STEP 12
Smooth the edges of the ball into the body in the same way tat you did with the bottom line.http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190515_zps2fbb2ac5.jpg

[daboarder]

STEP 13
Taking a pointed tool, press it into the center of the ball, work the edges a little bit creating a hole.http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_190549_zpsfb54d4b0.jpg]

STEP 14
Repeat this a few times spread over the body of the spore, aim the vents gently towards the back edge of the spore mine.
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_191445_zps17e11bf2.jpg

STEP 15

Repeat this as often as required to create an almost limitless supply of spore mines. Mix them up by trying different body shapse, vent sizes and locations, heights and head plates.

http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_191933_zps609cde68.jpg
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_192005_zpsb62a6460.jpg

edit: Don't be too worried about fingerprints on the main body of the spore, they add a nice organic texture to the body of the spores.

[YorkNecromancer]

Now this thread? This is what this
http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2014/01/hobby-making-your-own-spore-mines.html should have been.

Good work.

[Wolfshade]

Yes, I concur.

Much more informative especially if you don't happen to have spore mines already.

[Slacker]

Nice tutorial! I think spore mines have the potential to make for some interesting strategies, a cheap threat that your opponent will probably want to ignore but shouldn't.

[chicop76]

Nice. Too bad I have a ton of those guys throw years of getting them free. Like gun drones with tau.

[chicop76]

Nice. Too bad I have a ton of those guys throw years of getting them free. Like gun drones with tau.

Is there any non stick gloves. I was debating on using gloves with oil with green stuff, to get rid of finger prints. I was just wondering what people die to get around the prints problem.

[daboarder]

there are, but I find the loss of fine feeling in your fingertips isn't worth it, usually the best way if just wet your finger and smooth out the area with that or a tool, as I said I didn't for these because I like the look.

Here's one I painted, very fun and quick to do.

http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_221142_zps397ce392.jpghttp://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_221158_zpsa1199cad.jpg
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_221204_zps1a2fe613.jpg

[chicop76]

[QUOTE=daboarder;389689]there are, but I find the loss of fine feeling in your fingertips isn't worth it, usually the best way if just wet your finger and smooth out the area with that or a tool, as I said I didn't for these because I like the look.

Here's one I painted, very fun and quick to do.

http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_221142_zps397ce392.jpghttp://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140127_221158_zpsa1199cad.jpg

Thinking about it. You should paint them up and than take them stem out and replace with a transparent stem and base.

[KrewL RaiN]

Is there any non stick gloves. I was debating on using gloves with oil with green stuff, to get rid of finger prints. I was just wondering what people die to get around the prints problem.

I use Nivea hand cream on my tools and fingers. You dont use a glob, just enough to evenly lube the tools.

As for those mines, they look nice and a lovely tutorial to boot.

[daboarder]

Thinking about it. You should paint them up and than take them stem out and replace with a transparent stem and base.

Yeah you could do that, or if you had some floral wire (I used paper clips so they're not too flexible) you could do a main tentacle around the wire, let it dry and then bend it.

I really want to try and throw up some scratch built mieotic spores too.

[Cpt Codpiece]

just what i was talking with my gaming bud about the other day, pretty much the same steps i was planning.

as for finger prints, good old petroleum jelly (Vaseline), just stab your tools in quickly and wipe off on the rim of the pot, as for hand working, again a tiny amount in the palm rubbed in stops sticking and cuts finger prints.

im allergic to nivea so not tried that, plaus less chance of animal wee in vaseline.

[daboarder]

Been working on scaling up this method to produce meiotic spores (really liking the idea of filling my FA slots with 2 Spore mine clusters and then a meiotic spore cluster just to maximize how many floating death balls are on the table.)

Heres the progress on the larger spores so far, the base is only temporary ans its the only one I had lying around at the time.

http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140129_071616_zps5634f110.jpg
http://i556.photobucket.com/albums/ss2/daboarder/20140129_071642_zps6138c13c.jpg

[Pauly Addams]

Great work :)

Gave me some insight into 'sculpting movements' so thank you for that