gatehouse WIP 2 - gates

 gates for the gatehouse, scratchbuilt using the Tudor Wall Panelling from Fenris, they still need hinges fitting, but are pretty much done... as I was at it I did a 2nd left side gate with a wicket door just for variety - I say left side, but the design means I can flip them around and mix it up (the wicket door just opens inwards on the left side), so I can have the peephole and plain door, peephole and wicket gate, plain and wicket gate, and so on...

the wicket gate door itself does need a bit more work - this is my 3rd attempt, just doesn't seem to work right... hey ho...

gatehouse WIP

a bit of a build for February... a gatehouse to go alongside the manor house to help vary it up a bit and as a start to a coaching inn type courtyard... I had hoped to be further along with this one, but a bug swept the office and I've been playing alot of Fallout: New Vegas...

anyhoo, the side piece is designed to slot on over the chimney at the end of the manor house like so:

it's a bit more fanciful than the main house, but I've tried to give it a bit of character to match the vague idea of phases of build (with the manor house having a newer wing attached to an older converted hall), so they've used the remains of an old watch tower and added a timber frame on top - once the timbering is done, there should be sense of stone work trimmed and patched to fit the frame in places... in time, with additional pieces I can have a decent coaching inn yard with stables and maybe even a fortified manor house, depending on bits made and used...

I'd toyed with several uses for the new building, but space restricted any stairway, so I had to use a ladder which changed it a little bit in my mind... so I could still make the most of the thinner room over the gate, I figured a loft door would look nice enough and the whole top floor can be just used as storage, which will make furnishing easy, with maybe a merchants desk on the raised ground floor.
 

the front has an overhang on the older stone base, figuring if you could get a little more floor space you would... as I said, a little more fantasy perhaps, but I'm quite happy with it so far...

the Gabriel Hounds

Some supernatural beasties that have been planned for a while, but I needed the right canine body. Gabriel Hounds (also called Gabble Hounds for the noise they make as they fly across the sky - which was probably just geese) are said to be born by the death of unbaptised children and have the heads of humans. The heads in this case are from the werewolf head sprues from Maxmini, the wolf body is from MiniatureMojo's Scavenge Skirmish Survive range - they have 3 different types available, but I prefered the hunched pose.

Not my best paint jobs, I hate doing fur as it never allows me to blend like I normally do, plus I wasn't happy with the white (definitely need to buy the very intriguing White set from Andrea Color). And they had to be white according to legend, with red ears - I had planned on blending the ears in to the white, but the fur around the heads put paid to that.

If I ever get the chance to do an Akula and get my own mini's made up, these are the first things I'll have made...

At The Muppets of Madness

A thought popped into my head as I was painting this Faceless Horror from Reaper and it kind of ruined it all for me... what should be a writhing mass of teeth, eyes and pseudopods suddenly took on the air of a singing Muppet... I think it's the teeth...

so many singing mouths... mind you, in true Lovecraftian style, painting it will drive you mad as you keep finding one more sodding eye.

a quick rebasing

ok, that was Christmas out of the way, and I struggled a wee bit to get back into the swing, but to start with a quick rebase for an old figure that was for a planned Slaine type affair, but will equally do muster for the Folk Horror stuff... a crone for the maiden Angel Blake...

Timbered...

Ok, timbering done, need to do the curved corner timbers, some distressing with the wire brushes, inevitable g/s repairs, then window sills from matchsticks and the rendering... and tiles, getting a bit worried about the roof tiles now, the cobbled together nature of my build may not lend itself very well to lots and lots of narrow horizontal lines... 

And, added a couple of dormer windows for the attic to the rear of the house, decided the roof was to much of a featureless expanse and windows looking down into a courtyard at the rear would make sense for a working inn. The chimney was a bit of a bugger, initially it was much thicked, but decided to narrow it down, stil undecided on the top, a couple of pots are possible. Also, I'd initially placed the breaks level with the floor breaks, but this meant exactly matching that, so it was easier to make the break higher up, so each floors chimney extends into the next floor - this also helps serve as anchor points for each floor, as do the attic dormers.

There is also a little detail on the end of the main part of the building, a vent for an internal smoke bay, which would be under the stairs to the attic. This does serve a purpose for when the rear room on the ground floor is kitted out to be a kitchen. Planning you see...

I need to get some figures painted soon though, been a while and starting to get that itch, especially with Dr Payne from Heresy and today being, well, you know...