The Return

So long away. What have I done?

I decided to log on to my blog today and discovered it had been three years since I had made my last post. My first two thoughts where " where the  hell has the last three years gone? ", and " Why haven't I been posting anything about any of my projects? " To be honest the desire to post has not been there for a considerable time. My Wife and kids and I made a move across town to a new larger place a few years ago. I was all hyped at the time about finally having the space for a more permanent work area for gaming and modeling, but unfortunately the basement area where I was going to set up proved to be a little too dark  for my eyesight . I ended up working on the good old kitchen table again. Another hitch to my plans was finding people in my town who where interested in gaming the same genre's.  Most people here play 40K or Warhammer Fantasy and little else.  to be honest  I had grown a little tired of those games. Not to mention that they had become a little to difficult to afford on my salary with three children as well. The one friend I did find who was interested in gaming WWII with me, backed out of the project after a few months. I had invested in a large number of figures and vehicles for both of us. Fortunately for me My eldest, an 11 year old boy is showing interest in gaming and model building. We  do have some bumps to work through though. Alex, my son was diagnosed with Autism spectrum disorder when he was four. While while he is very high functioning. we have difficulties with his impulsiveness at times.  which makes  sometimes simple tasks challenging. I am hoping that model building and gaming will help him develop a bit more control over his disorder. My two daughters are also becoming interested in gaming to a small degree. I hope that we can make it a family activity at some point

My blogging plans.


The first thing was a name change. Wargamer on Deck was a name I wasn't really happy with when I created this blog. But I couldn't think of anything better  at the time. With this blog I intend to concentrate  solely on Miniature gaming and Role playing games. So the new title encompasses that, and the sporadic nature in which I indulge them. I am creating a second blog where I will discuss model building. I am certain as yet how to handle the posts that cross both boundaries. So with that in mind, I hope this is a whole new start. I wont promise that i will post regularly, but i will post more often than every three years.


Ciao till nest time
George

Scenery from Acrylic ice chips

I was reading a discussion on TMP today, where Cacique Caribe was asking what potential uses Acrylic ice cubes and chips would have as scenery. It so happens that awhile back I saw some as decorations at one of the grad dances where I was working security. I rushed out the next day to the local craft shop and purchased a tub of them. Once I got them home I proceeded to cut out a base for them out of illustration board. I made the base in a multi hex patern, asI was planning to use them with Heroscape board sections. I then coated the base with snow texture and set aside to dry. One id had hardened I painted it in suitable erath colours. Once that was dry I put on another layer of the snow texture paste and let dry. Then I took a hot melt glue gun and started glueing the ice chips down on the base. I was careful to arange the pieces as I was gluing them so that there where not any large gaps. It's been almost a year since I made this. I still have more than enough left in the tub to make severall others but I think I will try a different aproach with the base. The nice part about the hot melt glue is that if I want to take this piece apart and redo it it, there will be little or no damage to the chips themselves. I have uploaded a picture so you can see the results. There are a couple of 28mm figures on either side for size comparison. Let me know what you think.


George.

Log Cabins.

I was reading some folks posts on The Miniatures Page, about their log cabins they made. It inspired me to post some pictures of a log cabin and barn I had made a couple of years ago for AWI Skirmishes in 1/72nd. Unfortunately I didn't take any progress pictures while I was building them so I can only show the end result. I started both buildings with a foam core shell. I marked out on the foam core where I wanted windows and doors to sit. I then proceeded to glue small pieces of doweling which I had purchased at the local craft store. Taking care to leave openings where the doors and windows had been marked. I also left an empty space on the log cabin where I was going to place the chimney. There I glued a block of balsa wood. The next thing I did was to take some teddy bear fur and cut it into rectangles each one the size of one side of the roof. I glued them down on the barn and the cabin and let them dry overnight. The next day I liberally applied some acrylic gloss medium to the teddy bear fur and used an old fine comb to brush the fur in a downward direction wile the medium was wet. Once I was satisfied with the look I set them aside to dry. I then fashioned doors from cereal box card. I embossed the plank lines in the doors using the back of an Xacto knife blade. The cross strips on the doors are more card, The slats on the roof used to hold the thatch down are bamboo skewers split with an Xacto knife and glued down on the teddy bear fur. I cut bases for both buildings from foam core and glued the buildings to them. Once they had dried I coated the bases with Duncan No Fire Snow for ground texture. I also used it on the balsa block on the log cabins Chimney. I Love No Fire Snow. I use it on the all my figure base for ground work, It hides the cast on base of the figure, adds texture and is very durable. Once the snow was dry I took both buildings outside and sprayed them with spray gesso as a primer and sealer. This was an experiment on my part to see if it would work any better than the cheap white primer that I buy at Wal-Mart or Canadian Tire. It worked fine but I found the results where'nt any better than what I already had been using, and it was almost 2/3rds more expensive. Live and Learn. Additionally I found the gesso took much longer to dry than the primer. After the gesso had dried I began to paint the buildings using craft paints. Working from a very dark, almost black brown to lighter browns. The Thatch I painted a dark ocher, working up to a light straw colour. The No Fire Snow groundwork I painted using an ochre coloured tan that I like for a soil colour. Once I had painted all the basic colours I did a wash with Future floor wax and raw umber paint mixed together. This shades everything and gives nice shadows. After that was dry I drybrushed The thatch and the raised areas on the logs to highlight them. I then Painted the chimney dark gray. Once the gray was dry I painted on individual stones with varying shades of light gray and tan. After that I flocked the bases with burnt grass flock and static grass. Then I fabricated split logs from bamboo skewers and dowel. Panted them and glued them down on the cabins base. I also made a saw and an axe from some discard of plastic strip, and found an 1/72nd scale wooden barrel in my bits box. After painting they where also glued down.
Hope you enjoy.
Cheers.
GeorgeD.

YouTube has got Knights.

Here's a really good video to inspire all the all the Medieval gamers out there!! Great eye candy.

Cheers.
George

More Reaper Figures.

I have been painting a number of Reaper miniatures from their Warlord, and Dark Heaven lines. The first two in the photos are from the Warlord Darkspawn army. I really like the way they have done the figures. The have a very ominous beauty too them.The demon figure, Ashakia in the Warlord fluff, was originally a mortal woman, dissatisfied with humanity given imortality in a demonic form. ( theres more to the story than that but nuff said). I wanted to keep somewhat of a "human" look to her so I painted her as I would any normal female figure. For the Witch Queen I wanted her to have a very unearthly pale sort of beauty. I tried using a prurple underoat for the skin gradually adding tones of lighter flesh tones to almost white skin highlights. I am not unhappy with the result, but I am still not sure if it is exactly what I wanted. The final three I painted up for my wife and some friends to use in a " Failed " Rpg campaign I had started running. The campaign lasted all of two sessions, when the party all decided to split up and handle the bad guys individually. They all ended up captured and sold into slavery. All the players where miffed at me except for my wife. Good thing as hers was the only opinion that really mattered. We pretty much ended the campaign by mutual agreement. I think the figures will be used for pc's in another game if I get one started though. The Dwarf I chose because it was a little more slender looking than most Dwarves. The character was supposed to be of mixed Dwarven/ Elvish blood. Everyone in the campaign wanted bright and colourful figures. The dwarven mage wanted a predominantly red scheme. The other two where completely undecided as to what they wanted. I decided that I wanted to incorporate red to greater or lesser degree's to tie in all the characters. For the thief, my friend wanted something that would blend in. I reasoned however that an all black scheme would be a little boring. I figured the gray cloak would blend in a bit better to an urban environment. The blue for the tunic and breeches was still dark if the character needed to blend into shadows. The red bags where my attempt to tie the thief in with the other figures in the group. My wife wanted to play a bard. So I went to town on the colour combinations. Red to visually tie it to the other too. I thought the yellow and blue helped to lighten up the figure more than if I had tried to do her in a monochrome scheme.




I hope you all enjoyed the pictures. Ta for now!
Cheers.
GeorgeD

Dana Murphy

I love Reaper figures. I think that their sculptors are among some of the best on the market. Their large scale figures are a treat to paint. I saw the lovely young Dana in their catalogue and had to paint her. Here are the fruits of my labours


Cheers.
GeorgeD.

Hat 1/72 scale 1812 French

I bought a couple of boxes of the Hat #8095 1808-1812 French Infantry, awhile back, with the intent of doing them and some Russians up for skirmishing using Two Hour Wargames "Black Powder Battles". I haven't gotten around to painting all of them. However, I did sit down one evening and paint up a sampling of one of the boxes. Overall, I was very impressed with the figures. The poses where reasonable. None of them where the " Hey Bill " pose that many complain about in other plastic sets. The detail is sharp and the figures are proportioned a little more "Chunky" than a lot of plastics. I think they would go well with metal figures of the same scale. The plastic in this set takes paint well. I think you could apply paint directly to the plastic without a primer. I still used a spray primer regardless. The figures I got where moulded in a sky blue colour. I washed a few up with Dish soap and water and when they where dry I primed them with white Krylon primer. I painted the figures with a combination fo some old Games workshop paints, Folk Art craft paints and Humbrol water based acrylics. I should get off my but and paint up some more and a few Russians so I can start playing with them. Anyway. Enjoy the pics and feel free to comment.




Cheers.
GeorgeD.

Military Models ( A sort of biography)

In addition to war games and RPG's I have had a passion for military models since I was 7 years old or so. I would pour over books with air planes and tanks trying to find the finest details. Then I would try to find a kit or scratch build those details I had seen in the books. My first attempts where pretty awful. I kept at it, and never quit. When I was in my early twenties, many of the lovely young ladies I had befriended would make comments about still playing with toys. I went underground so to speak, but I never lost interest in in modeling. My late twenties saw a lot of those fine young ladies moving away and starting lives elsewhere. I despaired at being a confirmed bachelor. I went through a buying frenzy. After all, I had no girlfriend at the time and no family. What else was I going to spend money on? So it went for a number of years. The kits purchased out numbered the ones built by a wide margin. Later,I met a fine young woman I became engaged too for a few years. I thought that it might be the end of my buying spree. Instead, she encouraged my to indulge my obsession. She would tell me stories of how her father would build models when they where children living in Germany. We saw each other for a long time. Then we broke up. It was a sad day. But we still remain close friends. My buying slowed down somewhat for awhile. Then about a year later I became interested in a long time friend. We moved in with each other and have been happily married with 3 children for nearly 10 years. My wife Dena encouraged me to continue with miniatures and military modeling. In her words, it was less likely that I would be out into trouble with another woman if I was home with her and my hobbies, than if I was out barhopping with the boys. Smart girl. Anyway. What started out as a short post about my tank models has turned into a ramble. Just look at the pictures. I hope you get as much pleasure seeing them as I did building them. About the models. The first is a early model Sherman tank. The kit is by Italeri and is 1/35Th scale. I painted it with Testors water based Model Master paints, and weathered it with a combination of airbrushing, drybrushing and chalk pastels. I used a Tamiya kit for all the extra stowage on the model. and sealed the whole thing with a matt varnish. The second kit is a British Chieftain tank. I built a few years ago, from the Tamiya 1/35Th scale kit. I chose the colour scheme on this one because the history in the kit instructions mentioned that Chieftains with these markings had been used in maneuver's in Canada. Since I lived in Canada that piqued my interest. The model was finished with paints from Testors, Games Workshop, Monogram an Humbrol. The camo was done with an airbrush. It was the first time I had used one and it didn't turn out too badly for a first attempt. Enjoy :)

Cheers.
GeorgeD

Aquarium ornament scenery

I have read numerous posts on The Miniatures Page About using aquarium ornaments and Christmas decorations as war games scenery. This is one beastie I found in a local Pet Smart store and instantly saw the possibilities. I repainted it using craft paints and flocked it using varieties of Woodland Scenic flocks. I am very pleased with the finished results, and plan to use it with my Amazons or Wargames Factory Romans for skirmish battles.

Cheers.
GeorgeD

I am still here

I thought it was about time to get off my bottom and update my Blog. Its been almost 2 years since I posted last and since then i have been working on a lot of projects. None of them to completion however. Since I last posted we also made a move across town, which resulted in a number of my projects being smashed to pieces in transit. One of the foremost being the Martian war machine I made from a computer mouse. I was so heart broken that I haven't had the heart to look at it since the move. It's still my intent to post photos regularly, but it remains to be seen if I will be able to. I am in the process now of looking over some of the items that where destroyed and damaged in the move, to see if their repairable or worth salvaging bits from. I am still working piecemeal on my Amazons, and have started a 28mm American Civil war project using Old Glory miniatures and Perry plastic figures, as well as some Fenlon ACW artillery and crew. I will post photos as I finish some of them. In the meantime I have uploaded some pictures of some Reaper fantasy miniatures I completed a few months back. The pictures are not the best, since I haven't practised with the camera much. However they are a good measure better than the pictures I was taking with my wife's camera. Feel free to comment on the pictures and let me know what you think.

Cheers
GeorgeD