Dwarf Airship under construction

[white knight]

Looking for useful bits while passing through a toystore, I came upon these bags of plastic 54mm toy pirates, which held, among other (useless) things, a hideously underscale pirate ship. I immediately saw potential for the base of an airship, so I picked it up. The scale is really allover the place, but for once, that works.

Original:


After removing all the unwanted bits, and with a dwarf mini for scale (figure will be slightly lower once the tab is removed):


Filling the existing and newly created gaps and adding a door over the irregularly shaped hole:


And the ship will need a name of course. This one reads "Nex Superne". Anyone care to guess what I was going for with that in English?


You've already seen the captain here, though may not have realised it:


With the hands in place (note, ships wheel will get a support added):

[Calimero]

Each time I’m looking at your conversion I found myself wondering "why he didn’t cast them so I could buy and paint a few of his figures"… 

Nice work!

[Mancha]

You're getting disgustingly good with greenstuff.

[Prof.Witchheimer]

Another inspiring WK project! I like airships and always wanted to build one. Unfortunately never did.

[white knight]

As far as support goes, I have acquired some clear plastic rod, but I'm concerned it may not be enough to hold the weight (after all, I do plan to put quite a few metal figures in the boat) and I'm not sure how to determine the best spot for it (the gravity point if you wish). So I was wondering, would two of them detract from the overall appearance of the model? I'm leaning towards yes, but what to do then? A solution would be to put a tree under it for extra support, but that'll never be really strong enough to make a difference I think and it will hide part of the model/line of sight for the crew. Suggestions?

[Plynkes]

When you say airship, do you mean that pirate ship will be the gondola that goes under a balloon?


If so, please do make it a round balloon - a Montgolfier/Baron Munchausen sort of thing. I'm sick of everything being Zeppelin-shaped (Edit: what I mean to say is, a round balloon looks more Fantasy/less VSF).

But good luck however it goes!

[white knight]

When you say airship, do you mean that pirate ship will be the gondola that goes under a balloon?

I have considered various options (including magic powered and with regular sails), and yes,  it will be a balloon. Though it will be neither round nor zeppelinshaped. I had a hard time coming up with something suitable and it will be three smaller balloons, tied together with ropes. I hope that will still be suitably fantasy. You can see the basic structure here:



This will get covered in putty and such. The top half will be covered in a large sail, to which will be added the cables that attach it to the gondola (so the balloons will kinda be trapped under the sail). I still need to work out a few things, but that's the main idea.

[white knight]

Figurehead added. A Foundry cherub. Not very dwarflike at first sight, but very empire-like and these are imperial dwarfs.

[Plynkes]

Looking forward to seeing that come to fruition, and seeing how the business with the sail and all comes together.


(Let me just say I've nothing against Zeppelins - I love the things! Just didn't think that look was quite right for this.)

[Prof.Witchheimer]

As far as support goes, I have acquired some clear plastic rod, but I'm concerned it may not be enough to hold the weight (after all, I do plan to put quite a few metal figures in the boat) and I'm not sure how to determine the best spot for it (the gravity point if you wish). So I was wondering, would two of them detract from the overall appearance of the model? I'm leaning towards yes, but what to do then? A solution would be to put a tree under it for extra support, but that'll never be really strong enough to make a difference I think and it will hide part of the model/line of sight for the crew. Suggestions?

This tree solution seems to work..

[The Dozing Dragon]

You really are pretty damned good sir!

[Red Orc]

So that's what the Dwarf doctor/levitation artist/raver was for... nice!

Good find on the pirate ship too. I was admitting the other day that I first started lurking here because I was 'building' (ie not building) an airship... I may have to pick up some crappy out-of-scale pirates now!

[rob_the_robgoblin]

BRILLIANT.

I would love to build a couple of these.

Wonder if it would work for a more generic fantasy game such as armies of arcana.

I love the writing in greenstuff, great deal of skill there. I would have scibor'd that! 

[AKULA]

Nice work Seb.

 

[anevilgiraffe]

looks great... a similar supporting rod issue stalled my dwarf air longboat...