Scenery: Pigs pen

I have plenty of scenery for my bolt action table but it's lacking some center pieces, some stuff that really draws you in and makes you look closer. Therefor I decided to make a couple of pieces starting with a pigs pen. It has to be big enough to fit a full unit and still must have some nice details. This was fun to make and I'm looking forward to the next project.

I started with a piece of MDF and some wall sections from the Italeri walls & fences set. With some coffee stirring sticks I created some bits and pieces and the pigs are ancient hogs.

Cheers,

Seb

Making a gaming table

I'm currently making my own Bolt Action Table. You might have seen the woods, hedges, ploughed fields and the 4ground buildings I have put together recently but of course I also need a table to put all this stuff on.

This is the first installment of my work in progress. 
-I have 3 pieces of hardboard of 125x62cm and have secured them on a wooden frame.
-Then I have managed to secure a GW battlemat after searching everywhere. This battlemat is just too small to fit over the three panels.
-To overcome this I have cut in some roads (1 main road of cobblestone and some dirt roads). this way I could stretch the battlemat over all three panels.
-I came up with a design for the roads so that I can make a lot of different lay-outs. all three pieces fit together regardless of how I lay them out. I can flip ,turn and lay them down(as long as the green side is up) in any order and all the roads still connect. I tried this out with my design in scale on three pieces of paper.
-I then glued the battlemat down on the panels with some PVA glue.
-The roads were still bare but I filled them up with some acrylic paste in which I have made tire tracks. Because it's acrylic I can paint them and it stays a bit "rubbery"and flexible so it won't damage easily.

next is making the main road out of "cobblestone" wallpaper and paint it up. I'm also going to make some different colour grass patches here and there to break the monotony.

Have a look at the pictures and I'll try to explain what I did.

1;First is the design stage. I already had a general lay-out in my head how I'd like the table to look and fit together. I cut three pieces of paper in scale of the table panels and drew the road plan on it. I made sure all three panels would line up no matter how you turned the panels individually or in what order you would lay down the panels. The red lines indicate where to cut the Games Workshop battle mat as it would not fit the panels.

2; Screw down the panel on a wooden frame, this will keep them from warping and keeps them nice and sturdy.

3;I have 3 pieces of hardboard of 125x62cm and have secured them on a wooden frame. The screwholes are covered with wood paste. 

 4;The Games Workshop battle mat doesn't quite fit but after the roads are cut it will be fine. I glued the battle mat down with watered down PVA glue.

5:The roads are cut, the mat fits! result!

6;The dirt roads were filled with acrylic paste and some sand in which I made tire tracks. The acrylic paste can be painted once dry.

Cheers,

Seb

Salt chipped Manufactorum

Last Christmas I got two sets of the games workshop 40K Manufactorum. Having two sets is great because I can make a good sized building or rather ruin with it. I want to make 3 single corner pieces that can fit together or can be used as 3 single ruins. I plan to glue them down on a piece of MDF and add some debris here and there.

I also wanted to try a new technique I saw on the internet. It's called salt chipping and it's handy to create a weathered look for your buildings or vehicles. If you are not familiar with this technique then I suggest you watch THIS video by Girl Painting where it is explained quite clearly. (it is an actual remake of a video done by MassiveVoodoo but they did it in German)

The technique on it self is quite simple and gives a stunning result. much better then doing it by brush or sponge. It's just a bit more work. I might do a tutorial on it myself when I'm going to do the next bit of Manufactorum.

As you can see I added some "motivational" posters to the walls for added realism. Quite fun to do and I like how it turned out. I just made these little banners on my pc with photoshop but on this scale I think even MsPaint would work. I scaled them to size and printed them on normal paper. then cut them to the right size and soaked them in some gryphonne sepia wash and stuck them on the wall without any glue or anything. Then I torn a bit of the edges and folded some corners as if the poster had been hanging there for many many years.

In the end I think I have got a pretty decent manufactorum ruin but as I said this is only 50% of the work because I'm going to glue them on some MDF and make the floor and add some debris. I will keep you posted.

Cheers,
Seb