Archive for the ‘Terrain’ Category

8

If you search the net for walls in 15mm,20mm,28mm etc you will find
literally hundreds of companies that make them and in a huge amount of
varieties. Even so there is a conspiracy out there that thow shalt not make
or sell a curved wall. A do not mean a tiny curved wall but a long sweeping
20 degree curve of a wall. If you look at any pictures of WW2 gaming every
house has a straight wall connected to it, every factory has a square
compound so a straight wall can encompass it.
Even the narrow and winding lanes of the ancient bocage countryside that
were shaped by wandering sheep and carts supposedly wandered in straight
lines to ensure straight walls.
Noooooooooooooo, it cannot be true.

Up until now due to the inability of designers to mould in a curve and a quiet
majority of complacent wargamers who have ignored this strange conspiracy,
we have lived in straight walled world.
That was until (drum roll) the company called http://www.modelscenery.com/ invented Reddiprene38.

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Basically a hard type of rubber that can be cut with a sharp knife easily
and then shaped using a hairdryer for less than 20 secs into any shape you desire.
It stays in the shape you mould it into. There is no mess and you have lots of time
to mould it and fix it into the desired position.
The church wall in the picture below was moulded by me and each 200mm section of
wall took me about 30 seconds to shape into place. Its stayed that shape ever since !
Whats more that entire length of wall surrounding the church cost £3.40 and is
suitable for 15mm up to 30mm depending on how you cut it.

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Its so good I would give this product my vote for best product made for the
modelling community this year, perhaps this decade ?
So now you need never be driven around the bend by straight walls and forever
spiral in control(not out).

For my Infinity project I have been trying to get

the feel and atmosphere to a certain whaling station

called Leith in the South Atlantic. I have micro zoomed

in on a still standing building called the, ” The Managers

house” in an attempt to carry across some of the feel of the

place. Now its not exact(I am no expert scratch builder by a long

way) and I have used artistic licence but I hope its in the style

of Leith and what I trying to bring out in the terrain ?

The 1st picture below is the original picture of the “Managers

House”. All the pictures can be enlarged by clicking on them .

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It not yet totally finished and I have just placed it on

a bit of empty terrain to check its suitability. Eventually it

will be surrounded by scrap metal. Also all the roof sections

are easily removed so the interior is playable.

One thing I have learnt is that I take my hat off to scratch

builders as the amount of patience needed to build these things

is nearly beyond me lol.

Enjoy .

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I have been playing around with backdrops for a

while now and I decided to take the plunge and

create one myself. So off I went with my trusty

SLR camera and found some French-ish looking

countryside(to be honest a hedge in England looks

just like a hedge in France) and snapped away.

I then paid a princely sum of £10 and got the

picture put onto Matte card.

The pictures below are the result. Beware they are

quite big photos and if you click on an image it

will enlarge.

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So how did I get on. To be critical the trees in lower

section are too large and I should of stood back

a bit when taking the photo. The Matte finish seemed

good and I was pleased with the size(300 x900).

Overall it looks fantastic, especially when its behind

your models. I have been to a couple of wargaming shows

this year and as of yet I have seen nothing as good as this

backdrop wise, if anything at all. If you go to a model

railway show they use them to great effect but it seems

wargamers are missing a trick.

Anyway hope you liked them and perhaps it will inspire

a few more people to have a go.

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I have been concentrating on the rust and that is

where all my efforts have been going as to date.

Nothing is fixed in stone at this point and I`m

still moving bits around as I decide on what goes

where.

So far I have got the basic rust colour I wanted

sorted its just the fine detail that needs to be

completed.
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If I am happy with the rust effects nearer the end I will

do a quick tutorial on how to achieve it.

Like the small rusty bridge ? Can you guess whats it made of ?

More of an update than project movement. I am
still working on the first board and still not sure
where everything is going to go, but its slowly
getting clearer.
I will let the pictures do the talking :

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As you can see I have also been experimenting

with scratch buit rust covered corrugated buildings.

The test piece in the picture is have way through

the rust painting process.

More soon 🙂

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Another day and another terrain project on

the go. This time its terrain specifically for

the game Infinity and as per usual I`m going

to stamp my own interpretation on it. Now nearly

all the terrain I have seen so far for Infinity

involves modern Sci Fi type city areas. Yes the

game needs lots of buildings for cover but I think

people need to be a bit more daring with their terrain

and just imagine that not everywhere in the future will

look like something out of a Judge Dread film.

Somewhere I have always been fascinated with is a little

known place at the bottom of the world. Its called Leith

harbour and can be found on South Georgia. Specifically

I love the old whaling station which is still very well

preserved but slowly rusting way. One of things that

attracts me to this location is the fantastic rust

colours against the landscape and the vast amount of

various metal equipment that has been just discarded.

For me its the perfect playground for a fight and I

intend on basing my terrain on that environment and

adding a modern Sci Fi theme into the rusting arena.

Big picture of Leith below:

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Added to that will be a large amount of snow and ice.

I have recycled some 15mm Flames Of War terrain boards

and got straight to work. I aim to make the boards

(which are 2 X 2 in size) modular and will start with

four boards and then add more.

So far I am just working on board one which will be

a dock type area. The picture at the top shows the rough

layout with the blue representing the water.

I had to build up the edges of the board

with additional battens. The boat is 1/48 scale kit that

will be turned into a rusting hulk. It will be next to

run down jetty(which was a 15mm FOW Russian scratch built

recycled bridge). There will also be a small modern bridge

leading to a small island/sand bank which will also have

some modern looking bit of equipment on it. Perhaps the

radar of my recent diorama ?

The theme sort of goes along the lines of run down whaling

station to the casual observer but on closer inspection not

all as it seems ? Time to send out a 5 man Pano response

team for a closer look.

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I have now built up the dock area and added a balsa wood

wall. The white paint is just covering the annoying green

underneath lol

Next up will be the jetty and island construction .

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I`m done until I build some more boards and yes

I hear you all groaning… not more boards !!!!

No my next project will be some Infinity boards so

rest easy.

Anyway back to the Normandy boards. I have added and finished

two new boards to make a total of six for the playing

area(4 x 6). The latest two have a nice river obstacle with

hump back bridge. They also contain a fixed defensive trench

line and artillery battery area. The artillery battery area and trench

line are camouflaged to stop the allied Typhoons rocketing the

hell out of place.

Please note you can click on all pictures to enlarge

and some of the pictures are quite big.

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I have added a full Panzer Lehr Division and the British 11th

Armoured Division to the board so you can see how it all feels

to play with.

Arty preparing to fire.

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Target spotted.

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View from above.

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Look out the boss is watching.

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Life in the trenches.

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Ok whos walked mud into the trench ?

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British forces prepare to enter the bocage.

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Panthers trying to deploy in bocage.

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Panzer Grenadiers moving up to join the action.

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German infantry moving up.

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Panthers stuck in a sunken lane.

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MKIV in ambush position.

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Moaning minnies at home in the thick hedgerows.

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Halftrack traffic jam plus a bit of anti air.

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Anybody bring any hedge cutters ?

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Hold on, hump back bridge.

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Lost Panzer IV.

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JagderPanzer IV`s defending the left flank.

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Thankfully the sun came out and allowed me to take the

photos above.

I will post up a battle report soon to see how bocage fighting

pans out 🙂

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Click on any picture to enlarge:

I recently put myself down for a diorama challenge on

the official Infinity forum with the theme being ice and

snow. This is what I came up with.

It was my first play around with snow and ice type products

and I am very pleased with the outcome.

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Basically its a 1 x 1 foot board with styrene used to

create the ice shapes. To create the snow and ice I used Soft

Flake Snow from Woodland Scenics and the ice is WS Water

Effects. I added a few bits of left over parts to create the

small jetty at the bottom right and a scratch built power source

for the radar. The radar is a £3.99 ebay special.

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The Panoceania Fusilier has been slightly converted so

he is holding a range finder and I scratch built some skis

and sticks to give the impression he is on patrol.

The hardest bit for me was trying to blend the diorama into

the photographic backdrop and make it look seemless.

I will take some more pictures shortly to show more of the base

and a close up of the Fusilier.

I know, I know I`m still doing the Normandy board

thing lol. Its been on hold for a while but my

creative juice has returned and its back to the

grind stone. I have been working on a small river/

stream and its taken some time to get it right. I hate

the lovely blue rivers you get on most wargaming boards

and wanted something a bit more disgusting looking to be

exact. Thus I need multiple coats of varnish over lots of

greens and browns because that’s the colour of the nearest

stream to me.

Click on a picky to enlarge:

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Now I have got the basis of the river in place I can

start to work on the bocage around it. I hope to cover

a lot of the river with overgrown stuff so it really looks

like a silted up, stagnant , slow running river.

Loads more work to do on the trench section and gun battery pits

but that will be a lot easier to do than the river.

I seem to have slowed down as Christmas is crept up

and concentrated on the small bits of detail needed to

bring the battlefield to life.

More walls(you can never have enough walls), a water trough

and pump by Hovels, a well from Hovels, a barn from a cannot

honestly remember(I buy things and they sit in boxes for ages

and then I remember them but for the love of.. I cant think

where I bought them from !) and some crafty animal water troughs/

feeders which have come from a new spring of battlefield goodies

I discovered recently. The spring of goodies is the world of miniature

dolls houses and farm equipment and its huge and full of 15mm/20mm size

objects 🙂

Anyway I bought a couple of cow looking troughs and stuck them to

side of the building and a wall and filled them with Scenic realistic

water(I tried E-Z water 1st but was not happy with the result). Add on

some foliage and Bobs your uncle. I also scratch built a tap on the side

of the barn to feed the trough.

None of its actually finished yet but nearly there.

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Finally just got to say to everybody, “Have a wonderful

Christams and I hope Santa brings everything you want“. Failing

that do what I do every year,put your own presents under the

tree lol