Trees! More Trees!

One project which I have put off finishing for a while has been some forest scenery for my gaming table.  I used the 4ground forest bases link and some woodland scenic trees.  Basing was done with a variety of sand, flock, and grass tufts.

This is the large base, with a drunken 28mm Saxon warrior for scale.  He must have wandered in the wrong direction.  The nice thing about these tree bases is that the trees are on round 60mm bases that are removable:

Makes it easy for gameplay, and if you want to mix and match different trees, you can.  Speaking of different trees, I also finished two smaller stands of trees using the 4ground small tree bases.  Here is our hero in his continued wandering:

And with some of the bases removed...

The nice thing about the woodland scenic trees is that they have their own bases (which were glued to the MDF) from which the trees can be removed.  So, not only can I switch the tree stands around, I can remove trees from the bases and mix and match them if, for instance, I wanted to make a base with mixed deciduous and coniferous trees.  Unfortunately, our noble Saxon did not wander into such a mixed forest, and hence there are no pictures.  Hope you like them!

DeepWars Ruins update

Over the holidays and the past few weeks I made some progress on my ruined building for DeepWars.  I am pleased to say that it is now ready to be painted!

First, I added some encrusting growth onto the structure using a pretty simple method.  I spread carpenter's glue where I wanted the encrusting life.  Then I sprinkled on dental plaster to get it to stick to the stone.  I shook off the excess.  Make sure you do not touch it with your fingers!  You will flatten it and ruin the effect.  I then finally used a water mister to spray a fine mist of water to wet the plaster, allowing it to fuse to itself and the glue.  I did this in several steps - I would spray a fine mist, then come back 20 minutes and repeat that several times.  Wait until a few hours have passed before touching the plaster so as to avoid flattening it.

Next, I added some plating and branching corals to the top of the structure.  These used yogourt container plastic as a base, with greenstuff for details.  Pretty simple and self explanatory.

Finally, I based it on a piece of MDF board with some sand and rubble.  Hope you like it!

Closeups of the corals:

Some closeups of the encrusting plaster:

Finally, I had an idea to make coral heads to decorate this and other underwater terrain.  Ever see the sea sponges in the paint section at your local hardware store?  The ones used to make cool patterns on your wall?  Well, those are made from actual sea sponges, which when cut into smaller pieces, make for easy and passable corals heads for 28mm.  Here are some sample pieces, cut and dipped in a mixture of craft paint, water, and PVA glue.  They still need some shading and highlighting, but you get the idea!

As always, comments and suggestions welcome!

Mordheim Building Part 3

Back to Mordheim, more progress has been made on the building.  Broken timbers have been added, a door and more windows were gouged out using both the dremel with a round diamond bur (and some water to cool and clean out debris) and pliers to chip away the broken pieces.  I have also started to add debris around the edges of the main floor.  This was done using a base of styrofoam (to act as a filler), with bits of wood and broken plaster glued on top.  I also spread some glue on the bits of smooth 'snow' on the building, and glued crushed plaster to that as well.  When painted, it should resemble dust/ash/debris nicely.

Lastly, I also completed the inside chimney and fireplace using some Hirst Arts blocks.  It looks nice, but unfortunately to follow the outline of the outside chimney, you have to block a couple windows.  Design flaw there, I guess.  At least I can say I did not make the building!  Enjoy the pictures, its starting to look a lot more Mordheim-esque.

A bit of a closeup here, you can see the fireplace, and how the chimney blocks the windows:

Funny, the building looks slanted here.  It's not actually slanted.  Must be the camera angle and/or the way the broken timbers were glued:

A nice view of the now-missing front door:

Note the blocked window:

Some cracks and detailing from the dremel:

Feel free to comment or add any suggestions!

DeepWars Underwater Scenery

In anticipation of receiving my starter force for DeepWars from my local supplier, I decided this weekend to put together a piece of scenery.  I used blocks from Hirst Arts mold #65 - the ruined tower.  From there, I made just the base tower from the website instructions.  It turned out quite well, I should think.  However, this being a game based underwater, I decided it needed to have a bit more sealife included.  Work is not finished yet, but I managed to sculpt on some sponges, barnacles, and other encrusted sealife with some greenstuff.  I hope you like it, as I still need to sculpt more.

A closeup of the barnacles and sponges on the front arch:

Back view of the ruin:

Closeup of the sea life:

In addition to sculpting some more details, I also plan to add a thin layer of plaster over parts of the building to represent calcareous encrusting organisms, such as coralline algae and some small corals.  That will likely be done using some PVA glue and water, details of which I will post later.  I want it to have a vague semblance to something like this random internet picture of encrusting reef life:

Hope you like it!

Mordheim Building Part 2

Time for a small update for my small side project...

Yesterday, I took the dremel to the porcelain.  It was slow going, and quite loud.  I used a diamond-tip bur for the dremel.  I varied between a round end and a cone-shaped bur.  The round end to gouge into the porcelain, and the cone to widen the hole.  I ruined the round bur completely by the end of it - burned off all the diamond bits so its just smooth metal now.  The bur creates a lot of heat - you will quickly see the porcelain turn red where you put pressure on the bur.  I found that by getting an eye dropper and dripping water onto the site, it helped clear debris, and it kept things a bit cooler which I think helped it cut a bit faster.  It still took forever though.  I punctured through the porcelain in a few sites, then mostly scored out where I wanted to break, and it ended up pretty clean.

After gouging the wreath out of the front window, I had an epiphany.  Pliers!  Using some hefty needle-nose pliers, I was able to break out the other windows that had little holes in them for the light.  Basically grip the thin bit of porcelain between two holes with the pliers, and then rock the pliers back and forth to make the little teeth grind along the porcelain.  After a few tries, the porcelain chips and breaks away (always wear safety goggles!)

After cracking open the windows, I glued the big pieces back together, added some balsa floorboards to help reinforce them, and then I did a quick wash using diluted future floor polish (hence the shine) and black/brown paint - just to bring out some of the details and darken the mood a bit.

I think its starting to look a lot better!

 Next up, I think I will attempte to gouge out the front door, then it will be on to the interior detailing.

Mordheim building!

Onto yet another diversion, I recently stumbled upon a wonderful resource for building terrain - specifically Mordheim, ruined terrain.  You can check it out here: http://www.ironhands.com/mordheim.htm  - I would suggest adding it as a bookmark.  Now, what caught my eye was how the author used porcelain Christmas buildings in his Mordheim stuff - link.  Tis being the season of such ornaments, I thought it was a splendid idea and proceeded to scour the online classifieds for a good source of gently used porcelain buildings.  After a successful search, I returned home with three suitable targets.  Here is the first test piece:

I think the witch hunter fits in wonderfully with the serene, winter wonderland portrayed by this cozy little dwelling, don't you?  Also, I think the scale works beautifully.

After admiring the piece, I assembled a few of my more delicate instruments:

 Donning the glasses (safety first, folks!) I went to town trying to make a convincing ruin.  The porcelain is quite tricky to work with, as it is quite hard and tends to break in large pieces.  I managed to end up with this piece here:

I think its a good start.  I had hoped I would be able to punch out the doors and windows, but that seems like an impossible task due to the properties of the porcelain.  The building you see is actually 2 pieces, as it cracked down the middle.  That will glue together fine, but it gives you an idea of how finicky it is to precisely smash porcelain.  I  may have a go with a dremel and a grinding wheel (outside where my mess will not get me in trouble, most likely) or I might just leave it as is.  The inside will need some decorating - a second floor, wooden planks and rubble, etc.  I might try and add the inside of the chimney using milliput or something similar.  I suppose the outside of the house will be painted minimally - likely just some brown and black washes and some drybrushing, then I will have to base it.  The building cost me $5, so I think for the investment it is looking quite swell so far!

Comments and suggestions are welcome!

DeepWars Mini-Kicker ending soon!

As I type, there are about 16 hours remaining in the DeepWars mini-kicker!  There are still lots of miniatures to unlock, and you can get the product at a great discount off of retail!  The highest pledge level works out to about 40% off before any shipping charges (shipping is free in the USA).

The first stretch goal, the Dark Mariners Deepspawn Reaver Biomech already has some sculpting done, by the talented Bob Olley:

Looks great to me!  Here's to hoping we can clinch a few more pledges and unlock a couple more miniatures before this thing finishes.