Vagabonds Viking Village - Beehives Done

[Vagabond]

I've re-started on page 6 - Cheers

Sorry couldn't resist the VVV title.

Since posting this I have started a blog and extracted the relevant bits from this thread and posted it here https://vagabondswargamingblog.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/vagabondy-vagabonds-viking-village.html

As the title says I aim to build a small Viking/Dark Ages Northern Europe village and would appreciate feed back on what I am doing and how I can do it better or differently.

For reasons that I can not fathom now, my 1st build was the chieftains long house, should have been the last after I had some inkling of what I was doing.











So this is already done and I'm not sure I will go back to it

However I don't think the roof shingles work very well, the shingles are too big and I was a bit lazy and spread them out a bit too much. The thing I would appreciate advice on is the texture of the shingles. I used a fairly smooth cardboard and tried to compensate with downward brush strokes to get texture, but it does not look like wood to me, any thoughts?
For painting the roof I went with a black undercoat and then dry brushing gradually lighter shades of grey with a final green brush to simulate moss growth. Should I do it a different way?

I like the wall texture but it should be "puddled mud" ie daub pressed into the wattle by hand and so should be a dimpled finish, this is too sharp. Again any thoughts?

Next up will be a couple of small houses that I have just started working on. These will be similar builds, ie foam board structure but with thatch roofs and I am going to try watercolour paper to get the hand dimpled finish.

Thanks for any feedback

[Vagabond]

Sorry the colour of the roof has nor really come out in the post I will try and get a better photo put up. 

[OSHIROmodels]

Looks good 

Maybe a fancy bit of carving at the apex of the gable might help to set it off? A stylised dragons head or some such.

cheers

James

[Mason]

Looking good, sir.
The interior has reached the right blend of nicely detailed whilst still 'playable'.
 

If you are not happy with the roof you could always cheat and give it the teddy bear treatment (thatch).
 

Second the idea for the carved gable, or even a great aurochs-type skull or similar.

[Vagabond]

I am sure you are both right it needs a figurehead. How do I carve one?

I wanted to do shingles on the roof because it is the chieftains dwelling, and he would have expensive roofing, however but would like to improve the look of them.

 I would like your opinion of the thatch roofs I have done on the houses I am working on
Will post initial pics tomorrow, I am quite pleased with the structure, however I need the masters hand to paint them.

Paul can you make it to Derbyshire tomorrow night to give me a master class in colour matching and drybrushing

I can provide copious amounts of wine and food in exchange
Cheers

[Dr. Zombie]

I think it looks good.
I think I would have gone with at thatched roof. The shingled roof makes it look a bit more medieval than dark age.

Carved out gable ends would really make it into a viking house. But then again perhaps a Saxon who suddenly died of acute Axetothefaceitis lived there just a short while ago

[Vagabond]

Dr Zombie - I am coming round to that way of thinking, last year I went to Denmark and visited Ribe, Trellebourg, some place I can't remember and Hedaby in N Germany, I have just gone back through my Photos and there are only 2 houses with wooden shingle roofs and both of these had the walls constructed of timber, rather than daube and wattle. All the others were thatched. Bugger.

Here are a couple of small houses I am working on with thatched roofs, this is the natural towel which has a fine pile neatly combed down which I think works quite well, have to see how I manage to make it look after painting.

 On the 1st pic you can see the texture of the water colour paper I used for the daube, I don't think this is heavy enough to work.  




This is how it looks after the black undercoat, which was a bugger to get into all the nooks and crannies.



In the past I have soaked the towelling in a mix of pva glue and black paint but it is hopeless to apply without getting black paint over everything including me.

Let me know what you think

Cheers

[Marine0846]

Go with the toweling on the big house.
Looks like you have it down with how to do it with the little houses.
Fine work on the inside.
Very playable and looks great.

[gamer Mac]

I think the towelling works best. When I paint mine I use a black spray can as I feel it fills in all the little bits better. Did you soak the towel in PVA? 

[Vagabond]

Hum - this project is not of to a flying start.

The walls on the small houses didn't work and so I have re-daubed them. Over done the highlighting on the thatch roofs so need to tone that down.

On top of it all need to thatch the chieftains house!

Marine - ok I am convinced, I will thatch the big house. 

Gamer Mac- is a bit cold down here at the moment and i have to spray outside so I used black gesso for undercoat, I brushed on dilute pva 1st because I wanted to get all the threads of the toweling in line, it was much more controllable
By the way I have just painted the figure you use for your avatar, thinking of entering it for Bob painting club - except yours looks so much better

Thanks all for your advice- much appreciated.

Cheers

[Parrot]

That roofing looks nice, I also like the towel method, but I wonder, what do you glue the towel to?  I have used balsa wood or bass wood in the past but I wonder if there is something different.  

Also, do you wrap the towel under the roof or just cut it off a the edge?  I wrap it under, but then it has difficulty fitting sometimes, I wonder if the other way might work better.

What do you use for the wall daub?

[Mason]

I reckon that it will look great when you have finished, so persevere at it, sir.
I reckon you will be happy with the results.
 

I also reckon that I have something that you can use as a decoration above the door.
Let me dig around a little and get back to you.
 

[Dr. Zombie]

The thatching look very good.

[gamer Mac]

 
By the way I have just painted the figure you use for your avatar, thinking of entering it for Bob painting club - except yours looks so much better

Why thank you very much but I think I was just lucky with that figure not skillful and it was painted a while ago before my eyes started to go

[Vagabond]

Hi Parrot - for my later builds I have been using foam board for walls and roofs.



Plenty of support for the roof. In the past I have found balsa, and mounting board warped, I don't store them very well so that may be adding to the problem.

For the small houses I cut out a square from each bottom corner of the towel, the thickness of the foam board.



and spread pva adhesive over the roof and along the sides and bottom edge so that I could wrap the towel around that edge. You have to go back and push the towelling around the corner a couple of times but it did stick wiyjout too much trouble. The advantage with foam board is that it is 5mm thick so gives plenty of meat to grab on to.



It might be clear enough to see here. The reason for the cut out is to avoid a messy corner, you just have to be carefull that you make a good join there.

If you look at the small houses I have used watercolour paper that has a texture, this has not worked because it is still too smooth but you can get stuff with more texture, and I shall try this again because I think it should give a good result.
I have redone it this time with tile grout and paint mixed and pasted on with an artists trowel. I mix paint in with my texture so that when it gets damaged the colour shows through rather than the white of the grout.
I am not sure if I would recomend grout mine seems a bit soft but it is a couple of years old.

Hope that helps, and if anyone else has ideas on this please shout up, that is why I started the thread.

Mr Mason, I had the wine chilling hoping you would get here to give me a master class in drybrushing. As it is I had to go it alone, will post the results tomorrow.

Dr Z - thanks much appreciated.

Gamer M - tell me abot the eyes, I am using 3x magnification glasses for painting and then when I photograph the figures I see all the faults - a bit disheartening.

Thanks for your responses.