The Old Made New! Recycling old terrain pieces

Since I didn't have the time to create an entirely new river terrain piece for the next battle report, I thought it would be a good idea to find a way to "expand" the existing river piece.  

After watching a few documentaries on the Battle or the Boyne, I learned that even small rivers sometimes have very impassable terrain on either bank.  Marshy, boggy and bushy embankments that are almost more hazardous than the river itself!

So, I hunted around and found some old terrain pieces that I had made for another game system, which looked a lot like large old trees which were decaying in marshy, boggy ground.

While I was flocking the main ridgeline/road terrain piece, I thought I could spruce up these old pieces and see if they would work.

Originally, these were designed for a game system where figures could really interact directly with terrain.  That is why the whole piece is relatively flat.  However, that makes it perfect for this task, and by adding some bushes to it, it will break up the round profile and make it better suited for Bolt Action.

It will reflect the rough terrain that I want, but also offer more cover for entire squads.  The other game system had figures which were much larger, and fewer minis as well.

It didn't take long to have some nice greenery placed on the bases, which were old DVD plastic protective pieces.  Those date back to the Painting Pyramid video series, where I had to burn and label over 1300 DVD's!

Following the same process you have seen in the other foliage posts, I sprayed the moss with the water and glue mix through the misting spray device and added a few colors and textures.

The initial layers are done by mixing the fine, dark brown flock with the scraps of greenish flock, followed by lighter layers of fluffier green flock.  This will "shade" the plain bright green moss, almost as if you were painting miniature bushes.

You can see the difference this makes, especially when you carry the fine green flock up the sides of the trees like moss... ironic, I know!

I didn't forget to add my loose leaf tea "deadfall" however!  In the next post, you will see how this brownish color will blend in perfectly with the battle mat!

This piece is my favorite, as it is a tree that I sculpted 17 years ago out of wire and Sculpey!  Originally it was designed as a photo backdrop for our minis, but we learned right away that it was better to have a simple blue/white faded backdrop for that purpose.

I had ripped it off that 'diorama', but it had been damaged after many years of neglect.  I was almost going to toss it out, but I fixed it up instead and turned it into a terrain piece for another game system.

Now it has been reborn once again!

I really love how it looks now with the added flock and foliage.  In many ways, this is how I originally envisioned it... but didn't have the knowledge and experience that I do now.

So, let's have a quick peek at our handiwork...

I was amazed at the transformation of these pieces, which took less than 30 minutes.

Stay tuned for the next episode, where you will see all the new pieces combined for the brand new Ardennes terrain board.  I am almost set for the next battle in the series, "The Bridge to Nouvion".

Building a Bridge: Phase 2 Foliage

The second part of "big terrain pieces in a rush" brings us to the Badger Airbrush Stynlrez  primers, along with a few other shades.  Getting into all the crevices rapidly without damaging all of the details is best done with the airbrush.

The colors are not very important, since the vast majority of this will be covered with foliage.  It is more about setting up that foliage with some grayish browns.

I spent a little more time putting shades and highlights on the rock sections and tree stumps.  Again, various shades and textures of flock will go over the top of this.  Putting a number of layers of the primer over everything helps to seal it, and make a better surface for the layers of glue to adhere.

Now we are all set to get the foliage onto this massive piece, which is about 4 feet long.  I have done a number of foliage articles already on the blog, in case you wanted to put trees on yours.  

I have since realized myself that I can create separate tree stands that can be used for such things.

Using my wood glue and a touch of spray adhesive, I started to place the moss.  Once this is flocked, it really does look like tiny trees!

As I mentioned before, I wanted to leave some open areas for infantry to advance, but have enough clumps of trees for troops to hide behind.

If you recall my past episodes on the winter tree stands, I really fell in love with the dried out recycled loose leaf tea!  It has a great color already, and it makes perfect dead fall when it is slightly ground up.

If you are curious, it is a combo of Chai tea and Earl Grey. 

Once again, using the watered down wood glue in the misting spray bottle, as well as the spray adhesive, I placed my clumps, dead fall, and a few plants in strategic areas.

The magic of the flocking process begins!  Most of my flock (of all types) is from Woodland Scenics.

I have a number of tutorials on how this is done.  Here's one link for you:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2018/05/roadside-forests-new-tool-for-trees.html

In these images, you can see the difference that the flocking can make!  The bottom image has both sides completed, as well as the road on the top.

I mentioned in the first post that I was not going to sculpt in the ruts of the road, since I also wanted to use this as a hill or something else.  There will be some images in the final post that shows how I was able to place my smaller tree stands along the top of this ridge to completely alter its appearance!

When I saw this piece sitting on the table, I realized that in a matter of months, my terrain pieces have become vastly more realizstic.  They also take a fraction of the time to produce!

I was really pleased when I saw how this turned out, as I have a LOT more rocky/mountainous terrain pieces that have to be created for the Caucasus, Italy, and so on.  Those will present a whole new kid of challenge!

Balancing realism, playability and durability along with time and expense can be very tricky.  I think I have managed to figure out the best balance between all of them at this point.

You will be seeing this terrain piece in very next battle report, following up on Blood at Arras.  The British will be featured once again in a desperate retreat to the beaches of Normandy!

Here's the previous battle report:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njN4D64zH1k

I am still trying to work out the logistics of doing terrain tutorial videos.  These can get very messy, and a bit physical, so finding a place for the camera is not always easy!  Many experiments with a variety of tripods have been done... I have actually had to turn to some very old free standing photography tripods in order to prevent the camera shaking.

Anyway, there is more equipment that is needed, such as sound tiles, materials, and so on.  Any support that can be offered on the Patreon page is very helpful. Should the funding be available, I can even add in terrain tutorials as a pledge level!

www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

Building a Bridge: Phase 1

I wanted to try something new for the next battle report, which also required some new terrain pieces.  There were not many materials left (and not a lot of time!), so I had to turn to re purposing and leftovers in a pinch.

I needed to create a bridge over my river using at least one of the large corner ridge sections that I already had.  The two plastic bridge sections that I found on Amazon would form the structure, but it was clear that I would have to make a new raised hill section.

I gathered together every single scrap of foam that I could find to make a gradient that would match.  It also had to run length wise along the table, because this is mostly an "escape" secnario.

Using another piece of foam to create the stanchion on which both sections would rest, I was able to cobble together my scraps to make that raised section.

Another key thing to note right away is that all of these pieces need to be separate, as I want to be able to use them in other configurations... even other types of terrain!  You will see that all play out in subsequent articles.

Since there was no time to create a new, wider river as I had hoped, I "extended" my existing river by creating impassable marshy land around it.  I have seen this on many smaller rivers where the banks are almost more treacherous than the river itself.

This is where I would reclaim some very old terrain pieces, and some that I had made for another game system.  That will be its own how to article.

When I opened up my container of wood filler (which I thought was empty) I saw that there was a mostly dried out layer on the bottom.  After chopping it up a bit a palette knife, there was now some handy material inside.  Rocks!!!  These were not even completely dry yet, which was even better.

I made my usual glue and plaster mix, which would form the "sculpting" process of the ridge line.

After setting down the plaster, I could press in my "rocks", crumbling up the smaller bits into a cascade of broken boulders.  I was hoping to get the appearance of machinery had dug out pieces of the hill to create the gradient for the road.

At this stage I added more of the tree trunks.  While there is glue in the plaster, I did add some more to stick these on.  In this case, I want the four "new" tree stands to blend in with this piece, I am also thinking about the future where this is a defended ridge, and troops might have some cover via these blasted trees.

I moved along the terrain piece, making sections of my crumbled rocks.  This was also supplemented with some coarse, medium and fine gravel.

You can see how I am trying to build out the flatter bits of the ridge and make them look more interesting.  Once I added the gravel, I used a mist sprayer to apply a coating of watered down wood glue over it to hold it in place and seal it.

This is something new that I have added to the process since my original articles.  I think back then I used a brush with watered down glue.

I am not creating the usual tread marks in along the top, since I want to be able to use this piece as a ridge line that bisects the table (yes, it is almost 4 feet long!).  Eventually I do learn to build in as many uses for one piece as possible.

As you can see, not all of the ridge is festooned with boulders and tree stumps.  I am trying to break up the space, and also leave some room for foliage.  Heck, I also want to have some open spaces where infantry could be climbing the hill!

Phase two of the process will show how it was painted and flocked.  It was a challenge to work on the upper section of the road, as I had not tried that before.  In the end, I was glad that I took the chance to creating a multi use piece, as you will see.

I would really like to make some new terrain building videos, but more equipment is needed to do that.  I have purchased lights and other elements, but more are needed.  Any support on the Patreon Page would be most helpful in the endeavor!

www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

The Butcher of Rome

Not all of the street violence in Rome is caused by rampaging Gladiators.  Some of it is caused by the residents as well... like The Butcher!

He is one of the character figures from Gangs of Rome, an interesting new skirmish game from Warlord Games.  As you already know, I painted up a large batch of these figures for the big convention in Oklahoma City recently.

Since then, a host of new characters have been added for both the Gladiators and the Mobs.

As I painting this character, I chose to make the tunic look almost more like leather or some other heavy material, as opposed to the more delicate patterned cloth.  I tried to work in some greens and purples as well in the shadows, to indicate a bit of staining.

Of course it was very fun to do the blood effects on the mosaic bases!

Here's a link to the original step by step on the mosaic tile bases:

http://wappellious.blogspot.com/2018/05/mosaic-tile-basing.html

There you have it... someone whom you should not cross on the mean streets of Rome!  I will be making new step by step videos soon on Mosaic tile bases that will be available to my patrons.  The original Mosaic tile video is already available to those who do the $5 pledge:

www.patreon.com/JamesWappel

A New Matilda!

I have to say, it was quite interesting to work on the new Matilda "Boss" tank from Victoria Miniatures after painting two historical Matildas for Bolt Action!  While I was able to carry across many of the techniques onto this massive beast, I needed to make a few new twists, and some discoveries along the way!!

In regards to the Vallejo Metal Medium, that proved to be incredibly handy on all the weapon surfaces, as metallics were the order of the day on these.  

It was a material that I liked right away the first time I used it (I have a number of tutorials on that already), and since then I have learned more ways to take advantage of it.

In this case, I was mixing it with the Secret Weapon Miniatures heat paints.  It is a set of 3 (magenta, orange and blue), and I learned that those work best when combined with the metal medium.  

While the heat paints are quite thick, they are very translucent.  This means that the metals will really show through, making your heat effects look like part of the metals instead of something that was merely painted on!

I tried to come up with an insignia scheme that would be interesting, but also had a nod to WW2 historical markings.  Some of you will recognize the diamond, which is one of several shapes used on British vehicles.  There was also a very hilarious accident, in which I tried to replicate the unit type symbol frequently used on British vehicles as well.

If you notice the blue and red chevron/square shape, there's a letter 'V'  I did that because I have already done a variety of numerals elsewhere.  The colors of that square were used to indicate what type of unit is was (infantry support, artillery, transport, cruiser tank, etc,

Well, it was not until later that I realized I had emblazoned the vehicle with several "V" for Victoria on the Matilda!  Complete accident, I swear.

I also used some of the Green Stuff World leaf cutters to make a few leaves scattered around in the areas where debris might collect.  Lots of mud effects were done on the treads of course.  

This is just the first post in a series, because this vehicle comes with a TON or weapon options, including additional sponsons and even a different turret!!  Stay tuned for the next post which will show many more of these very cool options!

Meanwhile, here's a link to the store:

https://victoriaminiatures.com/collections/vehicles-and-bits-1/products/copy-of-matilda-boss-battle-tank