Cutting Losses

Okay, once in a while, one has to admit defeat in some of his megalomaniac ideas.

Last year, I decided to give a hand to sculpting scenery for 6mm gaming, the first creation being a small fantasy style hut and have it casted up to a 1000 copies.

The general idea was to have those huts in the Crisis 2012 free goodie bags... and I then completely forgot to arrange something with the club board to have them in there.  This results now in me being here surrounded by about 1000 of those little buggers, taking up a humongous lot of space and not being used for anything at all, nor having the prospect of going to be used sometime in the foresee-able future (let's say, at least not until 2027 or so).

So instead of tossing them onto the garbage can, if anyone wants them, he can just have them and do with them what they want, the only thing I'm keeping is the painted one and the original green, as a kind of memento in this venue of wargames.

If you want them, you can either pick them up from my door, or I can send them to you, but mind you shipping expenses ARE at your cost and would come down to around 50 euros within europe, 65 worldwide + 5 euros for registred mail (which I always use on parcels this size).  They are in resin, so not TO heavy to send.

So if anyone wants to have about 1000 scenery pieces for free, drop me a reply down here or send me an e-mail.

Building an Arcane Fulcrum

About a month ago, a combination of several factors made me start dusting off my old chaos dwarfs again. At that same time, I joined the Chaos Dwarf Online forum, where I`d been a lurker for quite a few years but never bothered to register before. You know, one more forum to check up upon every evening etc.

That day, I also discovered a tread for what is called the Artisan`s Competition, edition 11, in which the participants build something / write something or the likes, and this theme was building an Arcane Fulcrum from the Warhammer Storms of Magic supplement. I decided to enter!

And then realisation dawned... First of all, I`mm all thumbs in building, converting, sculpting etc department. Second of all, I had one week to build, paint and picture something, so the race was on.

The idea I had was a geyser of magma upon which floated an obsidian platform.




The base materials I could rummage out of my bits and junk boxes for this where a pedestal from the old Klingon AMT bird of prey kit (the vessel I trashed to create a Pulp scenery piece for about 1.5 years ago), an empty package of a roll of silk tape, a plate of resin tiled roof of about 2 inch square and a new package of standard yellow grey Miliput I bought once (unnecessary) for a piece of home improvement works...



Once all this was added together, the `sculpting` part started with greenstuff, the idea being to sculpt on flames to surround the ring, and to add an idol of Hashut in the magma to break up the monotonous look.





The whole contraption was then sprayed black, so that can of Chaos Black that stands here for more then 3 years got some use as well. You see, I usually undercoat with a brush and a variety of colors depending what overall color the models have to become.



The first base color was painted on, and the lines for the obsidian / black marble on the ring added




First highlights are then added to the whole shaboodle. At this point, I read the Dreadfleet issue of WD detailing the lava in one of the scenery pieces, and I thought to give that a try to contrast more with the still hot burning flames.





The whole Fulcrum was then painted, the flames taking the longest time of the model as it where 6 colours over each other.




Steam was added to the inner ring, and the base sanded for painting. The rune of Clan Vongalazthag, a stylised `V` that represents a bulls horns in a kind of way topped of the tile on the top for the wizard to stand on during the battles.




The base was then painted gray with a lava effect to go with the rest of my army, and the steam got some black and red inks dispersed through it to make it look a bit nicer. With that, the whole thing was complete and ready to be entered into the competition.



It ended up in the end an unexpected 4th out of 9 entries, netting 2 votes (and I never vote for myself mind you, in not one competition), which is more then I expected. There where some awesome entries in the thing, the winner was well deserved (Who that was? Just head over to CDO then and admire it on the front page, it`s worth it I assure you) and I was glad to do a small drop for all the Dawi Zharr out there!

Ciao Ciao

Sculpting a hut, my very first greenstuff experience ever...

I decided today to tackle a new aspect of the hobby, after more then 15 years of wargaming... to start dabbling in greenstuff and modelling clays in order to undertake a hand a sculpting.

Now, mind you, if I say `very first`, that is as good as very first ever. I did some (perhaps 10 or so) small patch ups on models (a collar, a tad of hair, ...) on 28mm models, and that was hell, I`m really not good at / with the stuff. With new into it, I actually mean totally new, I have no idea about curing times, tools best used, that kind of stuff. So armed with a ball of two part greenstuff and my stanley cutter knife I settled behind the desk, Gundam SEED playing on the background.

BUT I need a heap of scenery for both 6mm and 10mm, so I guessed, lets try it again then and this time with a bit more patience then usual... if it worked, I might give it some more tries, if it didn`t... well... no harm done.

So what to build and what scale? Nuhu, let`s not start with any hard questions thank you, I`m starting out with something very basic, which I labelled as a `fantasy hut`, a round hut with a doorframe, tatched roof and a chimney was ambitious for a green with green.

So first up was a `tube` rolled around a piece of oval plastic, which I think long ago was a part of an Osprey spyplane` engine kit or something, and a small piece of plasticard to support the roof from imploding. A small strip was added for the doorframe, and a second ball of greenstuff on top to make the roof.



Then problems arose... I couldn`t hold the thingie without trashing it, so in came a cap of creamtube and doublesided tape, and we we`re on the road again. The roof was `bulged out` and a small block of greenstuff added to become the chimney, and then the detailing could begin.
I did learn one thing from the few repairs over the years, namely to keep fingers and knife damp, not drown it like I used to do.
I envisioned the house a bit like the old 19th century `blockhuts` style, with a wooden underside and then limestone walls, before going over in the straw roofs. Hey, I said I called it `fantasy`, just in order to
1. not lie awake about historical accuracy and
2. just to have more artistic freedom

Lots of knife strokes later, the little hut got finished, and I`m not totally unhappy with the result. I`m definitly not a sculptor I guess, but the most important thing, I really, really enjoyed myself doing it and i`ll definitly be trying more things in the future. That much in fact, I even might think of looking for someone to cast the green up and as such be able to scatter some of them around on the battlefield... so no painting the little bugger for now.




And what about the final dimensions? The hut is based on a 2x2cm plastic base, and is just under 2cm in height. This makes it van be used as a sort of storage stable in 6mm, but also as a small hut in 10mm, and I think if I linger a few around in a normal dark age / fantasy village, it isn`t going to look out of place that much... so in a way, mission accomplished!

Medieval Village

A small village `cd terrain` sized, made with greenstuff, plasticard and some small 6mm resin buildings by Gauthey Miniatures, for use with warmaster or Seeds of War