Bandai Y-Wing 1:72

I'm having building work done on my house which means that I've had to lose my hobby space. I wasn't in the best run of form anyway, so this has really hampered my productivity. To get out of the dust zone, my kids and I went to my parents for the weekend and as is customary, I had a rummage around my old bedroom in the hope of finding a few nuggets of nostalgia and hopefully old models! Well I found one! A boxed Bandai Y-Wing (1:72) that I received for Christmas a few years ago. Joy. With my parents taking the kids out for the day, I set to work on constructing the tiny, detailed model.

Having worked on some quite difficult Airfix models with my son (small fiddly bits that need lots of gluing and don't fit particularly well) I was amazed that I did not need any glue to make successfully build this and the level of detail and quality was pretty astounding. I would definitely recommend these kits to any serious model-maker.

I wish I had the larger scale version to fit in with my Star Wars Imperial Assault minis, but I can imagine creating a diorama where this hangs in the sky, it's smaller scale lost in the perspective of distance.

Once the kit was built the yellows were painted on (rather than use the rubbish decals) and then the weathering which was done very quickly. Without applying a primer, I washed a dirty brown, very dilute oil paint mixture over the entire model and when dry applied a further range of acrylic washes over this including blacks for the burnt effect near the engines and browns over some of the pipes. A few of the details, including the pilot, droid and lights were then picked out with acrylic paint.

Overall it was a very enjoyable day making and painting this. Back home, I've established a temporary site for my hobby exploits, so (fingers crossed) expect a few more posts in the near future of a variety of different projects.

My little world (wip)

Following on from my last post about my new cemetery, I thought it was time to try and get some decent photos of my current tabletop set up. It's not a very accessible site (the corner of a low attic) but it gives me an opportunity to set up my stuff without any hassle from the wife or kids! I can just look and admire my handiwork up here, which is all very lovely until I smack my head on a low beam.

Pretty much everything you see in these photos is scratch-built, the only exceptions being the aforementioned GW Cemetery and the toy fort that I [originally] painted up for my son! He's grown out of it, so, as per my plan, so it's become mine! The scratch-built stuff is largely from the modelling workshop articles from early White Dwarfs; you may recognise the Townhouse, the Barn, the Cottage, the Ruined Temple and the Inn/Forge, but there's also some scenery that is inspired from elsewhere (the entrance toFighting Fantasy's Firetop Mountain for example). And then there's the scenery that's been inspired from a great many parts of the Internet and put together with my imagination and often some prolonged problem solving; my Mausoleum, Church, Ruined building, trees and my modular tiles.

As the title says, this is WIP; I've got more modular tiles to make and some much more fancy ruined buildings, roads, a backdrop, plus some more interiors/dungeon tiles and a load of miniatures to populate this little world of mine. Here's what I have for now though; enjoy!:

Best get cracking then...

Modelling Workshop 4: The Cottage (White Dwarf 130)

This is my 4th post in this little series of terrain building using the Modelling Workshop articles from White Dwarf, following on from number three; the barn, number two; the ruined temple and number one; the townhouse, with just the more complicated coaching inn and stables to go.

For this classic cottage, I wanted to approach it from a slightly different perspective, partly because I have made these before and also because I wanted to add to my Frostgrave / Mordheim collection with more ruined buildings. So after a bit of image research I decided to go for a ruined and burnt out cottage but still using the same materials and templates as per the original design.

The painting of this was really quick. A grey primer was sprayed on and then everything was washed with a very dilute dark grey. This was then highlighted up with a few drybrushed lighter greys. I then worked a cream colour onto the less burnt areas of wall and again drybrushed the highlights.

A little tip: always drybrush in the direction you want the light to be from; in this case from top to bottom. There will be more paint on your brush as you begin and therefore you'll automatically create a lighter tone at the top which will recede to darker through the brushstoke as you brush is less laden with paint. 

I then applied a multitude of green and brown washes to the walls to show it's derelict, mossy state. Finally I re-applied some black to the areas where the fire damage would have been most extensive, where the wooden aspects of the building are - window frames, beams etc.

Here's a couple of wips to show the process of making using all the traditional materials and techniques as suggested in the original Modelling Workshop articles. I meant to add clay stones to the chimney but totally forgot and instead applied my thinned polyfilla to all the walls.

And finally the plans from the White Dwarf, if anyone fancies having a go themselves.

Modelling Workshop 1: Town House. White Dwarf 137

Games Workshop's White Dwarf magazines from circa late 80's into the early 90's, really captured my teenage imagination and inspired me to immerse myself in the hobby then, almost as they still do now. I was a particular fan of the Modelling Workshop articles, where for the first time in my life, I was given instruction on how to scratchbuild, which was a step forward from the model Airfix kits I had previously been working with. All of a sudden my pocket money wasn't just to be spent on trips to Reading GW to just buy lead miniatures, but I now tried to get my hands on some foamcard and balsa wood; both of which transformed my modelmaking repertoire. They are still at the core of my scrathcbuilding/modelmaking I've just added extruded foam to the equation.

So armed with the experience I had gained some 25 years ago, I delved back into my old White Dwarfs and re-examined the Modelling Workshop articles. I soon decided that I wanted to tackle all of the fantasy articles from the period (another project to work towards..)! It just so happens that I still own the original Townhouse that I made back then (it's remarkably well made) and I wanted to do an adults version to see if I had improved or not over the past quarter of a decade. It also acted as a demonstration model for my modelmaking club at school, where the students are working on these same designs as well as various Airfix/AoS/40k models.

So for my modern version, I wanted to create a tavern using the townhouse structure. It just meant putting a patio out the front (eventually I'll make some benches and tables), creating a name; The Spotted Dog which is stolen from Fighting Fantasy's City of Thieves and a brazier and barrel for decoration:

Here's my original one, with a few later additions, namely the base, tree and fleur-de-lis. Only the chimney pots are damaged from the original build:

Which version is the better? The green moss looks a bit flat on the new (right hand side) version and the door looks tiny! I think I stuck to the plans much more carefully in my youth and probably spent about three times as much time on it; which is especially apparent on the painting. The new version was painted in about 30minutes (wet in wet and dry brushing - from memory the original took a long while longer). Anyway, I'll let you decide!

A few more angles:

And the original article with all the plans and instructions, as hopefully some of you readers may be tempted to re-visit the making of these classic buildings from our youth:

And finally a few images that I used for research and inspiration. I meant to add some hanging baskets but forgot - they'll go on my next build.

Kids building houses

This is what started the scenery building bug for me, the infamous townhouse from an early White Dwarf. Using cereal packaging, a scrap of mdf pilfered from my dad's garage, some foamcard (what a revelation that stuff was to a young, enthusiastic model maker), some polyfilla (again from the garage), some balsa wood and loads of pva, I followed the plans meticulously to produce my first scratch built, scale building.

This particular building has a lot to answer for and has helped me start to create a legacy. For this is the actual one I first made, way back in the late 80's (and is one of the few things I have kept from those days) and set me on the track to creating a whole range of different terrain when a teenager and then more recently after my hiatus. But fast forward to today and this little model building just keeps on giving.

In September I formed a model making club (rather than a gaming club - a reflection of me I guess), mostly because it is a love of mine that I can share with the students at my school, but also because my school does not have a D&T department, so the construction of things does not feature massively as a part of the students education - which is a huge shame. The club is popular, initially starting at 30 kids (there's only 100 in each year group) and now down to a hardcore 18).

I provided them with my model townhouse as inspiration (and gave them the backstory) and told the kids that I'm going to teach them how to create something like this, and then shared the White Dwarf schematics and the tools necessary for success. Here are those wonderful plans again:

Now considering it's a lunchtime club (about 30 minutes) and occurs only once a week - with the usual disruptions, here are the early stages of some of the wip townhouses (the other's are awaiting gluing):

 

And what a wonderful experience it's been. As a teacher I'm often amazed at how old skills I learnt (the hard way - from mistakes and pre-internet) come back into your mind when teaching and this is certainly the case with model making. Some techniques which I took for granted about the processes, the students had no idea about. For example, how to cut a straight line (I assumed they would use the set squares and rulers provided, but some went freehand and made a right old ugly edge). Doing a dry run before gluing, again the students didn't all consider this - again quite messy and catastrophic as the elements didn't fit, no matter how much pva was applied! Anyway it's certainly obvious that they are learning new skills, applying them, making progress and of course having fun with it. Our hobby is pretty special in those regards.

As an aside, I'm often asked how you teach art and am given the line that it's a "natural talent and some are good at it and others not". Bollocks. It's often used for sport and music too. I hate that, it makes the teaching of these subjects sound redundant. Yes some people do have an affinity for these subjects, but boy do they have to practise and experiment to improve further. And if it's a subject someone is weaker at (perhaps because they've never been taught it due to the overwhelming focus on numeracy and literacy at primary school these days) then they can often be the students who make the most substantial progress; unrestrained by poor habits or a self-belief that they've always been told they're good at it and therefore are shit scared of trying something different in case of failure. And besides a good teacher should be able to make any individual learn new processes if there's enthusiasm on the part of the learner and thoughtfulness on the part of the teacher. As an example, in our hobby I'm constantly seeing people on blogs and Facebook make huge strides of development in their skillsets (myself included) as they lap up all the shared advice, tutorials and videos there are available to us through a quick search.

I just wish I could build a real house. I need a teacher, some time and money/resources...

I digress. Town houses. I also spent a few rainy days with my kids making some more simple houses, but using the same techniques (and a bit more hands on help from me with cutting etc.). My daughter decided to add steps to her doorway and therefore positioned the door higher in the wall (the house on the right) and my son has spent a bit more time on his and has just polyfilled/textured the walls and tiled the roof. He loved that bit as he was just using his fingers to apply the sticky pva and coarse polyfila.

Here they are hard at work. Daughter is gluing on the wooden beams (note the coffee stirrers in lieu of balsa!) whilst my son's actually painting a figure in this photo as he waits for something to dry. My oldest daughter wasn't interested in all this, she prefers the games, and therefore doesn't make the cut for the photo.

Here's the result of his endeavours, a lovely, multi-coloured dwarf! However he did listen to me by thinning his paints and holding the brush nice and low for control. He's 4! Not bad eh?

Here he is in action. My wife says I pull a similar face when concentrating on painting my toys, but I generally use both hands.

And over the past few weeks he's painted all of these; decent speed to model ratio too! Can the zombie be added to the ScaleCreep  Hero Quest Heroquest blog please?

Finally, in other news, I've also been doing a bit of hobby work myself and my ode to the sleeping orc sentry from the Warlock of Firetop Mountain is nearly complete...

Arrabella - Mad Max style car WIP

Here she is (sans paint and headlights)! 

I love model making and the aspect I enjoy the most of a project like this, is the problem solving. When I was a kid making models for the first time (largely Airfix), the problems were just in following the instructions and putting the correct bits in the correct places without swamping the model in glue. Lego was actually the big step for me, moving away from following instructions that came with boxed sets, to using my imagination and creativity to make my own space ships from a massive pile of different shaped and coloured plastic blocks, all he time ensuring functionality. In the case of spaceship Lego, it was often symmetry; ie: "Do I have enough pieces to construct two of and those fuselage's?" and/or "Will that opening gangway ramp actually fit over the size of the entrance I've made?". As an adult these type of questions and experiments to find the solution keep me happy and take up a lot of my thinking time. Thinking time easily out-weighs my making time.

So with this build, over the past month or so, a lot of time has been spent thinking about how this is going to work. 

1. Research. Find images that inspire. Obviously MadMax was a huge inspiration but I needed plausible builds that have already been built and accomplished by model-makers to give me some reality inspiration:

Thanks to all the modellers who made these, sorry I have not given you credit by name, but rest assured you have completely inspired and reassured me.  

All of these show the sort of thing I wanted to achieve, looking especially at wheels, suspension, exhausts and post-apocalyptic additions. Further research into reality showed me that most of these are modeled at a 1:35 scale, which in my experience is just too large for 28mm sci-fi. So I resumed my search for 1:43 plastic kits, rather than die-cast, the latter being much more difficult to model and convert as I discovered with my Freeway Fighter model

2. Scavenge and purchase parts. I plumped for this Heller plastic kit, it cost me about 7 quid from ebay, the sprues have lots of pieces (40) which means I have more control over what I include and exclude during the build. I liked the aesthetics of the car too, the curves and character of the car fit in with the Mad Max vibe as well as just being quite pleasant to look at. 

I decided that I wanted bigger wheels and raised suspension so as to fit into a desert environment as well as a raised engine and side exhausts to give the appearance of a suped-up version. For this to happen I had to go and scavenge some bits:

• Wire gauze from Halfords for the windows.
• Plastic off road wheels from the Ork bike kit
• Plasticard (plain and the double diamond tread plate kind)
• Jewellers chain so equipment can be secured to the vehicle
• Plastic piping of a variety of radii for exhausts and roll cages etc
• Springs from a pen for the suspension
• Guitar wire for tubed pipes
• Computer circuit board parts for engines and other machinery parts
• The only purchases were from Zinge Industries for fuel tanks, spotlights, and other equipment a post-apocalyptic car might be carrying

3. Making

Having made the brave decision to cut the back of the roof off (I spent a lot of time considering the pros and cons of this and the ideal position to cut), I could start constructing the car. I cut out a space for the raised engine in the bonnet, which is made from a part of a computer circuit board and glued all the seats, steering wheel and dashboard together. I used some embossed plasticard for the floor which attached to the underneath of the drivers seat - it would be visible in the back of the trunk. 

I remember reading an article from a very early White Dwarf, by John Blanche I believe, about keeping a tidy workspace. I don't adhere to that philosophy and have grown fond of such games as: "where the fuck is that drill bit" or "I had that bit perfect length of paperclip in my hand just now", or the dreaded: "bollocks" as the tiny spotlight slips out of my fingers, bounces onto the table and either silently settles on the carpet ("fuck") or nestles amongst the general mess ("for fuck's sake").

I added the roof's spotlights to a bent paperclip. Gluing the wire mesh into the window space was a proper pain in the arse. I ended up using some Uhu thick glue as superglue did not work (bizarrely), and it was, as you can imagine, quite messy and imprecise.

Here you can see the backboard made of the textured plasticard. Really hard to measure the right shape prior to cutting.

 When putting it all together I discovered  an unforeseen problem: two interior wheel arches needed to be made to cover the space where the wheels will show. I've also added some guitar wire as a flexible piping from the engine.

Biggest problems: cutting plastic the correct shape to fit into weird and impossible to get to shapes and using the right type and amount of glue for the right materials. 

Next problem: Making the exhaust. Just bending plastic tubing invariably makes it snap or flatten out. So I had to introduce some heat from a lighter. But just the right amount or else it melts obviously. I found the best way to do this was to rotate the tubing 360 as it is exposed to heat, use tweezers to manipulate the required bend and then run it under cold water immediately. This took quite a few attempts.

Using a range of different radius meant I could insert one inside the other to make a more interesting shape, breaking up the long tubes into smaller sections. I added an Ork bike exhaust for the end piece and used a lot of precision plastic glue..

You can also see the jewellers chain that's been added with the help of some superglue to the spare tyre and sleeping bag etc. The grey resin bits are all from Zinge Industries.

Raising the suspension of the car was the biggest problem of all. I had to make some plasticard supports, seen here in black (the back two being slightly smaller than the front two) with holes drilled in to support the thick paperclip axle. Springs from a couple of pens were used for the actual suspension and were superglued over a plastic rod.

Blu-tac is your closest friend when model-making, perfect for doing that dry run (at least three times) before you break out the finality of the glue..

Here's a closer picture of the front two suspension columns.

And another dry run with the blu-tac helping me out.

4. Complete the build. When the functional side of the build is complete, there's usually some aesthetic improvements to add. In reality I added most of the additions during the functional build, but a few adjustments were made when it was all put together.

The frontof the car needed something extra, to make it have more of a Mad Max appearance, so a bumper with spikes and a skull were added. It helped elongate the car shape too.

Space for a passenger (with gun) was created and a hole drilled into the back for later addition (a Copplestone miniature).

The chassis was raised slightly higher than I had anticipated, so I needed to add some bulk to the undercarriage to reduce the gap to the floor and to break up the very flat line of the bottom of the car. So Arrabella (so I've named her) was given some addiional barrels, which are actually fuses and other barell shaped objects from a computer circuit board (as you can gather there's some great shapes on these for miniature model making).

And here's Abdul Goldberg getting excited about his new ride. It's been pimped.

Right I'm off to spray the bastard, wish me luck because I'll be gutted if I fuck it up now!