Small Sanada force

I've started rebasing all my Japanese figures onto pennies and have the first proper force ready to go.

Sanada has been my favourite clan for a long time so it's fitting that these should get done first.

I'm also going to have another look at the Sharp Practise mod I'm doing as I've had a couple of new ideas that will hopefully help to give more of a feel for the period.

One of which is having a number of retainers for each Big Man in relation to his status, so a Big Man three would have three retainers and these can be chosen from banner men, taiko drummers, conch blowers and some others that I've yet to finalise. Each type of retainer confers a bonus to the Big Man or the units he's activated, not too much of a bonus but enough that it might make a difference if used at the right time.

A possible name for the mod is Kankei but it doesn't quite have the ring to it that I'm after :-/

First of all, the group shot

Then we have a Big Man level three, Sanada Akihito

Then his Big Man level two younger brother Sanada Yoritomi

Then a small group of Sanada samurai

And two small teppogumi led by a teppo-taisho on the right (possibly a Big Man level one)

With two larger yarigumi each with its own yari-taisho (again, possibly Big Men one)

More to follow in the form of the Murakami and Miyoshi clans. I also have a unit of Shimazu and a few Ikko-Ikki/wako/rabble to base up and then there's the couple of hundred unpainted figures to get through...

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Gettysburg cemetery gatehouse

This has been done for a while now but I've only just gotten round to cleaning the photographs up (brightening and contrast).

Pretty much 95% acrylic construction with a few resin bits for the twiddly details. The figure is a Perry plastic ACW commander.

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Additions vignettes

Some of you might have seen these on the LAF but I'm putting them here as well.

They are basically small vignettes with a selection of the additions from my catalogue.

The first one is JA03 and JA09, the cannon and palisades.

And the second utilises JA01, JA05 and JA07 which is the lantern set, the small boats and the luggage set.

I've got the graves on one as well and I'll get some pictures of that later this week :-)

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SALUTE 2014

Firstly a quick note to say OSHIRO modelterrain is back open and I would like to say thank you to all those who passed on their goodwill messages :-)

Secondly, it was Salute last week (for those who didn't know) and I've posted some pictures from my samurai display table. This year I actually won the Best Trader Game award of which I am immensely  pleased :-)

Thirdly, I'll have plenty of new posts in the coming months of new and older projects but for now, here are a selection of Salute pictures.

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A bit of news

As some of you may know through my website, OSHIRO modelterrain, I am having to take a few months off due to medical problems.

We will be open again in the new year but as a consequence I'm not taking any orders, commission or catalogue for the time being.

This being said, I intend to do several posts on the ever increasing 'Japanese on Mars' project that has being ongoing over on the LAF. Some of you will have seen the work on this project but it will help to post it here as nothing really new will be done for the coming months.

Many thanks

James

Akira style gaming table

Going to Japan you can't help but notice the almost near future style of the cities, with cramped tower blocks vying for space and a host of bright electric signs.

This type of city has inspired me to do my own version for 28mm gaming and to have it in the style of Akira. For those who don't know what Akira is it's basically a near future, almost post apocalyptic vision of Tokyo with biker gangs, government agencies and psychics. The film is quite a mind boggler but it does have a certain appeal (my paltry synopsis really doesn't do it justice at all).

 For this project I'll be keeping more with what modern Japan (specifically Tokyo) looks like but adding futuristic elements to give that near future vibe.

The first I did was to draw up a simple, generic block of flats. These can been seen all over Japan in differing forms and colours. I'm keeping as much as modular as possible to allow for playability and changing the look of the board.

This a quick shot of a primered set of floors but without the ground floor shop, not very clear at the moment...

This is a view with a test coat of paint and limited weathering. The tiles were marked in the lasered grooves with a technical pen

This is a kit that will be for sale in my catalogue within the next week and below is a slightly better shot showing the top floors. The window frames are left out at this stage to allow for the ease of painting.

The ground floor shop had to be generic and I've drawn up several different designs for shop signs that will hopefully not tread on anybody's ip :-) The kit will come with window frames and glazing.

For the gaming table I will also be trying to light as much as possible and below are a couple of pictures of the shop being lit...

One of the features of modern Japan is the very busy, utility based skyline and I hope to achieve that with plenty of these power lines. This one was a test but I will be making a slightly simpler version for casting purposes.

One of the more different structures is the city parking tower which can be found all over the central areas of Japanese cities. An ingenious solution to the ever increasing lack of space, it's basically a tall carousel on which cars are driven on and then rotated for the next free space (that probably doesn't make much sense).

Below are some group shots of the original block of flats with a second one on the go and the parking tower in the middle.

And what Japanese skyline wouldn't be complete without the obligatory red and white comms tower. This will also be in kit form and could be used in many sci-fi settings.

Last but not least I'll be producing an extensive range of small accoutrements and additions to add to the exterior and interior of the buildings, starting with some air con units. I'll be making some bigger ones to go on the roofs and next will be some shop shelves.

Quite an extensive project as you can see but it has been on a back burner for several years now.

More to follow on the actual board itself in a month or so (after my last show of the year) and more on different types of buildings as and when I get a chance to design and build them.

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Off to Japan

Not quite but I've got a samurai commission to show.

It took a little longer than I would've liked but it turned out well in the end :-)

This arrangement has proven quite popular for commission based works and this time the request was to have removable roofs. I used the original templates from the resin catalogue items but cut them out of slightly thicker material to allow for the impression of a decent wall thickness.

I unfortunately didn't really take any decent wip pictures but if look at some of my previous samurai posts you'll get a good idea of the general construction process.

The only slightly difficult part was making the upper roof on the merchants house due to the fact that the upper floor is just about on the same level as the eave line. A rib construction under the tiles allowing for the low floor solved the problem though.

An additions set (JA01) and a small tree were included to add that little bit extra of lived in detail. Below are a couple more shots along with some detail ones.

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