Wednesday, May 1, 2019

Palms, Steamboats and Forts


It's been a while since I posted here, but I 've made some progress in making terrain specific to the Nile theatre in 1885.

The steamboats are a little over halfway towards completion. They're a bit rough and ready, but functional. I need to add the wooden planks to armour them, and do something to represent the paddle wheels.


Reports from British officers and observers at the time of the Nile campaign mention Mahdist forts along the course of the river. Circular in shape with one entrance, they housed one or two Krupp artillery pieces captured from ill-fated Egyptian expeditions. I'd call them redoubts myself, but those on the spot called them forts, so forts they are. Being well protected they posed quite a challenge to the British/Egyptian steamboats passing upriver, so I needed to add those to the Mahdist arsenal. One is complete, the other half-built as was mentioned in some accounts.


And finally, what Nile scene would be complete without a few palm trees? These scratch-built versions are fresh off the painting board.



I may tweak their appearance a little to get a more feathery look, but they'll do for now. I'm not sure whether to leave them on the wooden splints and base them up likewise, or make a more random pattern on circular bases.

3 comments:

Fitz-Badger said...

Looking good! Some nice scratch-building on the boats especially.

Michael Awdry said...

My goodness me that's quite some scale you are working at!

A J said...

Thank you kindly, gentlemen! I figured that turning out a batch of boats at once mass-production style would get them done quickly. They could all have come off the same slipway. ;)

 

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