More Armoured Bear!

And he's bringing some goat cavalry with him!

Are they trying to say something about Scots?

"Highland Ram Raiders," indeed!

  These are from West Wind Productions's Dwarf Wars line. Not something I would normally peruse, but I saw one elsewhere and went looking. Pretty cool figures. Makes me want to build a non-Citadel Warhammer Dwarf army.

  These photos come straight off the West Wind website. Andy, if you want, I'll take them off the blog, but they're really cool.

Interesting New Product for Builders

Litko has these in the Jim's Lab area right now. Strips of pre-made plywood shingles for buildings.

They are almost a foot long per strip. Five patterns to choose amongst.You get ten strips for $11.99.

Historicon 2011 Purchases, Final

   As I may have mentioned before, Historicon is a great place to buy toys. Most of the major vendors are there, or at least their US representatives for the manufacturers across the waters. Except for Eureka. Nic comes over from Australia. I think it is because he likes to wear silly hats halfway around the globe from home. Anyway, between the dealers and the flea market - pardon me, "Wally's Basement", there's always a lot of stuff to spend your money on. And so, the final rundown, adding on to those things I have mentioned already (i.e., not including them).

• 2x Car Wars turning keys
• 3x Monsterpocalypse buildings - for BattleTech
• Empire Helblaster Volleygun - another Dane bargain
• Woodbine British Section (10 regulars in caps)
• Woodbine Vickers HMG (4 figs)
• Musketeer Minis VBCW "Toff and Gentleman's Gentleman" (2 figs)
• Musketeer Minis VBCW Militia Standards (3 figs)
• Musketeer Minis VBCW Militia Boys ATR Team (2 figs)
• Parroom Station (?) Martian "Holy Man"
• 6mm Government Building (ptd.)
• Fight's On! Suez Canal set
• 2x Tactical Conflict Systems 6mm buildings
• JR Miniatures 12"x12" cobbled square
• Small plastic "Welsh" dragon
• 1 toy dinosaur (Dimetrodon, actually)
• 8x BTD Viking Berserkers
• 18x Asst'd crocs and lizards from Iron Wind
• 8x Eureka Frogs with Muskets
• 13x 6mm Les Batiments Railway pieces
• Les Batiments factory
• Les Batiments power house
• 7x Parroom Station Clockwork Soldiers ($8!!!)
• 2x Parroom Station Tatsuhiro Mechanified Infantry Suits
• Prof. Moriarty and Dr. Loveless
• 20x small fern bushes
• 2x 6mm boats
• 3x Foundry Victorian ladies
• 10x Foundry DA Sikhs
• 1x RAFM Sailor dropping timebomb
• 4x converted Martian marines
• 6x RAFM Martian shield gunners
• 1x RAFM High Martian
• 40K Vostroyan Mortar team (2 figs)
• 1x 15mm limber
• 1x Eureka Turtle Cavalryon Alligator
• 2x BTD Crocodiles
• Package of 1"x1 1/2" metal bases
• Pulp Figures Seebattalion Maxim (4 figs)
• Pulp Figures Seebattalion NCOs (5 figs)
• 2x Vallejo paints
• 3x Army Painter basing materials
• 4x random bits
• 16x Small rock formations (orig. islands for POTSM)

   And I think that does it. I still did not find everything I was looking to purchase. But I spent my money anyway. I should have held on to some of it for eBay purchases, but what the heck. The total makes it to just over 300 figures of various scales (mostly 25), plus 65 terrain bits, several books, and a few generic supplies. Wow.

RTV Purchased

   I bought this past weekend the first RTV I have ever had.

   For those of you who don't already know, RTV stands for Room Temperature Vulcanizing. It's a silicone rubber material used to make molds for casting resin, plaster, etc. It generally can NOT be used for lead - the temperature is too high, melting the mold. I believe there are some types that can handle the high heat, though.

   What I got was a Smooth-On product, called OOMO 30, IIRC. It mixes in equal parts by volume (easy!). I have read good things about it on the internet, at TMP and other places. Found it at a local art supply store.

   So, obviously, the plan is to sculpt up some items, make molds, and get to casting. Some of these things will be scenics related, so I thought I would mention it here. Specifically, I want to create some doors and windows to be attached to buildings, in both 15mm and 25mm scales. It is a pain to try and scratch build them each time, so I am going to try and create some good masters to cast from. Might make some railings, chimneys and such, too. Start simple before trying something ambitious.

   Anyway, wish me luck. I have a nasty feeling I am gonna need it. When I get a space cleared to work on it, I'll get to work. Hopefully, pictures and such will be involved as well.

Not Dead Yet!

Really... the blog isn't dead.

It's just that I haven't done a darned thing terrain wise in a month, unless you count buying one piece on eBay and picking up a few interesting bits of plastic that were laying around.

I have found a possible source for one piece of terrain I have been wanting to buy: the Cryx Necrotite Mining Rig for Warmachine. Now, I don't actually play Warmachine, but the piece looks just about perfect for my VSF gaming universe. Necrotite is a glowing green substance, and I have this stuff I call handwavium, which is used to create a chemically induced heat source for steam power, without needing oxygen. Perfect for long space flights - pardon me, aether flights - don't you agree?

Anyway, this rig looks just right for a large experimental handwavium reactor, or maybe a power supply for a small town, fort, secret laboratory, or what have you. I'm leaning towards secret lab, myself, waht with Herr Doctor Maton running about on Mars and all.

The other development is that I have begun looking into a supplier for a custom made Martian terrain gaming mat. Theterrainguy.com looks rather promising, and I have been in email contact with him. He thinks he can match up to my hill coloration rather closely, which would be great. He's also a nice guy and a fellow Texan, so there you go.

More later this month, I promise.

Interesting Stuff...

I have been searching for bits and pieces here and there for an aerial flier project, and while doing so, ran across some interesting things. I thought I'd share, in case anyone else is interested in the same sort of oddities.

These fellows make Cthulu-esque terrain pieces. Go to the bottom of the page, but check out the rest of their stuff, too. Its pretty neat. I wonder who carries them in the US?

http://www.monolithdesigns.co.uk/gothic_horror.htm

If you are in a hurry, and want nice looking stuff that's reasonably cheap and super quick, check these fellows out: http://www.worldworksgames.com/store/. They sell paper terrain that you download, print on cardstock, fold and place. I don't have any, but the pictures are nice. And if it gets crushed, chuck it and print a new one - nice!

Anyway, check it out!

Interesting Stuff...

I have been searching for bits and pieces here and there for an aerial flier project, and while doing so, ran across some interesting things. I thought I'd share, in case anyone else is interested in the same sort of oddities.

These fellows make Cthulu-esque terrain pieces. Go to the bottom of the page, but check out the rest of their stuff, too. Its pretty neat. I wonder who carries them in the US?

http://www.monolithdesigns.co.uk/gothic_horror.htm

If you are in a hurry, and want nice looking stuff that's reasonably cheap and super quick, check these fellows out: http://www.worldworksgames.com/store/. They sell paper terrain that you download, print on cardstock, fold and place. I don't have any, but the pictures are nice. And if it gets crushed, chuck it and print a new one - nice!

Anyway, check it out!

Great New Product

Okay, I check out Litko's "Jim's Product Lab" from time to time, just to see what all that madman has gotten up to lately. Some of the things he creates are just too cool.

This time, I think he's outdone himself. They have a modular building line for sci-fi/modern gaming. While I don't need that kind of thing very much on the projects I am working on these days, he just did up (well, I just noticed for the first time, at any rate) a couple of different sets of stairs to be attached to the outside of some modular towers. I absolutely hate making staircases. Despise it. I make a lot of goofus ladders instead. These may change that.

Naturally, they could be attached to the outside of pretty much anything. or the inside if you were detailing the interior.

Anyway, check here to see it. Scroll down the page a little bit. You'll find them.

http://www.litkoaero.com/page/LAI/JIMSLAB

Bookmark it - you're going to want to go back again later. I know that I do.

Perfic Panels - Anyone using them?

There is a company I found showing at Historicon in 2007 called Precision Products (http://www.appliedimaginationinc.com/), that manufactures vacuum formed polystyrene sheets of terrain - I have been working on their rivers in one of my projects - and embossed sheet for model building. Things like brick and flagstone and such for the exterior of models.

They also manufacture something similar to foamcore, but with a thin styrene exterior rather than the more common (dare I say 'traditional'?) paper exterior sandwiching the foam.

Has anyone used this material? It sounds rather more sturdy than regular foamcore, what with being more water-resistant, and the fact that I tend to use water-based glues and paints makes this a definite plus.

Anyone have practical experience of the stuff? Leave a comment if you do!

Perfic Panels - Anyone using them?

There is a company I found showing at Historicon in 2007 called Precision Products (http://www.appliedimaginationinc.com/), that manufactures vacuum formed polystyrene sheets of terrain - I have been working on their rivers in one of my projects - and embossed sheet for model building. Things like brick and flagstone and such for the exterior of models.

They also manufacture something similar to foamcore, but with a thin styrene exterior rather than the more common (dare I say 'traditional'?) paper exterior sandwiching the foam.

Has anyone used this material? It sounds rather more sturdy than regular foamcore, what with being more water-resistant, and the fact that I tend to use water-based glues and paints makes this a definite plus.

Anyone have practical experience of the stuff? Leave a comment if you do!

Primitive Huts

Okay, these huts are just becoming available, although they have been discussed on The Miniatures Page (TMP) for over a year.

The sculptor (whose name I can't recall off the top of my head, but who goes by the TMP handle of Cacique Caribe, or CC) finished them, oh, November of 2007 I think. Then he shopped around for someone to handle the casting and marketing and such for him, as he didn't really want to do all of that himself, but there was a lot of interest in the models.

Enter Alex Bates in Alaska, of the new Forge of Ice company. They get a deal worked out, and now, they are in production.

First, a group shot. There are four different designs:

Now a close up of one:

I have nothing to do with the paint jobs (nice work, though, especially the snow) which were done I believe by a Mr Robert Phipps of the United Kingdom, a customer of Forge of Ice and friend of Alex's. I hope no one minds me swiping the photos, but I'll remove if you want me to!

I pinched this tidbit regarding the snow effect from TMP (http://theminiaturespage.com/)

"Regarding the snow effect, Rob [Phipp] says:

I Just use a bit of PVA wood glue on the bits I wanted covered in snow, then used a white flock, then another coat of PVA and then Bicarbonate of Soda for the snow effect. You get a nice brilliant crisp white from it.You don't have to use a white flock underneath but it stops any colour from the tent from showing through if your PVA is too thin.
And that's how he does it!

-Alex"

The reviews have been most complimentary, for both sculpting and quality of the production castings. You can reach Alex through his blog, and here's a link with more info and pictures of the tents. http://forum54.oli.us/index.php?topic=5205.15

Primitive Huts

Okay, these huts are just becoming available, although they have been discussed on The Miniatures Page (TMP) for over a year.

The sculptor (whose name I can't recall off the top of my head, but who goes by the TMP handle of Cacique Caribe, or CC) finished them, oh, November of 2007 I think. Then he shopped around for someone to handle the casting and marketing and such for him, as he didn't really want to do all of that himself, but there was a lot of interest in the models.

Enter Alex Bates in Alaska, of the new Forge of Ice company. They get a deal worked out, and now, they are in production.

First, a group shot. There are four different designs:

Now a close up of one:

I have nothing to do with the paint jobs (nice work, though, especially the snow) which were done I believe by a Mr Robert Phipps of the United Kingdom, a customer of Forge of Ice and friend of Alex's. I hope no one minds me swiping the photos, but I'll remove if you want me to!

I pinched this tidbit regarding the snow effect from TMP (http://theminiaturespage.com/)

"Regarding the snow effect, Rob [Phipp] says:

I Just use a bit of PVA wood glue on the bits I wanted covered in snow, then used a white flock, then another coat of PVA and then Bicarbonate of Soda for the snow effect. You get a nice brilliant crisp white from it.You don't have to use a white flock underneath but it stops any colour from the tent from showing through if your PVA is too thin.
And that's how he does it!

-Alex"

The reviews have been most complimentary, for both sculpting and quality of the production castings. You can reach Alex through his blog, and here's a link with more info and pictures of the tents. http://forum54.oli.us/index.php?topic=5205.15

Rivers Project

[Carried over from my defunct Napoleonics blog]

[Originally posted Saturday, September 27, 2008]

I started a new terrain project last night, one that has been sitting in the Closet for more than a year. I bought some styrene sheets last year at Historicon from a company called Precision Products [www.appliedimaginationinc.com]. These sheets are 16"square, 0.025" thick, with vacuum-formed terrain impressed into the sheets. The two sheets I bought are 1" Straight Rivers [SKU 16091] and 1" River bends [SKU 16092]. The Straight Rivers has four lengths of straight river, each approximately 15" in length. The River Bends includes:

2 x 45 degree bends
2 x 90 degree bends
3 x Y-Junctions, and
1 x Wooden Bridge

I have cut out two pieces so far, the bridge and one 90 degree bend. Yesterday I filled the styrene hollows with DAP Water Putty to prevent it from crushing or flexing, and then glued each piece to a 1/16" plywood base. Late last night I primed the two pieces with flat white spray paint, the cheap stuff from WalMart. Today, I applied basecoat colors, using cheap craft paints. Sorry about the blurry picture, I was hurrying.

So far, I am pretty pleased with the results. The water putty has added some heft and rigidity, as has the plywood base. It is taking the paint really well, too.

I will be adding a link to all the photos to the margin tonight. I'll post more when I make some more progress.

Still to come:
Drybrushing for detail
Add flock and ballast
Pour scenic water into riverbanks
Build a hand rail. The only drawback is that the piece will lose its scale-neutrality if I do that.