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Author Topic: Giving the Boxer Rebellion legations a pre-siege look (French legation)  (Read 5372 times)

Offline War In 15MM

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More than a month ago I began working on my 15mm/18mm Boxer Rebellion/55 Days at Peking collection.  I have been thinking about doing this project for years; picking up odds and ends to serve as the legation buildings and figures for the Boxers, Imperial Chinese, and foreign powers.  It’s been a slow process… very much on the backburner of things I was going to focus my full attention on.  But about a year ago Blue Moon 15mm/18mm came out with their Boxer Rebellion line of figures and terrain, and I decided to adopt that as the center piece for my Boxer Rebellion efforts.  I purchased the Blue Moon legation package… five legation compounds (British, French, Russian, Japanese and US).  Because Blue Moon 15s are all about gaming (I’m not), they built all the legations with firing steps cast to the walls.  Since the British legation is the focal point of the foreign powers’ defense the British buildings are bunkered up.  I decided that I wanted a pre-siege and siege version of each of the five legations.  I’ll be doing a pre-siege and siege table.  That required that I modify and/or build the legation walls to give them a pre-siege look; no firing steps.  I’m probably the only one who thinks this is a good idea, but on the off chance that someone else might be interested this as an option I will use this thread to show how I attacked this project.  My first posting is of the British legation. The pre-siege walls are made from Evergreen, JTT, and Plastruct plastic.  At the time of this posting I am in the process of putting a Milliput base around the bottom of my British scratch built walls.  The British legation is unique in that the main legation building is bunkered as is the main entrance as well as the building referred to as the mission building.  To address this in terms of the pre-siege look I am seeking for the British legation I will be using an old Ian Weekley building as the stand-in for the main building.  I scratch built a new entrance gate, and modified the mission building (one of the few pieces of the five legations that can purchased independently).  I have been working on the pre-siege walls for all five legations for about five weeks… a lot of work.  I have completed all of them, but rather than swamp any of you who might be watching by dumping all five at once.  I will be posting pictures of each legation make-over one legation at a time starting with the British legation.  Hope you enjoy.
888c by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1743d by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1743e by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1854 by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1855 by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1860 by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1872 by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1875 by Richard Garretson, on Flickr41480785264_163f147b59_k by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1876 by Richard Garretson, on Flickr
« Last Edit: July 05, 2018, 01:27:38 AM by War In 15MM »

Offline OSHIROmodels

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Re: Giving the Blue Moon Boxer Rebellion legations a pre-siege look
« Reply #1 on: June 23, 2018, 02:44:53 AM »
Great collection  :)
cheers

James

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Offline War In 15MM

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Re: Giving the Blue Moon Boxer Rebellion legations a pre-siege look
« Reply #2 on: June 25, 2018, 03:58:14 PM »
Thanks Jim.  I'm hoping that this project comes together as something unique and worth seeing over the next eight months or so.  Doing it in 15mm allows me to use my standard tables (2 tables 5 ft x 7 ft each) and get a lot of stuff on them... I am always drawn to buildings/settings more than the figures that populate them.  By the way, your Star Wars' posting led me to make a big order for the Wizards of the Coast Star Wars Stormtroopers.  I used a lot of the Wizards of the Coast Star Wars' figures to populate my Spaceport collection, but didn't get into the Stormtroopers at that time.  I was working on a different concept at that time, but looking at your Stormtroopers, I couldn't resist them any longer.  Richard

Offline Deedles

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Re: Giving the Blue Moon Boxer Rebellion legations a pre-siege look
« Reply #3 on: June 25, 2018, 04:54:54 PM »
Great start .
Cheers
Deedles

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Offline Deano

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Re: Giving the Blue Moon Boxer Rebellion legations a pre-siege look
« Reply #4 on: June 25, 2018, 05:52:52 PM »
great stuff

Offline War In 15MM

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Deedles and Deano, thanks for taking the time to write and the kind words.
The next pre-siege legation compound I’m posting is the US.  In building the pre-siege walls for the five legations I will be using (British, US, Japanese, French and Russian), the two that gave me the most trouble were the British and US.  The British and US compounds shared one problem issue in common.  They are not simple rectangles.  This made it much more difficult to measure the different wall sections in an exact way, a way that would ensure that in the end all the pieces would connect in such fashion that there would be no gaps and that the overall shape would match the Blue Moon original.  The British legation had the added problem of the fact that the main gate, the main building and the mission building were all bunkered up and that had to be addressed in order to give the compound a pre-siege look.  I did not want to build new main gates for those compounds that weren’t bunkered, but when Blue Moon cast those gates attached to walls with firing steps I either had to cut the attached walls away from the main gates or hide the firing steps in a fashion that would not be permanent thus allowing me to give the gate the pre-siege look and the siege look.  I did this by building removable shrubs over the firing steps using Legos as the inner framework and covering them with Milliput scored to look like shrubs.  Another problem that existed with the US legation was that the tops of the walls were tiled so as to come to a point or peak in the center.  This was a much bigger challenge than simply having a tile top that ran in only one direction.  As was the case with the British compound walls, all of my pre-siege walls are made using Evergreen, JTT, and Plaststruct plastic.  Once the walls were built I then based them in scored Milliput for added strength and stability.  I should note that in my picture of the original Blue Moon US compound, the two main buildings are not properly placed.  They should set on either side of the main gate facing the inner compound.888d by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1834 by Richard Garretson, on Flickr

Offline OSHIROmodels

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Happy to be a bad influence  lol

Although this thread is making me want to get my 28mm Boxer stuff out again lol

Offline War In 15MM

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A bad influence yes, but much appreciated.

If you have Boxers painted and posted please direct me to them.  If not and you want to take a moment to share a few Boxer pictures here, I would love to see them.

Offline OSHIROmodels

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At the moment I've only got a couple of the Redoubt ones as I'm starting to sculpt my own for release in the coming months. I have got however plenty of Japanese painted up, some of which can be seen here (along with the buildings I've done so far) http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=107105.0

Offline War In 15MM

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Thanks for the link.  I've pulled the figure picture over to my reference file.  The building I have seen before.  It, like all the structures you do, is wonderful.  I was talking about your work with one of the managers of Brookhurst Hobbies last week.  He and his brother do great terrain work, and he was talking about how much he admired the work you do.

Offline OSHIROmodels

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Thank you kindly  :)

You might be pleased to know that I'm currently making the 28mm Chinese range into 15mm so you'll have some more options at some point soon.

Offline War In 15MM

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Something to look forward to.

Offline War In 15MM

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In building the pre-siege walls for the Japanese legation I used the same method and materials I used with all five of the legations’ pre-siege looks… Evergreen, JTT, and Plastruct plastic, Legos to provide the inner structure/skeleton for the shrubs hiding the firing steps next to the entrance and for the rear gatehouse, and scored Milliput as the shrubs and base for the wall sections.  The Japanese legation was unique in that Blue Moon provided the bases for the two Foo Dogs that flank the entrance to the Japanese legation, but Blue Moon did not provide the Foo Dogs to go on those bases.  The Foo Dogs I used (shown in my pre-siege picture are from the Wyrd/Malifaux  Zen Accessory pack.  I was fortunate to be able to pick up one of those at the Brookhurst Bring and Buy for just $2.  I had to pay full price for the second Malifaux Foo Dog.15BRB-103-Japanese-Legation copy 2 by Richard Garretson, on FlickrIMG_1833 by Richard Garretson, on Flickr

Offline Smokeyrone

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just great stuff here
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Offline War In 15MM

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Thanks Smokeyrone.  It took me five weeks to complete the five legation's pre-siege walls.  Now that they are done, I'm very glad I did it, but about half way through I had my doubts.  It's a lot of work.  I have two more pre-siege legations to post.  I'll post another one today or tomorrow.  For the last week I've been painting 15mm Boxers... a nice change from all the scratch building.  Thanks again for taking the time to write.  Richard