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I’ve been having a blast playing on the Silesian Trenchline scenery set for the last two weeks. Spoiler Alert: The set has been completed for quite some time now. That out of the way, let’s rewind a bit and get right back to where I left in the Silesian Trenchline part two article. That would be the undercoat…
In order to save time I prefer to get everything built first, then apply undercoat wholesale. This is where two 2×4′ folding tables and a set of thin HDF trays tends to come in handy. I go one tray / large piece at a time, spraying black undercoat where it’s required. I then set the tray on one of the tables and get another one. Once out of free space, I stack the trays on top of the previous layer, using small plastic cups as supports with a minimal point of contact. Fifteen minutes later everything’s nicely black.
For the painting process I went with a trusted, simple color scheme. The goal of which was to produce effective results while being easy to repeat across the entire set or to return to with any new scenery additions in the future (Such as the Antenna Cross added later on).
The core list of paints and a video tutorial following each step of the painting process can be found at Tutorial: Painting Trench Crusade Antenna Cross.
Easy to say the painting process was much faster than the building and modeling part. One to two hours of airbrushing followed by a few more hours spent on detailing. Finally a break after applying the AK Interactive Dark Earth texture on top of each piece, to come back another day and finish with a round of drybrush, apply varnish, add a few dozen Gamers Grass Brown 2mm tufts and call it done.
Although the Silesian Trenchline was complete and I had a few games on the set, the inspirational release never came. A few days later I still felt hunger for more Trench Crusade scenery for my tiny dudesmen to explore. The set felt complete and was pretty playable, but upon giving it more thought I figured to double down on some fancy centerpieces – or at least fancier than the ones I already had…
First, I added the probably most iconic Trench Crusade scenery piece – the Antenna Cross. I used a widely available STL with a few tweaks to increase playability and set the piece within my existing scenery set visual cues. A large wooden step around the base of the cross with a small sniper’s nest mid way up the cross and some Sandbags here and there made it work. I felt sated for the day…
The very next day, I had to come back to the project for another round. Got super inspired with a set of DIY objective markers seen at a local Discord – just had to make a set of my own. Nothing special, just a mix of resized 3d printed weapons, crates, ammunition and candles. I threw in a Meshmixered statue of Saint Karen – Patron of Supplies Acquisition, for a strongly themed secondary centerpiece.
Done in two hours, with a bit more work put into making the objective markers pop on the gaming board, finally put my scenery hunger to rest. For now…
This is it. The Silesian Trenchline is now ‘fully’ completed, ready to be fed the blood of plastic fighters. Will it ever get expanded? Maybe, but I already moved on to more projects, including half a dozen commissioned lightweight Trench Crusade scenery sets. I also feel like putting a lot more games in, before deciding what scenery might improve the playability on the Silesian Trenchline. If you have any fun ideas – be sure to drop them in the comments below. Until then – keep your helmets on!
hope you find this article interesting. Be sure to let me know your thoughts in the comments below, or at Facebook or Instagram. I would also appreciate it if you considered sharing this content with your friends, who might find it useful. Finally if you are looking for a professional miniatures painting service, be sure to contact me with this contact form. I always reply within 24 hours, after which please check out your spam folder.
It has been a few days in the grips of the Trench Crusade fever. The squad and I had a few games, and went deep into the no man’s land. With the construction of the Silesian Trenchline (part one) we have crossed the point of no return. In order to finish the scenery set and be able to play the game for real, an array of proper peripherals and extras had to be made. So here we are…
I kicked off with a set of most essential peripherals, being the walkways, ladders and firing steps. These are necessary to get the most out of the entire trench line. Fortunately they are also fast and easy to make.
For the walkways I used two thin pieces of 3mm thick plasticard to support the length and adhered some broken stirring sticks on top. I was considering cutting the sides to fit the ‘rails’ underneath but ended up liking the ramshackle look.
The ladders were made by gluing a few steps on top of two, precisely cut, stirring sticks. I then glued decorative halved balls to fake nails. Not very realistic, but a cheap additional detail to spice things up.
Finally I used the leftover sides of the XPS foam as the base for the firing steps. These got cut into 4″ and 6″ long pieces then covered with PVA glue and stirring sticks one side at a time. Once properly adhered, the stirring sticks got nipped off. The process was then repeated on another side until completed, resulting in a set of very light, but durable firing steps.
The Extras such as damaged barrels, stacks of ammo crates etc. are great to hinder miniatures movement and provide some additional cover on the board. Most importantly this type of scenery adds much needed detail to the composition and can be moved around easily for best visual results.
I used a bunch of 3d printed elements (full list at the bottom) and mounted them on a 3mm thick plasticard with cyanoacrylate glue. I then added some small gravel and poured thin cyanoacrylate on top, sealing it with an activator. This created extra texture and volume around the 3d printed objects. I then cut off the excess of the plasticard, forming an irregular shaped base for each piece. In my opinion this makes the scenery look less artificial and allows for individual pieces to be combined into larger shapes by siding them with one another.
The scenery set was taking shape, but it still lacked the most important thing – the ‘soul’. The Trench Crusade follows a certain artistic theme and I wanted to tap into it and create some memorable centerpieces. Elements of scenery not just to steal a glance or two, but seem significant on the gaming board. To try to achieve this goal I have built two shrines, by breaking and mixing 3d printed elements with stirring sticks. I then based both of them on 3mm plasticard, then combined them with two smallest pieces of the trench wall – both of which have a straight vertical space designed for this particular purpose. Gravel and super glue followed to build volume and texture.
No proper Trench Crusade board should be devoid of Bunkers and I have added three 3d printed pieces to the set. All properly based on 3mm thick plasticard and surrounded with extra details. I used this opportunity to introduce two rows of anti-tank fortifications to go alongside one of the bunkers, further enhancing the militaristic theme of the set.
In order to push the overall theme of the set one step further I glued a few dozen sandbag barricades along the trenches with the PVA glue. Initially I planned to keep these separate, but a few test games convinced me otherwise. The reduction of modularity was a fair price to pay for the decreased setup time, comfort of use and improved transportation.
With everything built and ready, the undercoat followed. A lengthy process of mounting every scenery piece on top of a tray with two sided tape, then spraying black undercoat all around. I do like my undercoat done right after all…
And with that out of the way the only thing left seem to be the painting process, but this I will leave for the next article – coming soon. In the meantime feel free to engage with me about this project at Scarhandpainting social media or down in the comments below. I’d be happy to chat 😉
List of used STL files:
Sandbags & Barrels by DICEVERSE
Bunkers by GRADDESIGN
Tanktraps by BIMBUSPRINTABLES
Cannon Ammunition Crates by MKHAND_INDUSTRIES
Cannon Shells by MKHAND_INDUSTRIES
Artillery by ALPINEWEISS3D
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The Trench Crusade got me my friends. Apart from the allure of the online hype, a lot of my buddies spent the last few weeks entrenched in mud, inviting me in. I gave up and fell victim to their plea for reinforcements. If you follow my blog for a while, you already know that when I get into a game I go all-in, thus here we are – I am making the Trench Crusade gaming board. Now put your helmets on and follow me into the Silesian Trenchline.
Usually, when planning a scenery set for miniatures wargaming, I start by making a rough sketch, or set up a provisional board to gauge how much scenery elements feel right. With the Trench Crusade, the community is wildly creative. Scrolling through some amazing examples of gaming boards online I got an idea of how much stuff there should be and how I’d like to approach things. I purchased a few pieces of 50mm thick Styrofoam (XPS foam), a large bottle of PVA glue, 1L of brown acrylic paint, few packages of thin wooden stirring sticks and got to work.
The core concept of the board was to have it modular, but not limited to square panels. The brilliant idea of creating trenches via stacking walled hills on top of the battlefield really spoke to me thus I went with that. I’m not one to sit down and precisely measure stuff and prefer to work fast and intuitively. The way I do things is cut a single piece of material, then use it as a measuring tool and cut the rest following the lines of the template and a piece of straight board or something currently at hand. I find minor lapse in precision working for the visual benefit and realism of the scenery set. This is what I did, cutting a single 4×4″ triangle and using it as a tool to mark core shapes in XPS. Once done I cut out the shapes with a wallpaper knife.
For the angled sides of the ‘hills’ I marked the top of each piece with a marker, following a previously cut piece of XPS about 1″ wide. This way I had the top of the slope, the supposed bottom being the actual edge of each piece. I then cut, focusing on holding the knife in a steady position and following the imaginable angle between the two lines, not caring if I made any slight errors on the way.
Once I had a few core shapes I set them up on a 4×4 gaming mat in order to see how the set ‘feels’ and how much I need to add to reach the goal.
I wanted to have my ‘trenches’ textured with something simple, but effective and look rough. I chose to go with gluing texture on top of the walls with PVA glue. For this I cut old wallpaper alongside a piece of badly damaged transportation paper into strips slightly wider than the height of the ‘walls’. Glued them one at a time on each scenery piece, then upon reaching the second round I used scissors to cut off the excess of the dried out piece, before adding another one beside it.
I then used a large synthetic brush and sealed everything with a mix of PVA glue and water. Left it to dry afterwards.
Once the scenery was completely dry, I used a portable gas burner to diversify the texture on top of each piece – done outdoors. I then used PVA glue to mount some roughly cut stirring sticks in semi regular intervals on the sides of the trenches. Finally, using Super Glue, I glued a lot of these 3d printed crosses on each wallpaper covered side, then cut the bottom excess using clippers. This provided a visually interesting setting composition with just enough detail to fit the world of the Trench Crusade, but not too much not to stand out from under the actual scenery.
The final step for the day was to seal everything again. I mixed water, PVA glue, brown acrylic paint and fine decorative sand then used it to apply texture on top of each piece. I then added a bit more paint and water into the mix and gave the sides a spin. With the help of my valiant daughter we’ve done another round just to build up volume and increase future durability of the scenery.
The pieces got stacked on top of one another and left to dry through the night, while I sat down to tinker with some extras, mainly walkways, ladders and trench platforms, but I will leave that for the upcoming Special Project: Silesian Trenchlines part two – Peripherals and Extras.
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Armies On Parade – a yearly contest held by Games Workshop, pitting lovingly crafted Warhammer armies from across the globe against each other. I always admired all the stunningly painted pieces of art presented in the content with a mix of awe and jealousy. Deep down I felt (and still feel) the ceiling is just too high for me to reach. Then again the entire theme of this competition seems to be fun and participation, sharing our hobby joy, rather than trying to win against the very pinnacle of talented people out there. This year, seven days before the very deadline, I have decided to unleash my Crimson Fists and join the challenge!
Like all of my hobby projects, the Crimson Fists collection started out of nowhere. I was ‘divorced’ with Warhammer 40,000 for about ten years, after abandoning a huge Space Marines army back at the down of the sixth edition. The new Primaris Marines grew on me and for a long time I felt like it’ll be fun to start a new army. One day something broke and I went for it, getting just enough carefully selected boxes to build a solid 2000 points list. I had many ideas on where to take my miniatures, including multiple made up Chapters and color schemes. In the end, remembering the wrathful charge of the Crimson Fists from the “Crimson Tears” Soul Drinkers novel, I decided to follow up on a youthful dream of a Crimson Fists collection. Contrary to my usual practices of fast bulk painting to play, I focused on small numbers, cherishing the process and pouring my heart and soul into each and every miniature. I steadily grew the collection, adding a few units at a time, prioritizing unit diversity rather than chasing the meta. As it happens, expanding a collection by adding one or two units every month, allows for some awesome hobby experience – but also expands the available toolset to breathe fresh air into the gaming experience. With a lively, positive local community around the corner, I’m having the time of my life with miniatures games right now and am speaking from over 25 years of wargaming experience behind my belt.
Easy to say that having a main, living project – a growing collection to add to and have fun with, might have saved me as a hobbyist. I love my Crimson Fists army and it is for this reason that I chose to honor it by preparing a special diorama.
Once I’ve committed I had a really bad time sleeping – multiple ideas ferociously fighting with one another inside my head. I spent almost four hours laying in bed, trying to fall asleep, grinding thoughts on how to better present the army. In the end I chose to focus on a two level base with a part of an exposed ground level and a large vantage point. I have been building advanced Crimson Fists themed scenery for the last year and figured a relatively simple base would allow me to use everything I have to build an interesting background and add detail.
To spice things up I have added a decrepit bunker complex entry tunnel and taken it a little bit further with a set of small lights spread across its length. Because there was an entire vantage level coming in on top – I had to finish painting the tunnel before starting to work on the exterior area.
It took me about four hours from laying a wooden worktop on the ground to sealing the vantage floor on top of the finished tunnel. What was left was the exterior and this part was rather easy in comparison. It took less than two hours of the actual work (and a lot of AK Interactive’s Dark Ground texture paint apart from other hobby materials) to see the thing completed.
Once the painting process was finished, I was left with the tedious and challenging process of setting up the background, planning the scene and breathing some life into it. I always admired cinematic shots from White Dwarf magazines – never would I ever dared to imagine I would be taking one myself 🙂
It took a lot of time and hard decision making on which units to include and which ones had to be cut, but in the end I finally had my epic, cinematic shot. Or at least a test shot to be precise.
Now all is in the hands of Games Workshop’s team. Let’s see if I can get as much as a shout out from them. Keep your fingers crossed for me mates!
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I have been a huge fan of everything Pirates since early childhood. It started with LEGO Pirates back when it was still a brand new hotness, then continued to grow throughout the years. Once I moved to Miniatures Wargaming I dipped my toes in a range of Naval warfare games, Dreadfleet being the latest. Years went on, games rose and sunk, all the while I craved to find that ultimate Naval warfare experience – with beautiful miniatures and all the sassy fantasy vibes… and I did!
At the end of cursed year 2020 Mantic Games released their own naval game Kings of War: Armada. A wide range of artfully designed, beautifully detailed and perfectly themed “Tiny Resin Ships“. I fell for this game head over heels. Got all four available fleets and started expanding collection, feeding a typical hobby hype frenzy. Once I run out of ships I set my sights on a grand new project: Scenery set. But not any scenery set – an ultimate, well crafted and detailed set to match with the ships. Here’s where story of the “Kraken Islands” begun…
I set sails and ventured into the unknown, experimenting with stuff I had at home. Few hours of work saw a first pair of islands done. The process (that you can follow in it’s entirety here) was rather simple and the result looked pretty decent. It increased my hype and sealed the deal – I was about to make more islands!
As time passed, new islands joined the collection. First another pair in a similar theme to the first one, next a set of rocks to add verticality and diversity on the gaming board. The scenery seemed fine as a gaming set, but felt far from an “ultimate set”.
Armed with experience from previous endeavor and nagged by a creative muse – I gathered a crew and set sails in search of ultimate Armada scenery once again. This time around I aimed at larger, multi level, more interesting islands. Scenery pieces that could tell a story. For this purpose I decided to dump plasticard in favor of bark. More so, I spent over half an hour to dug up some old sculpts, made years back for unfinishedTM 3d Settlers of Catan board project. These costed me a lot of work back in the days and I was happy to use them for such a cool project.
It took me two days to finish a first amongst the new islands. “Lighthouse Island” looked pretty dope as a centerpiece and set the direction for the upcoming series.
The work continued and soon “Wizard Island”, “Volcano Island” and a series of smaller “Wild Islands” followed. The set looked great and brought a feeling of satisfaction. It definitely sated my hunger for Armada scenery. For the time being at least…
Having few games on the set and using it as a background for Fleets photographic sessions brought a creeping feeling of unease. Sure the islands looked cool and I already put a lot of effort into them, but something just felt off. It took a while to pinpoint the exact issue – bases just didn’t fit the fleets theme. They had to go.
Once I set my mind on something I go for it all speed ahead! I have contacted a friend from Micro Art Studio to help me out. He used a set of size comparison pictures I took and established dimensions for acrylic bases. Time stretched as I impatiently awaited delivery. Finally – they got here (like few days later) and I let the barbarism of removing previous bases, take control of me. Pulling off huge chunks of painted plasticard, all the while protecting detail from getting damaged, was the hard part. In contrast, basing went smooth and easy.
After an intense day of thorough rebasing I had it! The final form of the Kraken Islands was there for me to behold. And it seems I’m done with the project… For the time being at least…
See full gallery at: GALLERY KRAKEN ISLANDS
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Welcome to second part of the “Mortician’s Pitch” Special Project part 1 article in witch I take you on a ride from bare meshed wood planks to a finished Guild Ball pitch. Stick around and see how “Mortician’s Pitch” came to being.
Let’s pick up where the previous article ended: Two thin coats of black wall paint followed up by a Chaos Black sprayed undercoat. All to reinforce the surface and prep it for a paint job. The paint job itself was divided into three parts: “paving stones”, “grave holes” and “pitch lines”.
This part was pretty easy. A solid coat of Vallejo 74.603 German Panzer Grey, followed by a 1:1 mix with Vallejo 74.601 Grey drybrush and then with pure Vallejo 74.601 Grey drybrush. All done with a 4″ wide brush. With these three layers done some brown haze was airbrushed here and there with Vallejo Air 71.133 Dirt and Vallejo Air 71.042 Cam. Black Brown.
Next part was to paint the insides of the detailed holes. I airbrushed most of it with a mix of browns, and then grays. A soft bright grey drybrush over stone elements, one layer highlight of the coffins and bony paint job of skulls – all complicated a bit due to the sheer size of the board pieces, but other than that simple and easy. That is because I planed for water effect to be darkened with few drops of brown ink. Paint job just didn’t need to be intricate.
Most dangerous part of the project was Resin. Working with resin is very difficult. The thing is messy AF, sticky, gotta be carefully prepared and poured in, but most importantly – a single tiny hole and entire thing ends up on the floor and all over the underside of a project. I know this, because it happened in the past with. More so, a tiny drop on your hand and you can be sure of glossy stains everywhere! With Mortician’s Pitch I actually came prepared. I prepped solid plastic barriers for the half-holes at the middle of the board. I also sealed any potential holes with a thin layer of PVA glue. The resin got poured in and the long wait started…
… and it all went to shit when over 24hrs later I realized that resin is still sticky. I gave it another day to coagulate with no positive result. If you worked with resin you probably know what that means – if resin is still sticky after 48 hours it will stay this way forever. I must had messed up proportions when mixing two ingredients with colored ink. A revitalization process started, with me spooning gummy “goo” out, carefully not to damage paint job underneath. Was very difficult and took few days to accomplish, but I finally landed at a point where it was possible to apply another (this time properly mixed) layer and seal it.
Last part of the paint job, finally possible due to resin being properly hard. I carefully measured distances around the board, covered resin parts with paper thin plasticard and used painting tape to mask most of the board. I then airbrushed the lines with pure white paint.
Revealing the final effect was hell of an excitement. Now I gotta play some games on this troublesome new board!
I hope you like the article. Don’t be a stranger and let me know what you think either in the comments or at my Facebook page.
My hype for Guild Ball is pretty strong. The game looks like a lot of fun and miniatures have a great feel to them, that makes me want to leave everything else and just start painting. My Mortician’s team being currently on hold I decided to focus all the Guild Ball related inspiration around another project – Mortician’s Pitch.
At first I thought about something blunt, like cobblestone texture with pitch features airbrushed on top. Thing would be both playable and looking nice. It all changed once I accidentally bumped into this magnificent piece of scenery by Brokentoad. Those half buried coffins almost catapulted me out of a chair. Such a nice idea. I knew I will order this piece, but first I just had to implement a similar feature to the project. This made “Mortician’s Pitch” evolve from a simple flat cobblestone into a more 3d design. Still, how to insert irregular shapes on top of what is meant to be a playable surface… and then I thought about clear resin…
Off course a man gotta pick a right spot to dig a grave, not to mention placing an entire graveyard. I decided to go with two 10mm thick, 100x50cm wide meshed wood planks as a base for the pitch. These are a bit wider than necessary, but playing different games throughout the years taught me to leave some spare space around the proper gaming area. This way if anything gets damaged it wouldn’t impact playability of the board. 10mm thickness means these would stay flat and be durable enough to withstand any random fuckups that might happen some day.
In order to allow me to “work” with the surface and nest any 3d elements I chose to cover the boars with additional layer of 5mm thick styrofoam.
I carefully planned the layout of the board. Figured that it would be cool to have goals and the middle point of the pitch additionally detailed. I have a huge amount of random stuff scattered around my hobby room and as it happened I had a perfect match for these features.
With goals in place I covered entire board with styrofoam, leaving only certain spots to reveal detailed elements from underneath. I also left two holes for the most important feature – coffins. Additionally I reinforced the edges of the board with thin planks of wood – just in case. I just like my scenery durable and sturdy.
For base texture I picked a trusted wallpaper that helped me with other fantasy projects in the past. Being easy to work with a wallpaper is a great way to texturize large areas, plus it helps keep wobbling models safe in case of a fall.
I glued the wallpaper on top of entire board. No measuring required – I removed excess wallpaper with a giant file. Fast & simple.
I uncovered all the detailed features by cutting the wallpaper around them, leaving approximately 1-2cm surplus, to then cut it into smaller strips to be glued inside the holes.
Now was the time to bring in all the coffins. These were made using 3mm thick plasticard. In projects like this I tend to save time and leave perfect measurements out. Once I measured and cut out a single coffin, I then used it as a template to cut all the rest. Fast & simple yet again.
These then got texturized using a medium sized stone. Plasticard is a durable material, but with enough force it gives in and stones are great to provide an uneven texture.
Next step was to insert the coffins and some additional detail elements into the holes. I used white plaster to partially fill the holes, then arranged all the detail inside.
With all the features arranged to my liking I textured the insides of the holes with Games Workshop Martian Ironcrust texture paint. Once dried I placed some dry twigs here and there and sealed everything with PVA glue. This last step was very important to ensure resin stays in once used.
Everything modeled it was time to undercoat entire board with trusted acrylic black paint. Two thin layers of a black wall paint followed by a spray coat of Chaos Black.
This project was planned to last approximately 48hrs, but working with clear resin can sometimes lead to unexpected (and messy) complications. More than a week into the project and some of the resin didn’t coagulate properly. I decided to scrape it off and apply another layer. This is also why I decided to divide this article into two. Undercoat seems like a great place to finish part one.
If you like the article and find it interesting – be sure to let me know either in the comments or at my Facebook page. See you in the next article, hopefully soon. Here’s a little sneak peek:
The idea of introducing cars to my Infinity gaming board is one to haunt me for quite some time now. Many times I found myself in a toy store, standing before a toy car shelf and trying to pick a right car to fit Infinity the Game scale and sci-fi theme. Easy to say that all my efforts were futile, thus I postponed the idea time and time again, slowly loosing hope. This state of things changed drastically just few days ago…
I was visiting the post office, when all of a sudden I saw it! The postal worker was playing with an ideal toy car. Wait!? She wasn’t playing at all! That was a PC Mouse! Imagine my shock, when that realization struck me. Shaped like a car, with lights glowing bright, the PC Mouse was just perfect!
Two days later I was in possession of half a dozen PC Mouse cars. This was where “Infinity Cars” Special Project actually started. After a good look at the cars features I figured that apart of awesome futuristic design, the cars had translucent light covers, black mirrored glass, chrom elements plus some of them had battery powered interior glowing lights. These were key features I wanted to transfer onto final form. I started dismantling the cars to pieces…
It didn’t took long, as parts came off pretty easily. Depending on a car type there were either one or two screws that needed handling, other than that I only needed to pull parts gently for them to come apart.
Every piece being separated, I prepared everything for a proper paint job. I didn’t modify the cars too much. Removed “scroll buttons” and glued in some Warhammer 40k bitz to add Sci-fi looks instead, glued left and right buttons firm, removed “the insides” of cable mouses. Didn’t even bother to strip the paint.
Afterwards the cars got undercoated and soon after I applied a paint job with bright, juicy colours. I decided to keep the paint job simple, with no decals, freehands and other stuff that could have spoiled the perfect shape of these futuristic cars bodies. These are scenery pieces after all, too much is not always same as better.
The “Infinity Cars” are nowe done and I cannot wait to use them in the upcoming games of Infinity. I do hope you like the idea of using PC Mouse as an Infinity scenery piece. If you want to grab your own, just look for “PC Mouse Car” at E-bay or google. In the meantime I invite you tocheck out the “Infinity Cars” Gallery… and tell me what you think in the comments below 😉
Cheers!
“The Mirrored City of Shadespire is a nightmare plane of illusions and madness, an ever-changing labyrinth of endless stairs, cramped streets and soaring archways. The original city is drained of all color and life, and for thousands of years, it has rested as a foreboding ruin. Those unfortunate, brave, or foolhardy adventurers that set foot within its walls are drawn through the veil between realms and trapped within the Mirrored City. For such wayward souls, all hope seems lost. Yet there are those who will not accept their fate without a fight.”
Whenever I pick a new title I always crave to have an ultimate gaming set – the same happened with Warhammer Underworlds: Shadespire. It started when I’ve finished working on a small Shadespire commission and was instantly drawn into the game. Two days later I was already painting my first warband – the Sepulchral Guard, but it wasn’t enough to quench my hobbystic thirst. I moved to another warband, being Garrek’s Reavers, all the while my hype was kept strong by Shadespire facebook group – full of awesome inspiration. Somewhere in the middle of Garrek’s Reavers paint job I let myself be overwhelmed by hype and decided to go for a Shadespire scenery set. The idea was to keep it as crazy cool as I am capable of. Concept was there – inside my head – all along, fueled by Shadespire’s background story and insanely sweet art from the rulebook. So, the scenery was to fit the board with a ‘ruined city of sorcery and mysticism’ theme in mind. Most important part: ‘Shadeglass’ – broken, ghostly lit mirrors incorporated to a variety of trinkets, statues, pools, wells etc.
The way I see scenery making is this:
I faced “Shadeglass Scenery” Project following these key points. Started by preparing all the stuff that seemed usable and/or necessary. I like my scenery to be light, durable and painting friendly, so I picked 3mm plasticard to become both bases and baseline shape. Used hot water to bend some pieces, then cut ‘walls’ and hex bases out of the stuff…
Plasticard is very easy to work with. Adding texture all over newly created ‘pieces’ was a matter of using a right tool, rather than sophisticated and time consuming techniques…
With texturized walls and bases I was ready to move to major features – Shadeglass vessels of all sorts and sizes. For this purpose I used perfume cups plundered from my wife’s collection. (At the point when I’m writing this article she already noticed all the missing cups – fortunately the scenery is done and we played with it so she’s more like – ‘for the greater good’)…
Throughout about twenty years in the hobby I accumulated a vast collection of bitz, although until recently skulls where a rare commodity in the collection – Praise Nagash, Games Workshop released a set of skulls thus rendering them near to unlimited. Skulls backstory aside – I used some bitz to add detail and points of focus to the scenery…
I then used self prepared Hobby Gravel to add more detail and make the scenery pieces look ‘ruined’. Once I was sure that each piece is telling it’s own story – final polish followed and all was ready to get painted…
Painting a ruined city of sorcery and ghosts was an interesting transition between a color recipe I use for Shadespire warband’s bases and working on a much more bigger scale. I decided to follow my guts – start as usual and then see where it would take me. Somewhere along the way I started adding blends of purple to compliment incoming ghostly green’ish-turquoise hum. This turned out to be a bullseye hit, creating an illusion of morbid, colorful lights dancing across the ruins…
The ghostly hum of Shadeglass was a real challenge. I feel very comfortable with toxic green light, but going turquoise is moving away from warm color spectrum – my sphere of comfort. Still a hobbyist gotta do what a hobbyist gotta do – I braved the unknown with a mix of Vallejo’s Jade Green and White.
Broken Shadeglass mirrors – a special feature and main theme of the scenery. Decided to approach this in two different ways. First are the hand painted broken mirrors, adorning walls. I simply airbrushed hard angles with a mix of Jade Green and White using a Scarhandpaing’s business card like a stencil. I then adjusted transitions of particular ‘pieces’ of glass and made them more distinct with sharp white lining. Other vessels were a different story. I cut translucent plastic into shards and tossed them into resin-filled vessels. Some sunk instantly, while others stayed afloat – creating a really nice effect – which unfortunately looks much more badass in real life, than in the pictures.
The “Shadeglass Scenery” set is done and it have already seen some Shadespire action. Who knows what will come next if the hype continues? Either way – if you plan to venture into the Mirrored City – be sure to head there through “SHADEGLASS SCENERY” SPECIAL PROJECT gallery…
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“The Colony” – an Infinity gaming board project that streaches in time and space.
Yes – The Colony Special Project lives on and dayum! I almost run out of space to store it! Last time (“THE COLONY” SPECIAL PROJECT part nine) I was pretty sure that once I airbrush a bit here and there, The Colony would finally be completed. Imagine my surprise when I saw how the project expanded since last article. So, let’s dive straight into it…
It finally happened – The Colony is now fully painted with no MDF, be it white or regular, visible. The project was set aside for few months, when all of a sudden I got new buildings from Gingermane and painted them to match my existing set. I then followed through with all the rest including bridges, food booths, walls and ad stands. Fortunatelly for me, Bocian from Gingermane is a cool bruh of mine and he cut thin paper pieces to cover all illustrations adorning his designs. I only had to take care to cover plexi elements by myself. Once done – my work went fast and easy. Few evenings was all it took.
The Colony is vast already, but there’s always room for some extra terrain pieces. With new Gingermane designs appearing every month it’s difficult to stop expanding . It gets even harder, as he let’s me peek on work in progress designs and I sometimes get to buy some before release. Obviously when I saw ‘SF024 The Tower’ I freaked out and demanded these be handed to me emmediately. Gosh how I love these two…
Another addition to The Colony – ‘SF010 Cargo Crates’. Slowly my own designs and scrap-built scenery are forced off the gaming board. I don’t mind it, cause at this point I’m already hooked on Gingermane’s stuff either way 😛
With ‘SF024 The Tower’ I intorudced black/grey colour to The Colony’s overall scheme. It seem to compliment the board so I followed up on this, going back to older scenery pieces. I wander if these, once paper box, buildings will ever rest…
One day ‘The Colony’ will be finished, but seeing how it changes time and time again I can only say TO BE CONTINUED…
