Generic Middle East Village in 20mm (24-10-2015 Gift for a friend)

[Gunbird]

Just a starter for my project, to keep tabs on what I need to do.

Figures: Have what I need, will not invest in more till these are painted.
Scenery: Wrecks, civillian vehicles, optional bits for houses
Houses: Got plans and pictures that I have to convert to plans.

Managed to pick up the final piece of the puzzle last week. As I did not want to use foamboard again, or foam plastic plates, my choice had been set on cork tiles. Well, it is nigh impossible to find those here in the Netherlands. And what I did find cost me 6-10 euros for a small 4mm thick tile, excluding shipping. So out with cork tiles. At the local DIY store I ran into big packs of XPS insulation foam with big sheets, 59x79cm and 3mm thick. I picked up 1 pack, with enough plates to cover 7m2, which will now be my building meterial of choice. More then enough for quite the city!

For a change, I'm not trying to outdo myself on the detailing of these. Back to the old days when I had no money and plenty of creativity and I scratchbuilt all of my scenery. Fortunately most of the buildings in Afghanistan are pretty rudementary by our standards :grin:

I'll start off with a few small testers first as I want to try out some different ways of plastering them. What stuff I do have from Vallejo is too coarse, I'm thinking about using watered down Milliput to coat these. Edit: No, Gesso is now my coat of choice.

First building test. Took me under 2 hours to make mainly due to figuring out what worked and what did not. Used a 30x10cm sheet of foamplate to make this plus a cardboard tissuebox. Cutting and glueing that together cost me more time then the building.

It is supposed to be a small workshop with a rear exit. It has 2 coats of Gesso now, I might add a third just to be certain. Hope you like it, if you do, let me know, and if you don't, well, please don't hold back

[Marine0846]

Your are off to a good start.
Really like what you have done so far with your building.
Look forward to seeing it painted.

[Centaur_Seducer]

I always love your builds and projects, and I firmly believe that this will be a top notch, over the top job as ever
I do look forward this project as it develops

[traveller]

Very nice!

I look forward to see more of this 

[Jase]

Looks good!

Just a question, what's Gesso and where can I buy it?

[Modhail]

Looks like a promising start!

How sturdy did you find the XPS to be, compared to, say, the foamboard and foamed PVC we've both used before?

[Gunbird]

Jase, Gesso is an artists paint used for priming the canvas before use. Found in art shops, or in this case, at the local Action discount store in the arts and crafts section.

Erik, it is not very sturdy so I'm adding crossbraces when and where needed. Larger roofs, I'm working on one right now, get a large H-beam in the middle to support it. The plate and plastic we worked with before have a much higher strenght material wise but are a lot more difficult to cut. I'm finding this a nice trade off, cutting is much faster, but you take a little bit of extra time bracing it before you glue it down onto plasticcard or hardboard.

Considering I just did the basics of my 2nd, larger building in under 15 minutes of cutting and glueing, you see why it has my favor right now. Now just to cut strips of cardboard to do another 3 big shutters.

[Jase]

Thanks!

Does Gesso give you that texture as well?

[Gunbird]

It does, though I tend to stipple it on instead of brushing it on, which enhances the effect.

[Gunbird]

Bazaar test, bit bigger building, supported the construction in the middle with a 5x4 cm H-beam construction so it can take the weight and. I won't put my flightstands on it though.

A closed Bazaar. First clue troops would have of an impending attack would be closed doors and windows and no people on the street. When I'm more advanced I will try and make a working bazaar with a gunshop etc. For now, this will have to do.



Now, onwards with building 3, and after that I shall make time to do some minor detailling and then paint the 3 in one go.

[traveller]

It looks just better and better! Any chance you could take a photo of the building parts so that we can steal your clever constructions?

[Gunbird]

Honestly, there is nothing to it. Foamsheets used for insulation laminate flooring and discarded cereal packageing, that is it.

But, when the first 3 ones I make turn out the way I want to, I will make more, with plans and everything. Tbh, if you want ideas now, go see Matakashi. His PDF on making Afghan compounds is very useful.

[traveller]

Thanks, I missed that part of his wonderful website 

[Legion1963]

Looks very good wayswatcher. And two excellent ideas; Gesso and the DIY stuff. Everything that is free or very cheap and can put to use to make scenery is welcome. Thanks.

[Big Martin]

A great start. Loving the effect you're getting with gesso covering. I used watered down polyfilla on my Mogadishu buildings and it was a pain to get decent coverage.