Some Rough Terrain

Today's Tutorial :: Rough Terrain!

I created some Rough Terrain for my 28MM MEST rules. In terms of the MEST Tactics rules, unless in Flying status or using Agility, models move at half normal rate. This is very similar to many tabletop wargame rules.

Tutorial

I'm trying a new process for building this terrain which goes like this;

Crafting

1. Cut some MDF. I start by getting plyers and breaking off weird shapes from masonite boards I purchased from Michael's Art Store.
2. Next I use a matt-knife to refine the edges of those boards.
3. Then I glue some small bits of expanded styrene. I use this "Pink Panther" brand.
4. I carve that with my hot-wire knife into interesting shapes to form boulders.
5. Afterwards, I use some plaster spackle to given some texture to large areas of the board. I use the high-density type, and so it takes some time to dry after application.
6. While the spackle is wet, I start jamming into it small rocks and pebbles of various sizes. I think kitty litter or aquarium pebbles could work well for this, but I got my rocks from the side streets and washed them before use.
7. After everything dries, I cover the entire surface with a coat of Elmer's Glue. This helps seal the spackle, the pebbles, and also glues down any fibres from the styrene.

Painting

When that stuff dries;

1. I go over each board with a thick coat of black acrylic paint. This may bring up some of the glue, but it will all eventually dry again. I try to hide all white and pink; flood all surfaces with black paint.
2. When the black paint dries, I use dark brown and wet-brush all of the boards in an attempt to bring up some of the textures.
3. After the brown paint dries, I dry-brush tan acrylic paint.
4. I also dry-brush some medium gray.
5. I then do a very quick dry-brush with a 4-inch brush white on the edges of all of the boulders I carved out of styrene. I also touch up on the rocks and pebbles where I think looks nice. However, I do this by drawing up from the edges of the boards to the tops of the boulders.
6. And I wet-brush medium green in areas I want to look as though it were damp.

Flocking

After that tan dries, I try something new!

1. Get some green flocking material. I use fine-powder dark green and lighter clumpy forest green.
2. I mix a bowl of medium green acrylic paint with Elmer's glue.
3. I dab the boards in the areas where I had already dry-brushed with green paint earlier. 
4. I then sprinkle some dark green flocking on those areas.
5. Afterwards, with my fingers, I jam the clumpy flocking atop that where desired.
6. When I am done with everything, I spray the clumps with flocking glue to hold it into place.

Wide boards. About 3-inch by 10-inches

This is about 6-inch by 8-inch

Another big piece.

Some of the pieces with boulders made of carved pink styrene.

How the new Rough terrain looks like with some 28MM figures. 

Some Terrain

NOTE: I recently revisited MEST Fantasy Gladiator with my nephew. He is definitely getting better at the tactics. Just a short 4-Turn battle between myself, him, and my brother. We each received 4 characters.

Overview

The Fantasy Gladiator genre set that I have is 1:18 scale where in each figurine is 90MM tall or about 3.5-inches in height. At present this is my principal ad hoc demo set for new-comers. I've used this set at my workplaces for the past 6 years ... works marvels because the figures are large! However, I created the set with very little terrain except for 12 pillars. The idea was to keep everything simple.

Well, I've learned that with more figures there's probably going be a need for more terrain. Especially if the demo set becomes a competition game. And so, I've built more.

Process

Here's my process!

I purchases this foam board from Lowes. It is about 1-inch thick about 4 by 8 feet in dimensions and sells for about $8.00 USD. You'll need to peel that "R-Tech" plastic from the front, and a similar but gray foil from the back. Otherwise paint won't stick to it.

This was my Christmas gift to myself. About $120 USD. Cut the big foam boards into smaller squares and rectangles. The ruler you see at the top allows for precision cuts of consistent dimension.

You will need this hot-wire knife to create details in your foam, and to carve out gashes and scratches. This is a lot easier than when I used as hot wire gun.

So, I cut out a bunch of square and rectangular tiles. I stacked them together and started using the hot-wire knife to cut shapes into the tiles. You can see the crazy gray foil that still sticks to the foam board.

More creative stacking. You may notice that I have some MDF boards I use as the base. I got these cut a few years back. I think places such as Lowes and Ace Hardware (both in the USA) will cut MDF for you. Otherwise you'll need to get a circular saw because MDF is hard to cut with a blade.

I tried to create step-like layouts. I figure that maybe I can use these finished projects with both my 1:18 figures and with my 28MM figures. Why not, right?

More of the same. Some interesting gaps for the smaller figures to move about.

Once I have the shapes hot-glued into place, I need to add some interesting texture. I use sand and white glue for this. BTW, I discovered that you can purchase jugs of white-glue for very cheap. I highly recommend this.

You can see that the sand and glue chunked up a bit. Bah. Not a problem.

What I did afterwards when the glue dried is that I revisited each piece and added another layer of white-glue as a sealant. This allows the remainder of the sand to be locked into place. It also creates a smoother surface for when I paint.

These walls have a base-coat of dark brown. I did a thin black wash afterwards when the brown dried.

The foreground is essentially done. The background walls need a dry-brush of white.

When I dry brush, I use a lighter brown across the entire face with a 2-inch brush. I then use a 1-inch brush  with pure white for dry-brushing corners and edges.

Spray Bar with Magnetic Mounting Posts

Overview

A "spray box" is basically a large cardboard box which is used to place unpainted figurines while coating them with primer spray paint. The idea is that the box will isolate how much spray paint travels around during the process.

One of the things I've learned since I've first started this hobby is that a "spray box" is really messy. And so I've discovered that if I create a "spray bar" I can minimize my messiness. It also helps to conserve primer spray paint, and allows me to have my figurines neatly organized. This might not work for everyone, but for those people that have mounted their figures upon fender washers this will help. The fender washers are magnetic and will

Things to Get

A pencil.

A screwdriver

A matt-knife with sharp blade

E-6000 or general-purpose glue.

1 x 36-inch wood strip (36" x 2" x 1"). Maybe a heavy wood like walnut.

1 x 12-inch wood strip (12" x 2" x 1/4-inch). A light wood like pine.

16 x 2-inch bugle-head construction screws

16 x 1/2-inch cylindrical spacers such as "compression adaptors"

16 x 3/4-inch ceramic disc magnets (the cheap stuff)

16 x 1-inch fender washers with 1/8-inch holes

16 x 1/2-inch flat washers with 5/16-inch holes

The Steps

1/2-inch cylindrical spacers.

1/2-inch flat washers with 5/16-inch holes

1-inch fender washers with 1/8-inch holes

2-inch bugle-head construction screws

Some wood bars.

Same wood bars at a distance. One bar will be cut into smaller pieces.

Score 2-inch marks evenly spaced upon the thicker wood bar.

  

Here are those ceramic magnets. I'm using mine from an older project and so I'll need to clean up the glue.

Each of the mounts will use these bits. On a 36-inch wood bar with 2-inch spaces there will be enough room for about 16 mounts.

Good ol' E-6000. Sticky. Dries fast.

This is what the screws do.

Assembled for a dry-run. The smaller flat-washer goes upon the larger fender washer to allow the bugle-head screw to be flush.

And upon the flat-washer and screw head we place the magnetic disc.

We affix the mount. The warping here is slight enough to allow the screw to recess a bit. Don't drill them in too tight or the head of the screw will break away.

Here's with the flat-washer affixed and the disc affixed; both with lots of glue.

Cut the thinner pine-wood board into 3-inch sections. I have a sander and so I make the rough edges go away.

Again more E-6000 glue. I place paper beneath the end joints to catch any glue run-off.

Here's what it looks like with a figure upon the mount.

My figure bases are zinc metal and so they stick to the mounts against the magnets even when I tilt the entire bar. The bar therefore can be tilted during application of primer spray as well. And then I can keep the bar and figures neatly in a row near my painting table. Should I ever need to move the entire lot, I just pick up the bar and relocate.

Aggro's Fantasy WIPs May 10 2015

I still can't seem to leave Comments...
Oh well. I wanted to first give a quick "thank you" for all the kind words people have left in the Comments section.
Meanwhile, I have another photo I took this morning to see how things were coming a long with the latest batch on my painting table.
I can now see a few trouble areas that need some touch up.
Man I paint slow and I still hate painting eyes, even with micron pens!

All and all, pretty pleased with how things are coming along.

On another note, I was looking for a cheap secratery desk to use as a painting station to keep things neat and tidy. Anybody out there use this one from iKea? I am not expecting quality by any means, I was just curious how the storage for the paints, brushes, etc worked out.

Finished (more or less) Fantasy Models by Aggro 84

Thanks for all of the kind words left in my last post's Comments section.
I can't seem to reply back in the Comments section for some reason, but then again, it has been a while since I have used this blog.

I haven't varnished sprayed these guys yet, so I might go back and touch up a few things now that I am looking at some of the photos blown up again. All around though, I'm fairly pleased with the results.

These guys look better in person (honest). Some of the flesh tones are washed out here. I am still not happy with the thug in the middle, but I am a little sick of him right now.

I am happy with the evil eye Dwarf and the Gobbo warrior. I can really use more Gobbos! This one was really fun to paint.

More Broo. The one on the left painted up the best I think.

After a vote for red hair and a vote for blonde (thanks 24_Cigarettes), I went with orange hair for the thug playing the horn.

Undead

A grab bag of what was left over during photographing.

I hope you all enjoy.

Aggro 84's Various Fantasy Model WIP's

First post in a looong time.
I finally set up a painting table again and I have been slowly getting back into a painting groove.
I took these WIP shots to look at and check for areas that need touching up.
I figured I might as well share them.

The Goblin (2nd from the left) was the first one I have painted in years.

Some classic Citadel sculpts in this batch

I'm not sure where the Undead Dude on the left came from. Some more of the old school on display here.

These are the least complete of the lot. I am not sure what color to do the thug in the middle's hair. Any thoughts?

Its good to be back painting again. I am hoping to have most of these finished by the end of the weekend.