Size Comparisons

 Ok, so I do love the Bloody Miniatures range. Lovely sculpts. But... I’m torn on the size. They work with some figures, not so much with others... they make Angel Blake look more childlike which I like, but she’s nude which is wrong on sooo many levels. The old woman is minute and looks odd, but the blacksmith just looks stout and solid. The bishop looks small, but he did against the Mantic ghouls anyway. The Cardinal is shortish, but not terribly so... but the Warlord cavalry men are tiny, even against a Warlord plastic infantry (which is the witch hunter base figure.

Decisions, decisions... sigh...

wood for the trees and other vistas

ok, excuse the poor photos (colours really aren't being done credit), but have finally got stuff to stick to the sodding trees... it looks much more blended in real life, but job done (finally). The big trees sadly just didn't work, tried and tried to get them looking as I intended and just couldn't - so chopped them down and used the bases for thickets (as I was very happy with the bases), these are a good solid line of sight blocker, and will be doing some smaller ones as well to help make a more overgrown woodland-ish look. The new and improved foliage of course meant I needed to redo my bushes, so the hillfort and other bits of undergrowth have been redone to match the thickets, again, photos don't really do it justice... but as I said, more bits are in progress as I've run out of Burnt Umber.

 as the trees were to big to really get in the light tent, the board came out, which then dovetailed into a request someone on Frothers made to see it all, so above is the woodland in progress, with stone circle and hillfort, and below is the coaching inn, the blacksmiths and the two houses...

this has been surprising useful in that it fills the area better than I had thought - I have two more 2-storey houses to build which should about do it, along with some little bits for flavour (a well and some mud/dirt roads/townsquare), plus of course I still want to do a church and graveyard as a 3rd option (none of which yet exists). Also unseen is the river side which would roughly fill the bottom corner area above, and numerous hedges I built ages back when I was working to fill a larger area, plus some drystone walls from Fenris Games.

I know I plod along at this and am easily distracted, but am quite chuffed looking at it how good it's coming together... even if I do say so myself.

Blacksmiths

As with the other buildings, it only just fits in the lightbox, so photos may not be the best, but, for better or worse, the Blacksmiths is finished... 

As I said in the WIP, I removed the wall extensions from the wooden frame, it made more sense without the roof to only have them on the walls - they are now on the inside of the roof which I neglected to photograph...

 

It is of course an absolute swine to get a good photo of the inside, but hopefully this covers it. The forge floor was a conundrum at first, I didn't want wood, and stone seemed a bit too posh, so, after a pleasing result in the plague house, went for a compacted dirt/clay floor within a brick frame... didn't quite get the same result as the plague house, but it will do... I added a few clumps of grass where the floor could have cracked and seeds taken a foothold... strange fisheye thing happening with the photo, it is straight... honest...

 

and of course, the Smithy himself... rather than track down a blacksmith mini, I decided to go with stuff I already have (a sign of things to come I feel), and this chap is from the Warlord Clubmen set... as a cleaver was included in the weapons options for the set, I had always seen him as a butcher, but a g/s hammer and a brown leather apron and a perfectly compact and rotund blacksmith will do...

 

blacksmiths ooops

ok... this is really for anyone following/copying what I've been doing and buying the window packs from 4ground... the blacksmiths has been a bit of a slow slog, the thatch really annoyed me so I kind of stepped away for a bit and got distracted with some tents I started a while back and did some pressmolding and stuff...

anyhoo, back on with the blacksmiths and painting is all but done (getting the compacted dirt floor right was a pain), which is when I fit the windows... now I bought the market hall windows pack as it had more windows in it than the cottage windows pack so better value I figured... sadly, the market hall windows are a different fricking shape to the cottage and of course I used the cottage as the basis for the frames in the blacksmith... so they won't fit...

my fault I guess (not sure if it's on the 4ground site) but there you go, I'll find a use for them, but now need to order a new set of windows before I can get finished with it... sigh...

September is looking like a dry month for updates, but I have been doing stuff, just not finishing...

blacksmiths part 2

very productive couple of days... quite surprised actually, I'm such a good procrastinator... anyway, the basic build of the blacksmiths is done...

foampvc with bits of plasticard in spots and dressed with balsa, need to do the render, and add woodgrain texture to the supports and beams of the forge area which are plastic girder and foampvc for strength (balsa would have been a non-starter)...

not sure what to do with the chimney, will probably do a couple of extra layers of brick on the chimney so it has a hole as it were... the forge pieces aren't attached yet, I need to texture and paint the main building first, the base is made from thin plasticard layered to a decent thickness and to allow the forge and bellows to sit in cutaways designed for them... it's reasonably sturdy now, and should be quite solid when finished...

the building is based on the 4ground buildings (obviously), so the room has the same footprint and it will take the same windows... learnt a bit as I was going, and had to add a wee bit to the side walls as I hadn't allowed for the gap once the roof was added (may remove those from the forge sides and add them to the roof)... but it's been a fun job - although the roof was a complete pig, I've got it good now, but it was a bit disconcerting... the roof alone is making me rethink my plan for the pub...

blacksmiths part 1

not much to show on this so far, but it's a start and is probably the best chance to show the chimney off as I doubt it will be very visible once the building goes up...

the forge is from Ainsty (and comes with the bellows), the anvil was very nicely donated by a Frother... the chimney is blue insulation foam, brickwork carved on, then liquid g/s to have crisp up the edges a bit and to toughen up the foam...

am really torn on which design to go with the building itself, have been checking out various ones on the market... so watch this space for that...