Henge and Bracken

I finished this henge model a couple of days ago, but due to technical issues have only been able to post the results now. So, with the vegetation in place, here it is...

The vegetation is made up of pieces of Spanish moss, mostly painted a dark green-brown, along with a couple of clumps of foam and coffee grounds painted a lighter green and dotted with magenta to represent flowering bushes. A little wet brush stipple work created the dandelion patches.

As Fitz-Badger commented, you have to get the scale right. This model works for 10mm and 15mm figures. Anything larger would find it a bit of a squeeze.

Hadafix the Druid gets down and funky in a private ceremony accompanied by his pet adder, Abernathy, a monstrous snake with a sweet disposition.

Watched admiringly by his wife, Sharon, Hadafix's descendant Father Unctuus blesses the pagan sacrificial stone to remove all that primitive ancestral magic rubbish.

Next up will be another scenery project from the Neolithic Era. Stay tuned...

Butter market built

So here we have it - one butter market/market cross.

I initially painted it grey to match the church, but found it looked too drab. Mixing up a light mustard-colour I repainted it to look like Collyweston stone, a variety of stone found in the British Midlands which varies in colour from pale grey-beige to honey-yellow. The grey paving slabs on the base were drawn on using a sharp-ish pencil.

Of course, now I have a market cross, I need a market place to go with it. I'm thinking of using a section of roofing shingle coated with vinyl adhesive then painted. Not sure if it'll work or not, but I'll give it a go.

In other news, I find I'm horribly tempted to get into yet another field of gaming - WW1 Mesopotamia. The question I ask myself is - do I need another period with troops in pith helmets supported by river gunboats?

A bit of a butter market project

Having finished the church steeple I found myself assembling what buildings I have for the ECW period to see what it all looks like, and thinking the small community lacked something. Most old British settlements have a market place, which features or featured a market cross or a structure sometimes referred to as a butter or corn market. Having a few hours to spare due to rainy weather closing down gardening for a week or so, I thought I'd bung a few Hirst Arts plaster bits together to make a butter market structure. Again, it's in the Gothic style, and for the sake of the narrative was probably build around the same time as the village church.

Here's what I have so far...

The two-step platform for the building is made of metal discs taken from orange juice and Pilsbury dough containers, covered by cereal card and edged with strips of cardstock paper. Hirst Arts components make up the roof and supports, and the pyramidal roof is more cereal card. I'll add a cross to the roof pinnacle like the one on the church steeple. 

Next step will be to paint everything which will be inaccessible once it's all glued everything together then assemble it.

Steeple

So here it is, the completed steeple, seen in place on the tower of St. Aimless the Confused,* parish church of Much Giggling in the Hay.

Those fine chaps of Sir Rick Astley's** Regiment of Foote guard the church from incursions by those naughty iconoclastic sons-of-fun, the Parliamentarians.

Each of the four faces of the steeple has a small window made from rectangles of coffee stirrer cut to shape and shaved into wedge shapes so as to fit the sloping sides. The windows were painted on. The stripes marking planks, tiles, slates etc. didn't make it through the painting stage but enough showed I was able to go over them again with a sharp pencil. The cross atop the steeple took a bit of doing. A thin strip of wood provided the bulk of it, with the two arms being glued to either side to present a flat profile. I inserted the end of the cross into a small bead, pushing enough of the stem through to go into the apex of the steeple. Once glued in place I painted it all gold.

* Patron Saint of the Permanently befuzzled.

** Sir Rick Astley's a thoroughly reliable officer. He'll never give you up, he'll never let you down...

Next project ~ SMSs Roon and Yorck

I'm slowly building up the forces for either side in the fictional/alternate history naval campaign set in 1906 between Britain and Germany. The next project will be the German armoured cruisers Roon and Yorck.

Roon passing through the Keil canal sometime in the first decade of the 20th century.

The pair were completed in 1905, displaced around 10,000 tons and had main armament of four 8.25" guns mounted in twin turrets, and ten 5.9" secondary guns. Roon took part in several actions during the First World War, including the raids on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby. Yorck was less fortunate. She took part in the raid on Great Yarmouth on November 3rd 1914, but on the return voyage she strayed off course in heavy fog and ran into a German defensive minefield. She subsequently hit one or more mines and sank quickly with heavy loss of life.

In the campaign both ships will be brand new and ready for service. 

The Small Bang Theory

Who doesn't like a nice model of an explosion? I certainly do, but I rather lacked anything of the kind in my collection. Small blobs of cotton wool look less than appealing for anything but a smoke barrage, so I made a set of shell bursts for gaming.

Mahdist warriors find themselves in the middle of a bombardment worthy of the Western Front.

I made them using an amalgam of Spackle filler, PVA, black craft paint and used dried tea leaves. Mix the PVA and filler at roughly 50-50 ratio, add a blob of black paint and a drop of water, work the tea leaves into the mess until it turns clumpy. Set aside and allow to dry (which didn't take long in this heat). Once dry, glue clumps of the material together using a smidge more PVA, forming the distinctive arbitrary shapes of shell bursts. Once dry, glue to a base of choice and touch up with more paint if needed. I let some of the natural tea brown colour show since it looks like clods of pulverised earth thrown up by the explosion. Work up ground cover to suit your terrain. Repeat if desired.

They work nicely for most scales. In 1/300 they're a sizable shell burst. In N-scale/10mm they make a small shell burst or a mortar bomb explosion. 

Those rotters of the BUF find themselves in the middle of drastic landscape rearrangement.

I hope - with luck and a following wind - to game the Battle of Abu Hamad tomorrow. Fingers crossed...

Inigo Jones and the...

Two posh houses? Doesn't exactly trip off the tongue, but it's a way of saying I've finished the two Jacobean houses I've worked on this last week. Results shown below.

Not too shabby I think, although once again I should probably keep off the coffee before doing any fine painting. I managed to capture the overall look of the Jacobean style. As I mentioned in a previous post, some details had to be omitted due to being too fiddly or delicate for a gaming model. The roofs with the variegated shades of brown and brick-red tiles typical of the period worked. So did the classic 'crow-step' gables.

The chimneys are a bit oversize to give the impression of imposing height to the structures without adding to the tabletop footprint. Antique white craft paint represents the pale limestone used by the architects of the time for window bays and porches, and to pick out the edges of walls, gables and chimneys. I painted the porch columns and entablatures in white so they stand out a bit more.

Next up I'll make a gatehouse or two for the walls I made earlier then I'll get it all on the table for an actual wargame.

A Touch of the Jacobeans

The late medieval/Tudor house is finished, so I thought I'd add some more up-to-date buildings to the ECW village in the shape of two Jacobean houses. The style preceded the ECW by a couple of decades or so, and look quite different from the half timbered/fachwerk* style of the previous century.

I've got the bulk of the painting done, settling on the characteristic Jacobean warm orange-red brick. It's a little too hot in appearance, so I'll probably tone it down a bit with a yellow-brown wash. The window bays and doorways are antique white as these were usually built from pale coloured stone.

Just the windows and doors to do. I'll omit the style's more fiddly detail since these are working models for the gaming table.

Speaking of gaming... I hope to run a solo ECW game sometime this next week. My table has been up and ready for months yet I haven't played a game on it. With luck and a following wind, I also hope to visit family and friends in Britain either next month or November, at which time I'll retrieve a load of figures, models and books which have languished in storage since I emigrated. 

*No, not a 1980's German technopop band. Rather the German name for the half-timbered style.

New Girls of the SWA

Real life got in the way at times these last two weeks, although it's always a pleasure to cook in my own kitchen after waiting so long for our place to become available. (Dutch-style brown bread is baking even as I write). I even like to do various fixes around our new home - obstinate bathroom cabinets notwithstanding. This weekend just gone we did get to attend Cleveland Concoction, a nice SF/Fantasy convention at a new venue in Aurora, Ohio, finding the place without trouble even though a sudden blizzard descended on the area. The 'Lake Effect' snow stuck around all weekend, but by the time we left it was in bright sunshine.

I did manage to finish the VBCW 10mm figures for the Socialist Women's Alliance (SWA) platoon today. Although I'm not the world's greatest figure sculptor and my painting skills seem to have atrophied over the last few months, I think they look okay.

From left to right, back row - Medic with patient: 2" mortar crew: Two Lewis gun teams. Front row, left to right - Four riflewomen: Boyes AT rifle.

The figures are crafted from Sculpey and the teams are mounted on fender washers. I covered these with liquid nails and pressed dry tealeaves into the soft glue, letting it harden overnight before giving it a blast of 'Holly green' aerosol paint and finishing with wet-brushing on lighter green craft paints.

This addition makes up the numbers to two full sections, ready to take on all comers.

Then there's this...

My sainted brother-in-law left a toolbox behind after one of his visits. He does that kind of thing. He's a nice guy, but he'll vanish over the horizon following a family visit and afterwards we'll find a few boxes, bags and other bits-and-bobs that he 'forgot' tucked away in obscure places. I suspect it's his way of craftily de-cluttering his house at the expense of our living space.

But I digress. During the move I noticed a toolbox stuck in a corner of our spare bedroom. When I picked it up it sounded like it had a few things rattling around inside, but I didn't have time to investigate, just sticking it away in a space on the van and leaving it in storage with the rest of our stuff. Yesterday I came across the toolbox in our garage where the moving men had left it. I opened it and - found another whetstone.

*Head Desk*

AVBCW Sculpey session

A change of pace from Dux B now. My Sculpey had been in long-term storage along with all my other modelling stuff and I wanted to see if it was still usable. It is. What to sculpt? Well, I have been mulling over an idea for a Chain of Command ladder campaign based on a VBCW scenario located near my old home town. The stalwart ladies of the Socialist Womens' Alliance (SWA) are due to hold an area close to the River Bure which will see an attack by the local Flegg Fencibles LDV.

My current batch of SWA figures are based on 10mm Pendraken Miniatures SCW milicianas, of which there is only one pose. I bought a pack of ten, and converted two Home Guard figures to a female leader and standard bearer with judicious use of Sculpey and PVA adhesive.

The lack of poses posed something of a problem so I sculpted some additions for the force, making it up to two full sections with support weapons. Luckily the milicianas wear utilitarian overalls which are not hard to sculpt. The basic result is shown below.

From l-r, 2-inch mortar and crew, two prone riflewomen, medic with patient, Boyes AT riflewoman, two more prone riflewomen, and four Lewis gun pairs with spare ammo drums.

These are still a work in progress. The figures have been baked, and the next step will be to add some weapons, belts, ammunition cases and so on.

Yes, I need more temptation...

I need more temptation today! 

Those fine fellows at Pendraken Miniatures have released the first photos of their upcoming Indian Mutiny range. The first batch back from the sculptor are the greens for the Indian contingent and very fine they look too! If you're interested in gaming the period in 10mm, take a peek.

I can see an order winging its way to Middlesborough next year. As for rules, I read good things about the Bloody Big Battles (BBB) set for late 19th century gaming. Do any of my readers have experience with these they can share?

Pendraken announces new Indian Mutiny range.

The Storming of Jhansi.

Those lovely chaps at Pendraken Miniatures have announced the master list for an upcoming Indian Mutiny range. This is a period I've had an interest in for some time, but never got around to it as other periods demanded attention. The release date is sometime in 2018, hopefully before Salute. 

ECW casualties

I spent much of this morning getting the garden tidy so we can leave it in good condition when we move out. It's a little depressing, seeing all the plants we've established in the time we've spent here coming into full healthy leaf and knowing some will be left behind - especially when we suspect the person buying the house isn't a gardener. We will be taking a number of plants with us, and hopefully we'll have time enough this year to establish a garden in the new place. Fingers crossed...

So, enough of that. On with a bit of modelling stuff. Having some time off this afternoon I thought I would paint up the 10mm/N-scale ECW casualty figures I cast recently from resin. The pieces have been washed thoroughly and have had plenty of time for any remaining volatile vapours to disperse.

Top two rows, from left to right: Sir Alan Apsley's, Earl of Essex's Lifeguards, Bolle's, Montagu's, and a quartet of Parliament cavalry. The bottom four have yet to be assigned.

I painted up two figures for each of my current foot regiments, and enough for the (eventual) two regiments of Ironsides. Royalist cavalry casualties are to follow.

In the Victory Without Quarter rules, a casualty marker is placed if a unit suffers three hits from firing in a single turn: It represents a significant amount of metal tearing through the formation. Once the number of casualty markers equals the number of bases in the unit, that unit is destroyed. Since my foot regiments have three bases, any markers over two are redundant. In a similar vein my cavalry regiments have five three-figure bases, so any casualties over two are a major depletion in strength and the regiment is destroyed.

Bases and Casualties

Our house is all but sold, and we will now need to pack in earnest. At least the weather is warm enough for me to paint, so I took the Dux Britanniarum bases and ECW casualties outside and gave them an undercoat.

I used the same dark brown Rustoleum spray paint that I undercoated the livestock pen with earlier as I find it sticks better to the resin. The coverage is patchy - the nozzle decided to clog up partway through the session, but at least they're all covered. The next step, whenever that will be, is to do the grass effect and so on for the bases, and paint the uniforms for the casualties.

I'm really not sure when I'll be able to post again, so I'll sign off for now. 

Showing moldy results

Success! The new molds came out with few problems worth the name. First up are the wargame-oriented molds. From left to right we have the Dux Britanniarum movement tray, the three 10mm ECW casualties, and the five Zanzibari slaver casualties.

The next is the 1/56 lamppost mold in its freshly-molded form showing what I call the "nougat" bar effect where the silicone met the Sculpey...

 ...then the separation of silicone mold half and Sculpey, showing the master in the mold and the lugs which will keep the two halves aligned. The next stage for this will be to clean up the Sculpey residue where it's sticking to the silicone before installing it in a new box. I'll put another plug of Sculpey in the recess at the base to form the pour funnel. After that I'll brush Vaseline over every part of the new mold half with the exception of the master. As I mentioned before, if this stage isn't done the next pouring of OOMOO30 will stick to the other half and it'll be a helluva job to cut them apart. I speak from hard-won experience...

Last up is the pair of molds which I'll use mainly for decorative items, although the doors, window and column can be used for making buildings for gaming. On the left is the new bookend base, and alongside it is the decorative piece mold.

The latter is the only one so far that has any appearance of bubbles. These lodged in the two chevron pieces on the left of the mold. They won't really be a problem since they're proud of the main surface of the piece and can be trimmed off.  You'll notice some of the OOMOO30 flowed under the diamond-pane window piece bottom-right, but this will trim off without any problem.

In fact all the molds now need to be trimmed in various ways. Silicone tends to climb up the sides of the mold box through capillary action, making the base of the mold uneven with a detrimental effect on the casts. Trimming this off even to the point of beveling the edges solves the problem. A few of the Zanzibari slaver casualties will need cleaning up as the OOMOO30 flowed under some of them. A couple of the masters also broke up when I popped the new mold off, but this is par for the course. I shouldn't need them again.

After all is clean and trim, I'll pour some plaster and/or resin. Results to come!

Autumnal ECW action - Much Piddling in the Woods

That stern Puritan General Temperance-and-Prudence-Shall-Be-Thine-Watchwords Knott raided deep into Royalist held territory. He brought fire and sword to the Malignant believers in the Divine Right of Kings, smiting them hip and thigh, even. Now, with Autumn drawing on, Knott's on his way back to friendlier climes and winter quarters in the bucolic village of Much Piddling in the Woods - but the Royalists are snapping at his heels...

...Or they would be, if Sir George Moutebank can persuade them to get their act together.

The scene of the coming battle. Autumn's spreading her golden gown.

A goodly beginning for Parliament. Knott leads Montagu's regiment of foot on the final straight to the village.

Sir Allen Apsley's regiment of foot make an appearance on the south road. Now the race is on.

Sir John Norwich's Regiment of Horse gallop by to screen the troops on the road.

Their counterparts, Sir Chas. Gerard's Regiment of Horse gallop up.

Eager to confront the upstarts, Sir Charles forms his regiment into line.

General Knott peers at the oncoming Malignants through his spyglass. Knowing he's almost certainly outnumbered, he wonders - Will I have time enough to reach the village and safety?

Sir John's and Sir Charles' regiments square off against each other. Much Piddling in the Woods lies in the distance beyond the river.

Sir John's regiment begins a caracole maneuver against their rivals. Hits are scarce, but the overall effect is unnerving to the Cavaliers.

In the distance General Knott leads Montagu's regiment beyond the crucial bend in the road between the two woods. Whatever happens now, his infantry should be safe. The artillery follows on at a more leisurely pace.

The caracole continues to baffle the Royalist horse. Sir George Mountebank joins his cavalry and tries to get them to charge, but to no avail. Impatient at the delay, Sir Allen Apsley's regiment moves past the cavalry's flank.

The stalwart pikemen of the Earl of Essex's Lifeguard formed the garrison of the village. They welcome their comrades as Montagu's regiment passes over the bridge. General Knott peers through his spyglass back down the road. His cavalry are doing good work, but may need guidance. 

Finally, Sir George persuades the Cavaliers to charge...

General Knott joined his Trotters just in time to encourage a gallant counter-charge.

A bloody encounter ensued, to the detriment of the pusillanimous Royalists. (The red token denoting a Hit is about to be replaced with the deadly white token denoting a Casualty). 

Montagu's regiment lines the churchyard walls. The tardy artillery make their way over the bridge. Much Piddling in the Woods is safe for the army to winter in.

Eschewing the caracole, Sir John's regiment gives their opponents a good pistoling. Although the Royalist artillery and Bolle's regiment of foot fume at being screened by their own horse, Sir Allen Apsley's regiment is about to alter the equation.

The right flank sleeve of Sir Allen's regiment gives fire against the Parliamentary horse, causing some damage.

General Knott decides discretion is the better part of valour and leads his horse away down the road to the village. A triumph for Parliamentary arms!

* * * *

All figures are 10mm Pendraken Miniatures. Fought to Victory Without Quarter rules, the game was noteworthy for the amazing number of poor dice rolls on the part of the Royalist cavalry. Even the presence of their C-in-C wasn't enough to persuade them to charge for several moves (There's not much that can be done when the dice score fails consecutively to rise above 4!). When the Malignants finally managed to stagger into a charge against their rivals, the Ironside 'trotters' previously held in such contempt handed the Royalists their flowing-lock'ed heads to them on a platter.

The cards were drawn at random, and the sequence favoured Parliament quite enough in the first few turns to make their reaching the village with most of their force intact a certainty.

It was a quick, fun game, and gave me the chance to put my new Autumn-foliage trees on the table. I hope to be able to add to the ECW forces in the next few weeks. Watch this space...

The Earl of Essex's Lifeguard pikes.

What it says on the tin. I painted these pikemen on and off during the week, and they're now based and ready for action.

Of course they lack the 'sleeves' of musketeers that form up on either flank, but they'll serve for now. It illustrates the problem of buying multiple figures in packs - there are always figures left over after the units have been assembled. I get around this to some extent by varying the number of figures in a regiment. It gives the randomness found in unit strengths of the period where recruitment was inadequate, and losses through battle or, more often, sickness had accumulated.

Lazy Sunday

A thoroughly disturbed night means I'm feeling too out of it to do much today, although I'd hoped to run a solo ECW game featuring my new Autumn coloured woods. Instead I dug out a batch of Pendraken Miniatures 10mm armoured pikemen left over from the previous painting session and set them up on the painting block.

These chaps will form the pike companies of the Earl of Essex's lifeguard. I don't have enough musketeers to form the requisite 'sleeves' of shot at the moment, but should be able to get them when I place another order in a month or two, all being well. In any case, once painted these chaps will go to reinforce the Parliamentarian army of General Temperance and Prudence Knott, stalwart champion of Puritan values against the dastardly Royalists under Sir George Mountebank.

Teasel Trees - Finished

'tis Labor Day here in the USA, and I'm staying out of the sun after suffering rather nasty sunburn on Friday. Instead of gardening I spent time putting the finishing touches to the teasel trees I've had under construction for a week or so.

Expanding foam is extremely sticky. I used it to bulk out the teasels and provide good adhesion for the flock. As an experiment I also used it on the bases to see if it would work there too, and it came out better than I hoped.

I flattened the foam down on the bases with a wooden splint and spread it around a bit before it began to harden. The foam still expanded after I shook flock on it, and provided an unexpected benefit when some parts began to swell up and look like rounded boulders. Once all was dried/set I painted the bases, and the final results are shown below.

Overall I'm quite pleased with them. I still have another nine large trees to complete, along with fourteen smaller versions which I may make into orchards.

Once everything is done I'll trot out the ECW armies of those perpetual foes, Sir George Mountebank (Royalist) and Temperance-and-Prudence Knott (Parliament) for an Autumn encounter action. Watch this space...

Teasel trees - Experiments in Colour and Shade

A little more progress on the trees. I opted to use craft paint in the end as they give much more variety in colours and shading than spray paint. They also don't stink up the place, which is important since I have family members who are allergic to the propellants used in spray cans.

I used a variety of acrylic paint and mixed acrylic ink into some of them. A few times I wasn't too fussy about thoroughly washing the brush, so there would be some bleed-over of the previous colour into the foliage to give an extra shading effect.

The flock absorbed a certain amount of the first coats of paint, rendering them darker, but the next stage will be to wet-brush lighter shades on them to bring out the vibrant Autumn colours. The trunks and bases will be the last step.

I'm quite pleased with the overall effect, although the Woodland Scenics foam-covered versions aren't as good as I'd like. I'm going to try out a bit of acrylic inking to see if I can jazz them up.