Qiang watchtower

Now, this is the fourth one I've made of these and each time it's been a bit different. Same idea though, a large tower with a small construction next to it with some walls surrounding a small compound. These things in real life are quite something and it was difficult to make it so it would sit on a table and still look the part, hopefully it works...

This is a picture from the net of a real one, or a collection of real ones. As you can see, unless a large hill is built then it's quite difficult to get them right. There are even more extreme versions as well.

Anyway, onto the build. The main carcass was built from 5mm foamex (this material has many different names but is a type of dense styrofoam and can be cut a shaped with a scalpel) and once this was done it was covered in resin casts of Wills sheeting. I have had a large, A4 size, sheet of this stuff made from four sheets of the Wills styrene as it's much easier and cheaper to cover larger areas with it. There was some balsa wood used for the roofs and it was distressed quite a lot.

On to the painting. Various sprays were used lightly all over the build to break up the colour as much as possible (the photos don't really show this) and once they had dried then it was onto the weathering and washing. Many shades of brown and green were used, both pastels and inks, again to help break up the monotony. Also, several different greys and tans were used to drybrush some difference into it.

The ground was heavily drybrushed with varying shades of warm, earthy colours and a few inks were put on in places. Once all these had dried then the growies were added. Two different types for this build but more than I normally put. The area in which these tower inhabit do have some very lush locations.

Some balsa walkways were added to the courtyard and were painted the same as the roofs, namely sprayed brown and then lots of washes and drybrushes of different hues. Stains were added with pastels and the whole thing was given a coat of spray matt varnish.

ttfn

The grand fleet of the Murakami clan

Bit of a showcase post this one as I've been slowly casting and painting ships to do some Japanese naval gaming at some point in the near future and now I have enough for at least one force...Potentially two ;-)

The smaller ship will be going in the catalogue at some point soon but I thought it would be good to get a few done first to show them off.

The flags aren't glued and can be replaced with other clan mon depending on what fleets are chosen. I'm also penning some simple rules to go with them but they will need some playtesting before I post them.

On to the pictures :-)

ttfn

Japanese yamashiro watch tower

Staying on the Japanese theme, we have a wooden watchtower that would've been used in the numerous yamashiro that populated the landscape of Japan in sengoku period.

The main vertical struts had notches lasered in them on two sides (there were two of each of two different arrangements) to allow the horizontal members to fit easily and to keep the structure fairly strong. A deck was added to the top and the roof was made separately to allow the placement of figures.

I've still got a ladder to make and will possibly put some tate up on the deck as well but these will be removable. No wip pictures I'm afraid but I'll hopefully do that when I build the next one.

ttfn

200 followers!

A big thank you to all of you who follow my rambles and projects :-)

Here is a random selection of photos of past projects for your pleasure :-)

ttfn

Japanese sea cliffs

A small test piece for some future terrain making for when I eventually get round to doing some Japanese naval gaming.

Cliff inspiration from the net for starters (I hasten to add that this is for inspiration and I'm not trying to copy it).

First off was to carving some blue foam into the type of shape I wanted for the tester, keeping it fairly small in case it went wrong. It was done in a similar way to the Dorset cliffs but with a more vertical effect.

Next was the texture and it was a home brew mix of Sandtex and fine gravel. Liberally brushed on but not too much to look like thick paint. Some of the blue foam bits came off but some were added to the bottom to look like they had fallen (maybe a few more on the next ones). I didn't take a picture of the texture stage but went straight onto the colouring of the rocks and top landscape. Whiteish drybrushing in varying degrees of 'wetness' were applied to the cliffs and then a few different coloured inks were put on to break up the monotone colour (doesn't show up that well in the photos). The top bit was given a few heavy brushes of an earthy colour but it didn't really matter so much as the top was going to be covered in foliage. A tidal mark was also painted on with inks using a support to keep the brush level all the way round.

The foliage was the last big stage. I just went mad with bits of broken trees, trees sprues (the trees I use are made from a brass etch frame which is coloured and then the foliage is glued on top), some tropical looking plants and varying colours of clump foliage I had. The final thing was to paint a suitable beach colour on the base.

The finished result is pretty much what I was after and I'll be doing some more and bigger one in the near future. There's also a picture down there of a Man 'O' War ship as these could possibly be use for that as well.

ttfn

Star Wars ships so far

Just a quick post today with a picture showing all the ships and vehicles I've done for my Star Wars project up to now.

Top row, left to right.

TIE fighter (straight Bandai kit, just assembled and painted)
Old Imperial shuttle (modified toy, see an earlier post)
T-47c Snow speeder (modified Bandai kit, see an earlier post
T-16 (complete scratchbuild, see an earlier post)

Middle row

Intersystem cargo ship (complete scratchbuild)
Heavy space fighter (heavily modified Bandai kit)
Personal fighter (complete scratchbuild)
Heavy cargo skiff (complete scratchbuild)

Bottom row

Y-TIE ugly (two modified Bandai kits)
Racing 'Speedster' (complete scratchbuild)
Small cargo skiff (complete scratchbuild)

If there is enough interest I will post individual shots of all of them :-)

ttfn