Game: FNG

Thread: Re: Jungle terrain

Roosterfish — 2008-02-07T15:30:29+00:00

Another method is to go to a craft shop that has cake decorations and purchase the palm trees - they run about $.05 to $.08 each.
I then used a bottle cap which I made a hole (nail punch) and stuck the palm tree into that.
On the bottom of the bottle cap I used hot glue and some washers (the washer hole went around the palm tree stalk that was sticking through) for added weight to make the trees less tippy.
I spray painted the bottle caps and palm tree stalk brown and the leaves green.
I then dry brushed the trees when they were dry.
Individually they are not great looking, but in a clump of trees they rock.

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alanpolak — 2007-03-16T19:02:34+00:00

U.S. army "star"

Thread: U.S. Painting

alanpolak — 2007-03-16T19:01:41+00:00

Right most of the vc are done so onto the americans. Again real simple is the key as my scenery is practically finished and dammit I wanna play. Catachan green for the base coat. This is a good drab green and once you wash it in the black ink from the viet cong models it a makes the americans look nice and grubby. I'm going for a more rough and ready look here. The models are for playing with, I'm not trying to win any painting competitions here. Once the ink is dry you CAN if you must re-highlight the models to tidy them up a bit and highlight their webbing. I will do this on my "stars", the model that represents me in the campaign but probably not on the grunts as its just not worth the extra time. I might also go all out on the 30 or so navy seal models I have waiting as they are a bit special. But seal's have to wait I need my squad ready. Faces and hands are dwarf flesh as it gives the GI's a nice pink "I got too much sun" look. repaint the guns black, last few details if you fancy. The Peter Pig models have cigarette packs on some of the helmets so my star gets a mini marlboro pack on his lid. The M60 gunnner's link gets a coat of copper paint in the model of the links and that's it. Same basing technique as used on the Viet COng and away we go. Hope to start playing next weekend so next is a battle and I can try and explain the rules to this.

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alanpolak — 2007-03-16T18:49:18+00:00

completed stream sections

Thread: Rivers

alanpolak — 2007-03-16T18:48:15+00:00

the river sections where done in much the same way, actually exactly the same way, as the jungle trees. The thing here was to make them modular so I didn't have to number them and set them up the same way every time. First figur out the maximum width your river is gonna be at any one point then add 1.5-2 inches and then cut out how ever many strips of your hard plastic at this width. Doing it this way mean you can make the river meander as it should considering its a jungle stream. The width of the sections should be all the same as it's this you need to make sure they all match up once done. Example: I made mine 5inches wide, the maximum width of my stream is going ot be 3 inches, and thats pretty wide at 15mil scale, but it keeps my options open. Next you need to make sure that the river leaves each end of each strip of plastic at exactly the same point. Mark out the points on each piece with some white paint and then check them all once your done. Do it now rather than after they are all painted as a mistake now is easily fixed. Once i had the points marked I took my xacto knife and scored the plastic in the shape of my river. I want more of a stream than a river so put lots of bends in it. I also made a few turn sections so the river doesn't just go from one end of the board to the opposite side. Same as before just make sure that no matter how big your pieces are the ends are the same width. Scoring the river in makes it easier to glue sand on as you have to work quite quickly to get both sides covered in pva. It probably wont be very neat but concentrate more on the ends and let the middle take a few unplanned turns. After that its the same stages as with the trees. Paint and flock, then glue on trees. Painting the river should be last as you want to make sure that everything is bone dry for the varnish. Paint the river a suitably muddy brown water, i used a mix of scorched brown and bubonic brown, with more bubonic at the shore line and around the little clumps of mud I put in in the middle of a larger stream section. Use a gloss varnish but do lots of thin coats rather than glooping it on at once as all it once makes the varnish bubbly and it looks like foam and also crap. DONE

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alanpolak — 2007-03-16T18:34:17+00:00

Jungle example

Thread: Viet Cong Painting

alanpolak — 2007-02-07T10:59:08+00:00

Okay nice and quick is the way to go here as once a 15mm model gets put on the table amid scenery etc. all that blending and subtle inking is a waste of time. Remember, and this goes for any miniature painting, you are painting to play not win any competions. Plus with the way most wargames work, your men aren't alive long enough to warrant massive amounts of time painting them. So. Viet Cong first. You will need:

black,dark brown,flesh,metal,bone, or a light brown. I used Gw paints( elf flesh,scorched brown,boltgun metal,bleached bone,chaos black)

the final secret weapon is a bottle of black ink, not the crummy Gw stuff as it doesn't do what its supposed to. Proper artists ink. I'll do this in steps as it's easier to follow:

1. undercoat all your models black. Get them all done at once as you can still play with undercoated models, just not bare metal. Use black as it gives you instant shading, creates a more natural base colour and hides all kinds of sins.
2. Paint the details. Faces, pouches, sashes, hats, ak47 stocks etc.
3. Wash the whole model in the black ink. This will make all your colours go muddy looking and dirty. Don't panic at this stage. You shouldn't be spending that much time on each model at this stage anyway and the next step fixes any mess ups.
4. The ink combined with the black undercoat gives you all your shading. Now you just need to highlight what you want. I do the faces, as the ink makes the faces really dark. Dont go mad though. Remember these are VC guerilla fighters, the live out in the field, they are gonna look messy.
5. Pva glue the base. I'm using pennies as their sold and not too big that they detract from the figure. Dip into sand then flood with the black ink again. Once this is dry drybrush in your chosen ground colour. Camo green for me but my tunnel rats are on brown. Add a little flock. Done

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alanpolak — 2007-02-07T10:10:41+00:00

Viet Cong General test piece

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alanpolak — 2007-01-31T09:27:14+00:00

paper buildings from ebobminiatures

Thread: models

alanpolak — 2007-01-29T11:04:29+00:00

Haha

the fun stuff. As all this cutting and gluing was going on I placed an order for a variety of models. Research here is the key. There are lots of great websites that review the models available, question is: what scale do you use. I used to play a lot of gw games. Their modles are 20-25mil. What ends up happening in this scale though is that your scenery, if you want to build something elaborate like a prison camp for you men to break in/out of, then it takes up the whole table. What ends up happening is that your scenery in games of 40k or warhammer boils down to walls, hedges and small clumps of trees. With the long ranges of things like bolters and stonethrowers you get less of a tactical battle and more of a dice fest. Not for me. 10 mil is too small for something like small unit tactics. It's great for ancient battles, legions of romans that kind of thing. But I dont want to sacrifice character in the models, I also dont want to spend hours painting. So 15 mil seemed like the best choice. They are small enough that you can get by with the most basic of paint jobs. small enough and consequently cheap enough that you can buy loads without a second mortage, and big enough to have a level of detail that gives them character. PLus Peter Pig do a range of 15mm vietnam models and I really liked the way the looked on the website. Yes at the end of the day I went with a company called Peter Pig, who are on the net and attend all the big shows in England. They are very nice over the phone and after placing the order 3 days later a big box of metal showed up at my door. Sweet. Confession: I did order 50 viet cong models from ANOTHER company as they were doing next day delivery and I wanted some thing to experiment on paint scheme wise, plus I wanted variety in my VC models. BUT there is really no comparison betweeb these "nameless" ones and th Pig's. Check em out. They also do a fantastic PBR and tanks etc. plus loads of extras like villagers for all your PLatoon scene re-enactments, plus weapons caches, tunnel rats, snipers, helicopters too. Final word on scale. At 15mm, the Revell helicopters at 1/100th scale are practically perfect. They are a little of but the way choppers work in the game to be honest you wont care and or notice. Plus they are a breeze to paint and look cool. Right now that I've given Peter Pig loads of free press....Next time- On to the painting.

Thread: prison camp scenery

alanpolak — 2007-01-29T10:46:40+00:00

real quick one this. A friend of mine phoned me up and suggested this website for prison camp type scenery and it is fantastic. A little artistice license is needed as the models are specifically for a larger scale great escape wargame( which still sounds cool) but the buildings work. Check them out at:

www.ebobminiatures.com

They are really nice and worth the effort of printing on some nice card stock. I'm not going to post the files direct as I'm pretty sure this is some sort of infringement and anyway check out this guys site. One thing though. I printed them at 65% of their original size to go with my 15mm models so experiment with your settings, print one in a draft format then go to town. Also the guard towers, while looking really cool, are kinda fiddly to put together. NOthing too complicated just way more fiddly than the really simple cooler or barracks. watch your fingers

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alanpolak — 2007-01-14T13:23:40+00:00

sniper in jungle terrain

Thread: Jungle terrain

alanpolak — 2007-01-14T12:37:55+00:00

okay. Jungle terrain next. I have loads of the Gw trees but for one they are too big for the 15mm models, and two they're deciduos trees. SO after much perusal I went to my local pet shop and bought pretty much everything they had in the way of aquarium plants.Lots of different styles, a few different colours. Sorted. Now for the bases. Best thing to do with any scenery is to make it as basic as possible. This means you're not stuck with your terrain piece they way you made it forever. So lots of smaller bases full of trees are way better than one big impressive looking piece. I used cdr's for the bases for my trees. They're cheap and i like the round bases as they dont stick out too much on the table, and they're cheap. Some people use some form of wood, either thin mdf or even foamboard, but mdf is a pain to cut and foamboard too expensive for making lots of bases. So you've got your cds and your trees. First is texturing the discs.I used standard sand slapped on with lots of pva glue. Make lots as a vietnam game without lots of jungle is rubbish.Once they're all dry just undercoat them with black spray, whichever one you ue is okay. I have to say I'm not too neat when I make my scenery as I think once its on the board, you spend more time worrying about the position of your men and the large chunks of them that the enemy is shooting of rather than the super-detailed scenry that they are bleeding over. Of course go mad if you want to but thats the basic base. Once dry I spray them with an old GW spray Camo green. You cant buy this anymore but try to use spray as its quicker or you'll end up drybrushing the bases to match your board. I used Camo green s I have it and never did anything with it, and it blends in quite nicely with the static grass mat. Gluing the trees on can be tricky as you'll need to cut them down from the long stems that they come on, then glue them onto the bases. I use a mix of sand and gravel and the larger chunks of pebble make a good holding position fot the trees but not always so I had to prop the trees up with paint pots while they dried. They will fall of over time but a dab of pva sorts it out. Last thing to do is add some flock just to "jungle it up a bit". Try to leave some of the bases a little open, I made some paths using the flock to mark out the trail. Make it as varied as possible as it gives you more flexibility. Varnish and you're done. Phew. I made about 40 of theses tree nases and once its all laid out it looks pretty cool. No more though as I'm out of the green spray. Okay next the river section.

Thread: scenery basics

alanpolak — 2006-12-27T10:02:17+00:00

Okay,

Now that all the xmas madness has died down I can put this down on "paper". I have gone totally 'Nam crazy here after playing some of 2hour wargames's other stuff. Vietnam is perfect wargame material due to the small unit sizes(less stuff to paint), dense terrain(no ridiculous 40k style shoot-fests), and the great quotes from the countless war movies that you can use as your playing. BUT first things first. You need to get some models together and a place to play. This will be the first of a few....well articles I guess on how I built my nam scenery, got the troops together, then drafted all the other players in to this hell-hole. We are all ex GW players, I used to work for them. So the jump from their style of game to this was a major one. But thats for later. First. materials. A note here. I will post pictures of all the stuff I'm banging on about on the forums, as long as they get approved. But I dont have many work in progress shots. Fortunatley the pieces are really easy to build and its fairly obvious how I did them. Basically, if i can do it, you can too.

SO. First is the board for the game. Most wargamers have some sort of table that they play on. My choice here is 2 4x2 sheets of mdf. 6mil keeps it nice and light and cheap. The 2 sections make it easier to store. Mine are stacked under my couch.Later on I will be adding another 4x2 section of river to make a full size table. Keep it as flexible as possible,repetitive wargaming sucks.choice of covering material is a matter of personal taste. I had thought of using a textured wallpaper and just painting it over in muddy browns and greens, nut couldn't find one i liked. Next was just painting it green but I hate this as it just looks like a bit of green wood. So biting the bullet I got some battle mats from games workshop. They ARE expensive, a bit of a bugger to work with. BUT the finished effect is much better. It can look a bit too neat for some people.The neatly lawnmowered fields of south vietnam and all that. Choice is up to you.
Right thats all for now. Next...TREES

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alanpolak — 2006-12-11T12:06:49+00:00

work in progress

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alanpolak — 2006-12-06T18:27:02+00:00

U.S.Navy SEAL sniper

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whisperin_al — 2006-11-26T18:24:26+00:00

Back cover of FNG

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whisperin_al — 2006-11-26T18:14:47+00:00

Cover of FNG