Under construction

Lighthouse

I have no idea why I felt like I needed a lighthouse in my terrain collection.  Maybe it could come in hand for some Victorian scenarios, or Possibly for Fallout.  Who knows, but I do like the model.

King and Country

First, I used Army Painter Leather Brown spray to undercoat the entire model.

Then I dry brushed the model with a light sand colour.

Once the paint was dry, I smeared on regular Polyfilla with my finger and then before it was fully dry I used a wet cloth to wipe away the excess leaving filler in the recesses.

Once that was dry, I picked out a few random stones in Leather Brown and a very dark, almost black.

Then I used a light grey wash in streaks down the walls to simulate weathering.

I painted the stonework around the windows in a rawhide colour and dry brushed over that with an off white.

Doors and woodwork were just painted in whatever browns I laid my hands on and dry brushed with a brown/grey.

I do still have some finishing off to do, and a few repairs to make, but overall I am pretty happy with how these are turning out.

Frozen Outpost

Once more a delve into builds of the past.

It seemed to me that just about every infinity table out there seems to consist of either shipping containers or full-on urban settings. Not that there is anything wrong with that and I too have a full-on city set up, which I will post pictures of too.  However, I wanted to do something a little different and include more natural elements.

So, after watching ‘The Thing’ and looking forward to its board game release I opted for a snow covered outpost.  Not Full-on arctic conditions but more like how I imagine places like Canada would look.  Apologises to any Canadians as I have never been to your country, I just have this image of large trees and white snow in my mind.

I ordered a bunch of terrain from sarissa precicion to build my proposed outpost / research facility.

I really like the sarissa stuff and have used it as a basic shell for other terrain builds and will continue to do so in the future.  It goes together really well, and the delivery time is excellent.

I knocked up a quick test piece to see if I was happy with my snow and ice theme.  Of course, I had to add ‘Unit 57′ somewhere.

For the snow I used a mixture of PVA and plaster.

The red stripe was to add a bit of colour and I rather like the contrast between red and green (the green will come from the trees).

Next, I marked out a quick 4′ x 4’ area on my work table to see if I had enough bits to make it look busy enough.   I added some simple snow drifts to add variety.  It became apparent very quickly that I needed more trees.  A lot more.

I was happy with the height of the trees as it helped break up fire corridors from the highest points on the table.

I used a simple white cloth to lay out the elements I had finished on.

Overall, I was pretty happy with the layout and love the contrast between the snow and the trees.  It’s a fun layout to play on but does has one minor drawback.  The white plaster powder does come off slightly if you rub the terrain so I probably should have put a bit more thought into how I was going to tackle that.  Also, I am not sure that I want to base figures up on snow textured bases, so it does really limit its use somewhat.  However, it was fun to do.

Roman Villa

A very simple Roman building I made when Gangs of Rome First came out. Oh how time flies by.

For this you will just need some 5mm thick foam-core, MDF for the base, some card and other easily available scraps. These buildings are heavily inspired by the Touching History series of books that are now sadly long out of production.

First up cut out a base of MDF and using Foam-core make the structure of the main building.  I found it easier to quickly sketch out the footprint of the entire building and then use that to measure out the lengths of each piece.

Once the basic structure was finished, I used cardboard pre-cut paving tiles, available from model railway stockists, to create the paved areas of the courtyard.

Next, I used PVA mixed with brown paint to seal the paving down and made the roofs by gluing corrugated cardboard to pieces of MDF cut to size.  The join in the main roof was covered with a barbecue skewer.

The walls were plastered with poly-filla.

The roofs were undercoated brown, and the walls undercoated white.

The roofs were then dry-brushed with terracotta paint and the walls weathered up.

A red stripe was added to the bottom of the walls and the paving was painted.

The base was flocked, and an insert created for the central courtyard area.

A water feature was created for the central area.

Which of course can be changed out to a garden area and a completely different side garden.

All up this was a very simple build, and the same process can be used to create all kinds of buildings.

Junk Town

Having done a large amount of scratch-building and having a great friend who owns a picture framing company I invariable have lots of Foam-core scraps lying around just looking at me and begging to be given new life.

Hence, Junk Town was born.

I guess these were just built on a whim and desire to use up some odds and ends and maybe have a use in good old fashioned Necromunda / Post Apocalypse style skirmish games.

Of course, being for skirmish games all the buildings come apart with removable roofs and layers.  In some cases, the wooden platforms can also be removed to mix things up a little.

Crusader Castle.

Another older build and also another Castle Build, something a little more substantial this time.

So, the plans for this castle I had found on the internet some years ago and saved.  I can’t for the life of me remember where they originally came from or what the castle was used for.

Again, I used foam-core covered in filler for the structure.   This time I sanded the walls a lot because I wanted a nice smooth texture, especially on the corners.

For the most part the roofs are attached and there is no access to the interior of the towers.  I have found that although having access is a nice feature it rarely sees any use in the games we play.  If we ever decide to place figures inside a tower, we can use an abstract way to represent it and remove the figures from the gaming table.

Having said that there are a couple of roofs that come off and I have added a little detail inside by way of shelves and trinkets.

I made the main gates lockable and of course fully functional.  The entrance to the gate will have two options.   An earth and rock bank and an alternative wooden scaffolding structure.  These would be interchangeable to allow a slight variation to the building.

The whole model was then painted up in a very light sandstone colour.

Motte and Bailey

Another blast from the past.  I made this a long time ago now, but figured it was worth cataloguing here.

I have a fondness for castles and was asked by a friend if I could build a Motte and Bailey for the Dark Ages.  Never one to shy away from a challenge I jumped at the chance.

First up the basic shape was drawn onto a piece of MDF and straight away I could see this was going to be a big build. (28mm figure shown at the front for scale purposes)

The main structures were built from foam-core and again the wood panels were added with balsa and stirrers, just like when building Sandringham.  Between the panels I used normal surface filler to create a more interesting texture.

I used high density polystyrene foam to create the earthworks and a mixture of Balsa wood and Coffee stirring sticks to build up the wooden sections.

I kept all the buildings removable so that they could also be used as individual towers if desired.

Roof shingles were individually cut and attached.  It’s a long and boring task but I find the finished result looks nicer than tiles made from long strips.

I used normal household paint from the local hardware store.

I deliberately left off the foliage so that it could be added to match the foliage used on the rest of the table.

The castle has a working drawbridge and removable buildings.  The main tower also comes apart to allow access to the interior.

The whole model is huge and really dominates the tabletop.  I’m still not convinced with how practical castles are on the average wargames table, but they sure are fun to build.

Bretonnian Display Board

The idea of this display board was to try to maximise the ‘best’ side of the Bretonnian models.  For these I think the best angle to view them at is actually from the side where you can get a better view of the shields, barding and banners.

So with that in mind I opted for a long thing display board in separate parts that would join together to make one scene.

I imagined the Army marching through a town in all its splendour with pennants and banners blowing in the wind.   The bright colours of the Army contrasting with the drab colours of the Peasants houses and of course the hint of a castle wall.