Dark Angels - Part IV - Bases

I've made some test bases to get a concept going on how I should base the Dark Angels. So far I'm into two thoughts. One is a dark wasteland swamp kind of thing, and the other is a more jungle inspired thing, a bit lighter in tone, green shrubbery and such where the other will have mostly dark dirt, a few dark/black plants, some dark wet areas and a few small patches of grass.

So I made myself a test base of how each of then could look. For now I've left the sides black, I might do the jungle variant in a different side color, but I kind of like the definition it gives to the base.

I took some photos of the base as they are, and some with my test miniatures on, when I do the real bases I'll match them a bit better for the mini that is actually going to stand there, and I'll probably do them with the minis on then to start so that then don't look quite as much as they are standing on top of everything.

Dark Angels - Part III - Ravenwing bike

I've been more than a bit slow this last month, both with painting and with posting here. But now I have another little part of my future Dark Angels army completed.
As I got the Dark Vengeance set about a week and a half ago, I just had to try to paint one of the bikes in the set, both to try the minis in the set, and to get a painting scheme to do my Ravenwing in.

I read about a technique where you start out with a gray base, and then use black wash to build up the color you want, getting a bit of highlights and shading all in one go. So I tried this and I have to say that I like the thought behind, and i believe it will work really well, I just started out with a gray that was to dark, so I had to get some standard highlights in after all. The next one will have a lighter base color so I don't have to do this. Other than that, I made the cloak the same way as I did it on the last robed marine, starting with a dark brown base, and then going though beige up to almost white. On the parchment I did go up to white, and had a bit more contrast between the beige and the brown.
The silver parts got a black base and straight silver with black and brown wash over it. I did highlight it a bit with the base color in some places, just to get it a bit lighter than with just the washes. I also left all the silver and gold details with a gloss varnish, most of the rest of the mini got a mat varnish over the gloss to tone it down a bit more.

Well that most of what I have today, I do have a few more marines standing almost completed on the painting table, but as I'm waiting for a unnamed online store to actually deliver what I have ordered, they are all missing things like arms, a few heads, some shoulder pads and weapons. So they will have to be photographed at a later date when I got the parts in and had time to complete what is missing.

Until then, here are some shots from different angles.