As you wish

Time is becoming an issue these days, as it could be expected. While I am slowly (very slowly) working on large projects, I have been using scarce, brief moments to work on this small side project I had pending since... well, ahem. Some time ago. Ahem.

The 'Pirate Set' by Antediluvian Miniatures was, of course, love at first sight. Please go have a look at their ranges; all of them are so great. As soon as these particular minis were released, I knew I needed them. Just have a quick look, you'll understand.

Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die

Inconceivable!

Anybody want a peanut?

I'm the Dread Pirate Roberts, but you can call me 'Weasley'

Well, you can see it's been nothing but a quick way of remembering how to grasp a brush. I think I'm losing practice, so I just wanted to paint something that didn't demand too much time. Pics aren't particularly good, as usual, I'm afraid (seriously, Weasley's clothes are made of different tones of black, promise. It's not just a black primed mini; each piece is different!)

Now you want to watch the movie again. Don't worry, that's a good thing

Some time after these minis were released, Antediluvian solved the problem of having a Buttercup with these:

Don't you dare to tell me you don't need them too

Had they been released at the same time, I would have got them too. Sigh, I guess I'll have to place a new order then. I may as well get some of the Conquistadors of Mitclan minis. Ahh, decisions, decisions... :P

A new board (A story of overcoming)

For the last three or four years I have been using a kind of urban setting board for my Rogue Trader or WH40K2 games. I made these boards looooong time ago (I really mean long ago!), using just a couple of pieces of plywood and foam (back in those days I didn't even know MDF existed!). Two 120x60 cm (roughly 4x2') compatible boards.

State of the art back in the day. No, seriously, the cheapest way of having a board.

 You may remember scenarios such as Cops & Robbers, The Battle of Benny Hill (formerly 'To catch a thief') or Rebels with a Cause. You have witnessed my efforts to build an atmosphere and a sense of 'warhammeriness'. In fact those boards were built with a broader scope in mind, as I thought I could use them for fantasy settings (or even for a pirete project which I never started) with proper buildings. But after these years of urban warfare I felt I needed something different. Those boards could still give me a lot of fun for years, sure, but the ants in my pants started to ask for a different setting.

If you have a look at my Genestealer Cult project you may be aware of my attempts of building a dungeon. Catacombs, mining corridors and so where the Cult hides. Then I came up with the idea of building a small desert town, just the kind of place that could stand over the dungeon.

But not an usual board.

I started to toy with the idea of true 3D on a game, going beyond the mere fact of having buildings where the minis could climb to have better shooting spots. I had a different thing in mind, more in the idea of (more or less) vertical boards. What do I exactly mean by that? A board that has as much height as it has depth. Or even more, if possible. Not necessarily a skyscraper, as I'm thinking of a small mining town, kind of Logan's World:

Not the novel, the RT setting

If you are into Rogue Trader and Oldhammer I hope you'll get the point of what I'd like to achieve. In case you are not, how would I explain? I'd like to mix...

...the vertical concept from the Anasazi Cliff Palace, Colorado...

...the motley maze of Santorini, Greece...

...the desert feel of the Kasbah of Taourirt, Morocco...

...and the impressive bulk of Mar Saba, West Bank

So, how on Earth am I going to do all this? My early thoughts were oriented towards using the old boards. Could I arrange what I already had and recycle them to get my new vertical board?

Spoiler alert: No.

Long answer: I'll explain with pics. At least you'll see my train of thought.

This configuration is unfeasible

Fortunately I still had yet another plywood

You can see the madness. A board of 120x60x60 cm (roughly 4x2x2'). I'd like to overstock that with adobe houses or whatever.

Maybe I could then place another regular, horizontal board to keep expanding the town... Am I going too fast?

Well, OK, I'm going too fast. Of course you all have already thought the obvious things. But I had to go through the empirical experimentation to get convinced. First of all, plywood makes an awful material for this purpose, I need to move on MDF. Second, the vertical board cannot be plywood, not only for the bending, but fot the weight. No structure will hold that.

So what does all this mean? That I got rid of the boards and the plywood. I needed that space! I said goodbye to my urban boards and started from square 1 again. Winds of change!

Here in this context it's where that post about a spaceport fits in. I told you about the inner structure and how I needed to paint it before I built a proper building around it. Here it comes!

The spaceport won't be at ground level. Not when I'm thinking of heights! It will be as high as I can place it. The cookie box is 30 cm (1') diameter, so the spaceport will be quite a large building, at least in relative terms. In fact it will be the largest structure of the whole board, considering the volume of the box I'll have to build for it.

I mean huge

Yes, I'm going nuts. But please keep reading...

I made this 50cm high, which is the exact width of the wardrobe I will keep this piece in (I'll show some pics below). The spaceport itself will be on the top.

Upside down. Totally amateur method, but it works

So here it is!

If you look close, you'll see the outer door, it matches the inside one!

Behind the mini

I got a MDF board, to prevent bending issues. The vertical wall will also be made of foamboard, for weight issues.

The open space on the back is intended

The structure is light, but well reinforced:

Tornado proof. Reinforced everywhere

 So OK, this works. I'm happy with how it is turning out, I'm confident about its future perspective... and then I made the storage test. Yeah, that one that I didn't make until this point. Then...

OH COME ON! SERIOUSLY?

ARE YOU KIDDING ME??

The space on the wardrobe is slightly more than 50cm, but... I didn't take into account the door. When opening it, it is impossible for the building to fit into the wardrobe. Just a matter of milimeters, but that's enough.
To be fair, I'm a legal advisor, you shouldn't have trusted my maths since the beginning.

So I had to take a painful decision. I couldn't cut from the upper part, as the spaceport structure is way too complex to be dismembered. I cut 2cm (less than 1 inch) from below. Right, that part where all the reinforcement pieces are. That tornado proof part. That one.

Sniff.

So now the whole structure is 48 cm high. It now fits in the wardrobe (checked!) and I can keep on adding stuff. Of course what you see here is nothing but the very basic shape of this bulk. I'll have to add secondary structures and details everywhere.

An example of what's in my mind

I've been changing my mind about the whole appearance of this like every ten minutes since I started sketching the first concepts, and now that I see it in place... well, I keep on swiftly moving from a solution to another. For example, I always worked with the idea of ascending ramps, just adjacent to the building, so small vehicles could reach the top.

But I've suddenly remembered I have this bridge. I need to use it. Here.

So the project is really alive, it takes shape as I build it. I have a general idea of the overall aspect I want to achieve, but the details will unfold themselves as the moment comes.

By the way, I acknowledge I haven't shown any pic of the spaceport with a ship!

Note to self: the side project is to build a small fleet of weird ships

So I'm on it. It will take some time, you can see, but  the first step, which is always the most difficult, has been taken. I've overcome the setbacks and now it all will be easier (At least that's my hope!!)

Stay tuned for more!

Desert nomad cannibal Ghouls of Khorne

Well, the title is pretty descriptive. If you find out a better name, please be my guest; this is what sleep deprivation makes to me.

I had these almost finished, but the final touches have taken me some additional time, for obvious parenting reasons. Anyway, let me talk about what I'm showing today. They are the Khorne guys from the Shadespire core box, the other half of the commission I took from a friend.

We discussed long about the possibilities these minis offered, trying to find the mood for them. After many different ideas, I told him that I had the skellies warband and I planned to heavily convert them into a desert undead theme, but not the classic Egyptian-like concept. Cloaks, turbans, loose clothes, scimitars... that kind of thing. He also loved the idea, so we begun to translate that concept to these Khorne minis. After getting some bits, I started to work walking this path:

Yeah, desert made this to my skin

Deadly slap of doom

My face may look skinny, but look at my abs

Right from the One Thousand and One Nights

What do you mean my hands look 'different'?

You can see what I mean. I went for this kind of exotic vibe, thinking of a nomadic tribe of desert dwellers, hiding in the ruins of ancient lavish towns now shattered in pieces, hunting in the shadows, avid for flesh of any kind.

The original concept of 'ghoul' has Arabic roots, first coming into European culture with the translation of the One Thousand and One Nights, so it all made some kind of sense. I didn't try to achieve an accurate Arabic ghoul anyway, but just the kind of pastiche we are used within the Warhammer universe. So I painted the skins in this kind of sick, ashen tones:

Who are you calling sick?

Then I considered the Khorne idea. They had to have something red, so I thought of painting some small areas and see where to go chromatically from there.

Leaving the black dead eyes was an idea that came to mind when I saw this pic

I restrained the palette to earthy colours, all in brown, beige, some grey... I didn't envision them in a Red Era fashion, so I favoured mostly dull colours. The only touch of colour was the turban. I wanted something distinctive, a visual reference, and I tried this particular yellow:

I kept the basic poses (except for the spear guy, that anyway is bearing a two handed weapon) so they are more or less recognizable, yet... different.

Desert cannibal ghoul Power Rangers

Just an ambientation pic:

Ahhh, this feels like home...

It's certainly been a different project. I planned to do exactly this kind of conversion work to my own Sepulchral Guard; I like the vibe, but I don't know if I'll finally do it. We'll see whenever I unpack them!

Oops, I did it again...

The updating rate of the blog has alarmingly decreased, and I'm afraid it will keep this way for some (to be determined) time. But don't worry, it's not due to any bad news. On the contrary, I've recently become a dad again! The long awaited Suberling Secundus has arrived to our lives :)

I cannot be any happier, Lady Suberia is recovering well and the Suberling Prime is coping with all the stuff better than expected, so cheers!

So we have two now. How many more did you say we need? EXCUSE ME?

Of course this means that hobby time will somehow be experimenting some... difficulties. Ahem. I have some WIP on the workbench, so I'll try to see it finished first, and then I'll try to favour small projects which can be reasonably achieved. Right, no plan survives contact with reality, but hey, this works in my mind!

This is my life now

Don't fear, I'll be back as soon as I can!

Cheers you all!

Inner spaceport

You thought I was kidding when I talked about building a spaceport for my recently painted spaceport crew? Ha! :D

In fact this is but the start of a (pretty much) wider scenery project. Until I can show you real progress, let me just state that the plan in my mind consists of a small desert village which will have a suspicious maze of corridors and catacombs beneath ;) So nothing else than the town above my other current scenery project. I'm not sure of how will I be able to bring both together (and how long will that take!), but that's not really bothering me at the moment.

I have some pretty crazy ideas which I still need to develop, but those will be revealed in due time (i.e., as soon as I make up my mind!!). For now let me start with part of a building, precisely a spaceport. This will be quite a centerpiece on the board, just for its size if not anything else. I'm planning to use foamboard for the main structure, but it's more practical if I build and paint the inner part of it in advance and later on I build the structure around it. Let me explain with pics.

First of all, I used this Danish butter cookies box:

Seriously, has anyone ever seen actual cookies in any of these?

A foamboard door and some filler for the columns

This is beginning to look like something

I used texturised paint for the floor. It took a couple of layers, as the looks of it with just one was less than impressive:

But you can get an accurate idea by now

It needed some weathering and stuff. I finally got this:

Just a close up of the workbench. A fire extinguisher (safety first!), a toolbox and a couple of gas cans:

I have to add tools and dirty stuff, but I guess it works for now

This is all I have right now, but I'm already working on the whole building that will host this tiny spaceship garage. You can see it's not impressive at all, just a 30cm (1') diameter hollow space, but I hope it will look better when in place.

You may legitimally ask why bother on all this when Knights of Dice produce this beauty (it is a real beauty):

And has a European distributor: Shiny Games

I hope you'll understand when you see what I'm up to. But of course I can be persuaded of having two spaceports instead of one :P

All in due time. For the moment I have more than enough with my ongoing projects. I'll elaborate more on all this as soon as I have something decent to show!