Let's get back on topic.

Well after that brief sojourn I spent the last couple of days trying to get back on line with my current project.

I cracked on with the main characters for my tale.

They need: washing, dry painting, varnishing and generally tarting up. You'll meet them all, individually, as their adventure develops.
 

The Lady Jessica got a bit of extra modelling which I wasn't intending to do, but a lick of paint and I don't think she'll look too shabby.. Do I build a more significant role for her, she was just to appear in one episode.

Anyway, a bit more rule building to do this week. But first off to the big city for my eldest's driving theory test and (hopefully) a celebratory Chinese with the family.

I forgot how enjoyable modelling and posting is. Thanks for visiting.

Lorcan

Lazy week - Narrowboat

What a weird week. One of those ones where you run around like a blue-tailed fly, look back and you've got nothing done!

Saying, that I managed to quickly knock up a narrow boat, but I didn't finish my characters. However, I'm trying to blend some aspects of THW Long Rifle and BDTZ for the campaign and well I read them and did nothing more. I hope that old adage that your brain works on problems when you're not thinking about it is true.

Finally, the narrow boat experiment.

The tools required

Cut out the bases

The bulkheads

Commence Assembly

Bulkheads and superstructure

 Just needs undercoating and painting.

Catch you all soon. Thanks for calling in. Now to leave the house and get blown away.

Lorcan

Another X Wing post - Home made escape pods.

1. Get your tools together.
(The mints are crucial, the tea not so) 

As you may know I do like to run pre-set scenarios into a mini campaign. The next one in X Wing is the protection of a wounded ship. It came to me that the ship(s) could be the escape pods from the Senator's shuttle in mission 1. As there are no such items in the X-Wing world I thought I'd cobble some together.

2.Cut out balsa bases.
1/4 the size of a small ship.

3. X-Wing tac -tics

4. With a steady extra hand,
 drill holes into the mints.

5. Stiff wire supports inserted into holes
and glued in place.

6.Raiding the spice cabinet for some detail.

7. A lick of paint
(Must practice close-ups again)

8.Ready to enter the fray.

The mat is a trial run on scrap piece of material that I am hoping to make a 3'x3' gaming mat on. If I get it going I'll blog the project.

I'm also working on a new zombie campaign. I think Gunnery Sergeant Highway will make a comeback. More to follow.

Hope all is well with you all. Keep safe.

Lorcan

The Post that never was!

I was supposed to have posted this one last week as I knew that I would be out of commission for a few days. See the next post.

It was to support the WIP of the Paula M.

Having no TD skills whatsoever I was tongue in cheekily showing off this lack of skill.

The start!

Planning and Design at its Peak!

The idea is to draw out the deck plan on the left and then convert it to the model on the right.

All will become clear, later!

See you soon.

Lorcan

Lift (elevator) Project - WIP

The conundrum of the lift caught me so as I've been banned from setting up a gaming table ('til tomorrow night, Friday) and the civic improvements are never ending. I thought I'd take a leaf from Otis' book and give the model a try. (Sadly it was Otis Redding's book not Elisa Otis! Too obvious a pun to let go :-)

Now most modelers see ourselves a bit of a:

Leo

However, I have a tendency to think to end up more like: 

You all know what it's like when
you can't stop adding bits!

Well here's my lift/elevator WIP.

The intricate planning phase.

A quick idea.

The test model.

A shot of the lumber yard.

Runners and stanchions.

A check for fit.

The future.

Well thanks for viewing. Hope you've not got too much Saharan dust around your way. It was so bad here I found a lost Bedouin wandering around the garden this morning.

Lorcan.

SITREP: Week comm. St. Patrick's Day!

I can't believe that we are heading into the last week of March and I'm a game and BATREP down! Since I last posted I've finally got an interview for a new job so I spent a couple of days with the Viscountess getting a much needed new suit. This and trying to sort out getting to 'the smoke' for a 14.00 hr meet on a Monday and further job hunting fairly took most of the remaining days, so much for 'more time for gaming!'

Saying that and with the second part of my initial exclamation I realised that I needed a dock scene. So in the evenings I persevered. I had a view of a quayside with those US dock warehouses that you see on various cop shows (Streets of San Francisco and Kojak sprang to mind.)

I got three empty chewing gum boxes from the checkout of a local German based store (gratis, can't remember the German for free.) Well this is what I came up with.

The evolution from empty box to warehouse.

The production line

The warehouse in action

SS Paula M.

I finished off the SS Paula M with a slap of paint and an old orange bag for a dragnet. (Must get a fine tip pen to inscribe the name.)

Oh well I'm out among the English for the next couple of days so provided I survive  Jack Regan will be pounding the dockland beat next weekend.

Enjoy your week gang. Thanks for reading.

Lorcan. 

When The Boat Comes In

OK I decided that one of the first adventures of my new campaign would occur on a dock area, concerning 'rum running'. I realised that I may need a boat. So I tried to make one.


I downloaded some plans for free, I should credit the site and I think it's www.freeshipplans.com. Printed them out as 80% as I work in 1/72nd scale.

With my new proclivity for cardboard I cut out the outlines pasted them onto 'thick' cardboard, cut them out and began to build.

I now see that the ribs are in the wrong direction for planking.








All cardboard is not the same so I made the bridge and other bits from thinner stuff and the funnel from a toilet roll.

Odd bits of kebab sticks and match sticks added and there you have it.

Tarting up, undercoating and painting to do, so let's see how it finishes.

 If all ready in a couple of days, then we're going to the docks. If not it's off to the cattle yards.






Thanks for looking in and commenting on previous posts. (PS I think the current season of Walking Dead is ACE!)

Drive carefully out there.

Lorcan.

Hors de Combat - Diversion 2 - Rubble

I know I said that it would be tomorrow, but there was a level of drying involved. This project came out of a Batrep I read where a fellow ZBA member bemoaned the lack of rubble in his gaming box. So off I went.

1. Drew an outline on some cardboard/

2. Cut up some sponge to make bricks (?)

3, Pape Mache rubble (Tissue and PVA) and coated the bricks in PVA glue to harden them.

4. Hot Glue the rubble and bricks to base. Extending the HG for effect.

5. Undercoat, I'm not too happy with the HG 'detail'. Let's see.

5b. Close up of detail.

6. A Heavy dark wash. In future I will use a black undercoat, but I can't find my tin.

7. PVA wash in the relevant parts and a bath in grit. Touch up the bricks with a white dry brush

OK a bit more 'rough ground' then 'collapsed wall. 

Colgar6, in your last zombie batrep you said that you had no rubble for your 'collapsed wall ' random incident card. So if you want these they're yours. You can find my email on my personal description part of PZ,(drop me a line with your address) gratis btw too light to ask for postage, I won't be offended if you do not want them. If any one else wants some let me know.

Toe is healing but now is as black as night.

Eat well.

Lorcan

Hors de Combat Diversion 1 - Corpses.

Being compelled to sit about certainly activates the 'must do modelling' button and so I embarked on a couple of projects. One being some 'scenery' corpses or casualty markers and the other a piece of terrain.

This is number one.

1. Remove the skeletons form the 'Undead' box

2. A little bit of surgery, place them on a base and hot glue.

2a. Close up, I quiet like the effect given by the glue.

3. PVA glue and a bath in grit. 

3a. Completed but the 'glue effect' has gone. Note to self.

3b. Close up of a base.

4. Paint in the bones.

4b. Close up of bases.

I'll give them a dark wash when I'm at that stage with the other project. More to follow tomorrow.

Keep on modelling.

Lorcan