Tavern WIP

I have been steadily working on a big giant tavern project, here are some Work in Progress pics. Most miniatures gamers who like fantasy stuff will at some point desire a tavern for tavern bralws. This piece started as a facade for a table edge, almost dollhouse style, and has since developed in to a 3 piece behemoth.

The Tavern has been designed in 3 sections: a facade, an open floor, and a single top piece to combine them. The Final part of the which tavern is pictured here, is designed to be a self standing piece as well. Both the facade and the top piece are made so that they can be used as table edge terrain.

More to come when time allows, also keep an eye on my the Valley of Isk Facebook page for more pics:

Villa Giovanzana

Welcome to the Villa Giovanzana! This is home to one of Ravenswood's wealthy noblemen, who's family vineyards are well known throughout the Reikland.

The Villa evolved from two projects; a hill with Gazebo attached was combined with the beginning of a timberframe house. This was also my first experiment using single sided corrugated cardboard to create a pantile roof effect. As I recently purchased a 25' roll of the stuff, you will be seeing a lot more pantile roofs (not to mention my recent forays in to Rennaisance Venice via Assassin's Creed).

I you are interested in seeing more pics, head on over to my facebook page: faceboook.com/valleyofisk

Incidentally this piece is also for sale through my webstore: valleyofisk.com

Tell all your friends!!! :)

~Niko

War Torn Ruins

Welcome back to the Valley of Isk Project Blog!! After a great deal of thought and some testing of the blog on my web store, I have decided to KEEP this blog after all, as blogger has some great features that are missing in Wordpress.

It has been a loooooooong time since my last post. During this time away there has been lots of stuff going on, and stuff always has a way of distracting us from posting to our blogs. I have a new web store up, a facebook page and lots of stuff in the works!

Hopefully I can get a post up here per week or so. Also keep an eye on my Valley of Isk Facebook page and the Vallley of Isk website for more cool projects.

Up today are a few pics of the War Torn Ruins I have been working on. These started out their lives as quick and dirty ruins for a few games of Mordheim and later evolved in to something a bit more elaborate. I will be adding a lot more pictures, including "work in progress" pics to the Valley of Isk facebook page.

During the course of working on them I developed several new techniques, including the use of a new material for making shingles. The shingles were cut from a thin sheet of wood which gives them a lot more depth than heavy card and makes them easier to custom size; you can ealisy snap a wood shingle in half to fill smaller spaces when necessary.

I also perfected the use of a hot tool plugged in to a dimmer switch for controlling the heat setting, and used it to create the stonework at the base of these pieces. This method is pretty quick and creates deeper grooves between the stones than using the ball point pen on foam method.

The Docks: Finished!

The Docks are finally complete, and I am pretty happy with the results. I have some revised wharf pieces underway now and will be posting them soon. These are pictured here in their new home on a blue felt water mat. The next step here will be to build the stuff for the basement, including a variety of modular walls and such to make a tavern , warehouse space or dungeon or prison cells.

Slums of Bogenhafen WIP (Mordheim)

Here are a few Morheim style ruined buildings I am working on to add to the Bogenhafen Layout.

I have started a few new techniques with my buildings worth noting:

1. Roof Shingles are now made from a thin wood veneer. I cut them in to strips, stack the strips and use a mini-mitre saw to produce them. This gives the shingles a meatier look, plus I can snap them on the fly if I need to fill gaps.

2. Tight Bases: I am now cutting the bases of each building to the exact contour of the footprint (or as close as possible). I noticed in a recent game that we had trouble positioning a model on a corner due to the base sticking out about 1 cm, so I am going to eliminate the excess base material.

3. Banisters / Railings: I have developed a fast technique for railings and banisters. The bottom is foam core, with toothpicks poked in to the foam edge, followed by 2 or three thin strips at the top.

The slums of Bogenhafen are the aftermath of a brutal siege by the Axebite orc tribe. Fierce combat spilled through the North wall of the city and greenskins occupied the neighborhoods on the north side of the river Bogen for nearly three weeks before reinforcements from Altdorf finally arrived to drive the orcs back to their lair in the Grey Mountains.

Efforts to rebuild these devastated areas have been slowed by the expansion of the docklands, leaving the majority of Bogenhafen’s peasantry homeless or living in squalid conditions of ruined homes. There have been numerous requests for relief aid sent to Emperor Karl Franz, but so far Altdorf has been slow to respond.

Orc Boss-Hut (WIP)

"IT BETTER BE DA BIGGEST FING IN DA CAMP!!!"

This is the first stage of the Lair of Urktash Axebite, the biggest baddest Black Orc Warboss ever to roam the Grey Mountains!!

Every morning when Urktash wakes up he stands at the door of his hut and bellows a challenge to any orc that thinks he has what it takes to be boss. This inevitably results in a bit of a mess but is great entertainment for the rest of the tribe...

THIS IS A WORK IN PROGRESS

Docks: project update

The Docks are coming along nicely, and I decided that a water table was needed to determine the color pallette before the docks (small ones) and piers (large ones)could be finished.

I have built three piers (and five docks so far. There are a few more designs I may try in the next wave, but these will do for now. Once they are given the x bracing below and the deck has been scratched up for weathering, I'll be able to finish the painting.I will most likely add barnacles to all of them so that they hava an ocean look, even though Bogenhafen is a river town. Ropes are another detail I plan to add as well.

The Docks WIP shots

Aquisition of a mini miter saw from Micro Mark has significantly accelerated production time for the docks of Bogenhafen. I have 3 piers and 5 dock sections assembled. Here are some wip pics to show the progression of the whole layout including the quay. Questions and comments are always welcome. More coming soooooon

Painting the Quay

The 4th phase of the quay was painting and adding water fx. I also used Apoxie Sculpt to add some final stonework in the sewer and over the tunnel openings on the outside. The water fx is acrylic heavy gloss gel medium. It appears milky upon application, but later dries clear. I mixed a bit of green in to give it some mrukiness. Prior to adding it I painted a dark greenish blue on the water areas.

The Quay, phases 2 & 3: Stonework

There is a small corner in hell where they send you to cut tiny pieces of card to make the stonework for my quay project. Don't EVER get sent there.

Phase 2 & 3 of the quay involved the addition of masonry to the surface and the sewer. Why did I choose to use card for the flagstones? Durability and speed. I had no desire to get in to casting in plaster, which is the other way I had wanted to do the street, and foam would have been too delicate. I make my stuff as pretty as possible while still being tough and gameable, as that's what it's for.

The big scissors are tin snips, which I also use to make magnetic movement trays. Those two little buildings are a sneak peek at the modern zombie apocalypse stuff I am designing; it's acouple of warehouse pieces. More on that much later... for now, the docks.

Building the Model Quay: Phase One

I've been eager to build docks for Bogenhafen for a long time. After some scavenging in my basement "Mordheim style" I was unable to uncover any Warpstone, but did discover a bunch of musty old lumber. A day of power saw usage converted the best of it in to several game table surfaces, and the Quay for the docks of Bogenhafen. This piece is in truth a prototype for my future design: a modern day 4x4' city table, with underground sewer and subway along the outside edge. More on that later.

The basic concept for the quay was to have it run the edge of a standard 4x6 Warhammer table, and have it be as versatile and modular as possible. The overall size is roughly 4'x15", with a height of about 6". This piece could be combined with a duplicate to form a canal, or longer riverside section along a table edge. With additional raised table pieces, it could be placed with the river-edge facing the outside end, with the large, flat battlefield covering the majority of the table. I think you get the idea...

Wooden Pier Model in Progress

After a great deal of research I have begun to construct the first pier for the docks of Bogenhafen. The pier will be comprised of individual sections that can be moved around to create various configurations. This first pier is the prototype, and stands the same height as the quay pictured in the previous post. After several weeks of searching the web in vain for clear reference on the construction of wooden piers, I finally checked out some books on deck building and dock building, which proved invaluable.

River Barnacles: Bogenhafen is situated on the river Bogen, miles away from the sea. So why the barnacles? Just an experiment with this prototype, I may or may not apply barnacles to all of the pier pieces.

The Docks of Bogenhafen

The city of Bogenhafen is one of the richest in The Empire. I thought it only fitting that the docks be the next thing on my personal project list. This one features removable street panels to reveal the basements, as well as a sewer running beneath the outside edge. Once the quay is finished, modular wharf pieces will be added. The first progress pic shows a wood frame measuring 4' by 16" by 8", on which the stonework and everything else was attached.

(For anyone reading this blog who doesn't already know Bogenhafen and the Empire are part of Warhammer, a miniatures game by Games Workshop.)