Lesson learned: Read the rules before completing a task.
I’ve started my piece of scenery the other week and I got a bit carried away, building a trench is quite the thing for any IG-general. Then I returned to re-read the first post of IC and realised I should have made a WIP-blog. Shame on me. It’s almost done now so I’ll soon post the result anyway, but this piece will not be my entry. I’ll have to think of something else to do, and remember to document it properly…

Well, first a couple of shots of plan A, “the failure”. It’s not finished, but neither unfinshed enough to make a proper WIP of. The edges might seem a bit unnatural in the slopes but after trying to use my older more realistic looking scenery and spending quite a lot of time erecting falln models, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s far better to have a piece where the models can stand than to go all out on the aestetics. Function over form.

THe floor is made from matches, the ground is cork (I found lots of cork on a schol where I was working. They were about to toss all those 12″x12″ squares away. I saved maybe 30 of them They are perfect for making scenery. The inner walls of the trench are to be painted as metal and I only used common cardboard, the cereal-package kind and a few pieces of wires and cotton-sticks (ear-puryfiers). I’ll finish this later and post some more pics.
It’ll get a roof and some more bits and pieces. Oh, and mud of course, you can see the early stages of mud making on the floor. I am aiming for a high-tech WWI-theme on this one.

Plan B was the spacehulk, but due to a fortunate event this will become plan C and the former plan C will now become plan B which really has evolved into plan A. It’s nothing fancy, just a ruined building for an urban board.
My friend from past-times told me he’d be coming down and was eager to have a fight, though I do not have time enough to build a complete SpaceHulk board until he’ll arrive and I do want to fight his Eldar-army at home, not at the club. We’d fancy a glass of wine or a beer to those games see. I’m really looking forward to this, I guess I’m in for a spanking though, armoured Company against Eldar feels somewhat risky:/ I guess I could always paint up some more infanty-units though…
But anyway, back on topic.
I chose to make the model simple enough and to use only the most basic of materials, and to carefully document the whole thing.

First I started with a cardbardbox, one who was left from the move, it’s quite sturdy but also very cardboardy. I drew out a general shape and took some meassurement.

So I cut a few, six, wall pieces. The house will only have three walls, but I wanted them to be a bit thicker than scenery-walls often are. They tend to look a bit to obviously fake when they are too thin I think.

Some more lines in order to get the windows and doors where I wanted them.

Then it was only to cut the window-openings out and glue two pieces together.

This pic should really be in the right direction, but who am I to fight this computer. It’s far to late for me now… Just use your imagination folks or turn the screen if you feel an urge.
Here’s a first little dryfit of two walls.

On this pic you can see the sheet of cork I was talking about earlier as well as my daughter’s monkey-cup.

Now I’ve finished the basic structure and begun the adding of details. This is one of the most interesting parts I think. It’s now the house is getting it’s personality. I’ve decided to make it a quite gothic stone houseused as a dwelling or something. Nothing fancy at all. But during the fighting it’ll have become graduaterly more destroyed and also fortified so I’ll add damage and sandbags and such. But for a starter I began with making the windows just a bit more living by adding…windowy stuff.

Here you can see how I prepare the windowy-thingies. Same old cardboard, a knife and a pair of scissors. Cut a line halfway through the card and then cut stripes, bend and glue.

Here you can see how I prepare the windowy-thingies. Same old cardboard, a knife and a pair of scissors. Cut a line halfway through the card and then cut stripes, bend and glue.

That (and some sprues) makes the wall look like this. I know it has quite a hippie-flowerpower-air to it now, but once it’s been painted that’ll hopefully be all gone.

So what have happend since the last time?
Well I begun to make a topfloor, using coffestirring sticks from McDonalds. It’s not my No1 dining place, but when the kids force me to go there I might just as well add some of those to my supplies. They are like wooden, very thin icecream-sticks. Makes for a perfect scenery material.

They have rounded edges though so I cut them off to make it look a bit more realistic. I had to glue them to a pice of cardboard using PVA to add some stability, and I also make a frame using old sprues to give them something to rest upon.
I also finished the windows on the front wall (right wall in the top pic) quite late at night. I then completely forgot to cut the corners round on the stones, but I really liked that compared to the earlier version, so I had to recut the earlier ones into a more square-ish kind. It looks pretty bad at the moment, but I hope it’ll turn out better once the paint is on.

Here you can also see the base I’m making, well the early, sketchy base, but still.
You can also see the black pillar which was my initial idea of making use of a coathanger. I found a really nice hanger with a very pillar-esque thing to it, but I gave up on that idea as the pillar became quite out of scale. Who would build a really small house with a short and chubby pillar in. Nah. I will still be making use of that part though, but in a more grandios building.

Here’s a better pic of the pillar:

It also struck me that it would be quite irritating to have a pillar on that spot while playing. It’d maki it more difficult to reack any models hiding on the lower floor. So I swapped coathanger.

To this.

Look at the lower part in a close up. What more can a modeller wish for?

So I cut it up and also while having the big pliers in hand I cut one corner of the topfloor of, to make it look a bit more worn and blown to pieces. In the next pic you can also see the first layers of the crater I mentiones earlier. I just took a bit of a corksheet and broke it of to a round, crater-like shape. I made two such layers, one smaller than the other to get the sloped look.

Oh, and I added some window details too. I cut the top of some matches to make…things-of-wood-that-keeps-windows-in-place. I think I might add some glass to it later some small parts still left in th ewindows but mostly on the floor. It all comes in later stages though.

The early crater layers look something like this:

Next was to add some more rubble to the crater and for this I cut away some of the material from the base of the house, parts that will have been blown away in the fisnished piece. I think it makes the piece a bit more narrative, a bomb has hit it and it is easy to understand why it’s been ruined.

And, that’s where I’m at now really. I should have been working on it tonight, but now I’ve spent my time here in front of the computer instead. I do need more time…

So, I guess a deadline is a deadline, and this one I actually made. Sure, I’m not all finished but I guess I’ll never be, with anything. So, this is the end or rather my contribution to the IronChef III comp.
Oh, and I’ll upload some more WIPs once I get more time. Any questions or such are mighty welcome, as always.
Oh, and the pics are crappy, I know…I could almost say it’s one of my signums…

This is the complete piece, basically a bombed out house. The bending of the base will be mended.
The entrance

Left wall (from entrance)

Back left corner

back wall

Lost wall

Top floor

close up top floor

That’s it for now folks. Once again, thanks to you who replied to this and to my GF who said things like “You do know what a deadline is, right?” She should have some cred for this being posted at all…

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