Happy Christmas and some artistic inspiration

Happy Christmas to you all out there in blog land and all the best for 2015. This will be my last post of 2014. Six posts this year was to say the least a bit pathetic, so my first resolution for next year is to up the post rate. Wish me luck, I'll need it.

As for the inspiration, the pictures above are from Julian Merrow-Smith's brilliant blog

They have inspired me in creating my Battle in a box terrain project. He lives and works in Vaucluse, in the South of France.

More inspiration to come in the new year, all the best to you and yours 

Airhead

Never look a gift aquarium in the mouth

Just a quick post about a find I made recently when over at our costal estate (father in-laws house) He had bought himself a big new second hand aquarium. The previous owner  had some expanded polystyrene panels on the back wall of the tank to give the impression of natural rock backdrop to the tank.

Knowing about my wargaming affliction, when he took the panels out of his new tank to replace them with a new backdrop, he saved the old panels for me. Thinking I might have some use for them. What a star.

The pictures above show the panels along side some of my Greek 1/1200 Triremes. I'll repaint the panels cut them down and use them to create shorelines for my navel forces to fight around. I might build some small costal towns/ports as well in 1/1200 scale to go on them.

TTFN

Airhead

Its a small world

More progress on my 2mm battle in a box project, I've moved onto producing some built up area for the forces to fight over. The village and the walled farm are built on 30mm square art board, as shown in the bottom two pictures, to match the 30mm terrain squares on the boards. The bottom picture also shows how the center of the village with the church on can be removed so an infantry unit can be placed in the centre of the village, the buildings are made from high density foam. Carved using a sharp craft knife.

I've also bought another art box to be cannibalized into use as a battle in a box Mk2. Pictures to follow. It was only £9.99 from The Works. Bigger and more impressive than Mk1, I think some high hills might be on the agenda for MK2.

TTFN

Airhead

We have lift off

Two pictures showing the islands with most of their Sand and grit applied, the bottom image shows some of the string I used for creepers. The top of each island was covered in Mod Rock to give the look of over hanging turf with the rock eroded from underneath it. If you have never come across ModRock you should check it out for terrain modeling. Its basically gauze bandage impregnated with plaster of paris, great for creating soft contours. The top picture shows the islands drying out.

TTFN

Airhead

Off world terrain

I started out with some small sketches, shown in the last post and a drawing on my iPhone to give me a good starting point to aim for. These floating Islands are of course based around the terrain from Avitar, the film with the big blue dude's in. I was looking to create something which could be fought over and also fits stylistically with my pre existing earthbound terrain. So didn't want to have islands covered in heavy jungle type terrain like in the film. I also had a look through my reference files and found some illustrations which had some elements in which I thought would give the terrain an other worldly vibe.

The bottom two pictures show the islands in there early stages of production when they had been carved out of polystyrene and covered in PVA glue and had sand and small stones glued all over them. They have also started to have the hanging vines inserted into them and stuck with the hot glue gun, most of the vines were made from different types of paper clips but some were made from string which was stiffened with supper glue before being glued to the bases of the island.

TTFN

Airhead

Back in the saddle

So I'm back in the saddle after my prolonged absence. Just over 12 months since I last posted, apart from my resent WW1 post of my grandfathers photo. Nothing hobby wise has taken place over the last year, other than some magazine buying and blog watching when time permitted. A big thanks to all the wargaming blogger out there who helped to keep me entertained and informed over what has been a very hard 12 months. But as those Python chaps would say "always look on the bright side" 

So onwards and upwards. I have some projects that were part completed when thing's ground to a holt last September, including my Vietnam SF fire base in 15mm, 10mm Early WW1 and the 2mm scale battle in a box project and also a couple of project that I had yet to mention on the Blog.

The two pictures above are of some working sketches I've done for my first none historical terrain, in-fact you could call it off world terrain. I came across the FUBAR S/F rules on the web, and wanted to create some terrain to use them with. I purchased some Pendraken 10mm SF troops and vehical to use. I was looking to create some free standing terrain pieces which I could use alongside my standard earth bound terrain but to create a very alien off world feeling to fight over.

So the project is Planet FUBAR, more to follow soon.

TTFN Airhead 

One of the lucky ones

My Grandfather who served from February 1915 up-until 1918, and came home, and in remembrance of all those who didn't, from all the nations involved.