Vagabonds Viking Village - Beehives Done

[Mason]

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.

 

That is where you went wrong.
I hotfooted it up there only to spot the wine cooler through the window.
I could not knock after seeing that as white wine is something that repels me, so I hotfooted straight back again.
 

I shall still see if I can find your 'hall decoration' later, though.
 

[FramFramson]

That's literally the first time I've ever seen thatch done with towelling that didn't look terrible. Yours is actually quite good!

[Vagabond]

That is where you went wrong.
I hotfooted it up there only to spot the wine cooler through the window.
I could not knock after seeing that as white wine is something that repels me, so I hotfooted straight back again.
 

I shall still see if I can find your 'hall decoration' later, though.
 

Sorry - I didn't realise about the white wine, I had red and as you are obviously a sophisticated man from the capital, you could have mixed them for rose. 

The hall decoration sounds very interesting

That's literally the first time I've ever seen thatch done with towelling that didn't look terrible. Yours is actually quite good!

Fram - is this some kind of Canadian compliment 

Wait till you see how I can bugger it up with my painting

[Vagabond]

The final result of the small houses, I overdid the dry brushing and put 2 brown washes on to try and knock it back. I still think it is a bit over the top.



I am planning on doing a couple of vegetable patches but 1st I want to try doing a midden/compost heap. I did think to do it with one of the half polystyrene balls that flower arrangers use and cover it with towel roughed up to represent the compost but think it might be too uniform.

Would appreciate any links to this sort of thing if you have them.

Thanks

[Dr. Zombie]

I think they look great. If you want to break the coulour up a bit you could have some moss growing on the roofs.

Dungheaps you say. You have come to the right man. I have made a few dungheaps like this:
It really is just sticking various textures together in a pile.


And finished

[gamer Mac]

The house and the dung pile both look great

[Vagabond]

Thanks Dr Z - your dung heap is just what I wanted- thanks I will try and emulate that, do you have any others?

Moss on the roof is a good idea, I will do that, I did put some green into the mix but it doesn't show on the photo.

Gamer Mac - Thanks. Bye the way I did post your avatar mini on the back of beyond board. couldn't resist having BOB on my signature . In the process I came across image 26, the same figure, but as well painted as yours. Ho Hum - must try harder.

[Marine0846]

Your buildings turned out great.
Well done.

[Vagabond]

Hi Marine0846 - Thanks very much. Secretly between you and me I am quite pleased with them. The level of artistry on here is so high that anything I put up is only going to be mediocre in comparrison but posting has meant that I finished them quickly and to a standard that I am happy with.

The Middens - I am so impressed with Dr Zeds midden that I have started work on my own.





These are as shown - bits of string, garden wire, and best of all - the bits of foam left over from the house builds. Waste not want not as they say up here.

I had this brilliant idea that if i smothered the string in pva glue and wound it round the sticks I would have free wattle fencing. Free is good.

If you have never held up a bit of string and dipped your fingers in glue to smooth it on to the string, then your life is not complete. DON'T do it, buy the damn things.

As you can see the string ran out about halfway round the one on the left, it was a nightmare. Be interesting to see if it looks like string when it's painted up - hope not.
 

[Dr. Zombie]

Wow you don't waste time, do you?

[Vagabond]

Hey its a good idea of yours. Did you do a thread on this some while ago?

[Wirelizard]

The towel thatch looks great. I did the soaked-in-glue method a couple of years ago for Russian buildings and agree it's messy as heck but it looks good and dries nice and solid.

The middens look like a great start too, and I'm highly amused that LAF is a place in which we can trade methods of miniature midden construction! I should add some dungheaps to my Russian hamlet, clearly...

[Parrot]

Wirelizard, how did you make Russian buildings?  The reason I ask is because I now have a number of fireforge russians, and would like to build some buildings for them but I am not sure how to go about it.  Would the style just be wooden buldings or is there something to make them distinctly russian

[mikedemana]

Why not simply use black towels (or dark brown) for your material instead of white? Should save you a ton of time and effort.

Mike Demana
www.firstcommandwargames.com

[Vagabond]

Hi Mike - you're quite right Black would be best, but my wife was throwing this towel out and I thought - I know what I can use that for.

The Dung Heaps progress, the texture is dried tea from tea bags. 



The finished Dung Heaps



The string does look like string if you look closely and again I think I have overdone the dry brushing.



This one is wire from a gardening shop to tie plants, if you look at the previous post it is the bright green one, I think it probably looks the best, any thoughts on other materials I could have used?



Just want to thank Dr Zombie for the inspiration.


Next I want to do some vegetable patches, I have cabbages lined up but what else will go?

I know that in medieval England they used a narrow strip field system and 3 rotational planting followed by a fallow year. Does anyone know what the anglosaxons and vikings used as a field system to plant their crops? What does it look like?

Does anyone have links to this sort of thing?

Thanks for any help.