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Whale- Thank you for the compliment. More coming.

Dave- You are mostly correct. The workshop is brand new as of Jan 2017 and has been used many times. What stirred in my bones was desire to finish project and nostalgia for Dakka. Pics of my new space at some point.

Gits- Absolutely. I have flat plenty of flat plasticard walkways for game use but they are lacking in proper Underhiviness. I'll be changing that over time with random bitz and also a lot of stuff from the Shadow Wars terrain.

CommissarKhaine- I completely agree that the aesthetics would be better if I had irregular shapes. Due to finite storage space reaching capacity I had to cede to practicality. I will be creating parallelogram walkways (with 60 to 30 degree angles) to offset the buildings and break up the appearance of orderly 90 degree angles.



No new work to share today, just pics of old projects I haven't posted yet. They are "done" in that they meet my minimum tabletop standards and I have no immediate plans to detail them further but I know they could be taken to another level with some attention to detail.

Here's my most recent "finished" peice from July '17 and one of my favorites. It was intended to just be walkways to connect my other buildings. I'm happy I decided to turn it into an individual piece. The finish is clean because I was using it for SW-A and I'm keeping it like this to add diversity on the tabletop.






This is the only one I built and I don't imagine more would be coming

Next structure was built at the recommendation of Bruticus. I had 3 others but I wanted the bulkheads for a different project. This is the one that survived.



Many rebuilds over the years created this structure. This is the final build and I am happy with what it finally wound up to be. I would have preferred to rebuild it as it was originally but 6 moves and 20 years made that not possible.







These buildings were put together at the same time and years later all painted at the same time. They have been revisited for minor detail work but are playable "as is" and I do not expect a lot of future work.







This is another original '97 model that has been reworked multiple times. I really like this one for it's open spaces and overall size. I've played games where multiple combats were taking place on different levels simultaneously. This is a piece I know I'll be going back to for more detail.







I know I can put more work into these and probably will once I have the newest pieces painted to minimum standard but for now I appreciate how they theme and fit together on the tabletop.

(from a SW-A game this summer

CommissarKhaine- I completely agree that the aesthetics would be better if I had irregular shapes. Due to finite storage space reaching capacity I had to cede to practicality. I will be creating parallelogram walkways (with 60 to 30 degree angles) to offset the buildings and break up the appearance of orderly 90 degree angles.

Fair point, and the parallelogram walkways are a stroke of genius! I like that you are actually making the choice to move on in order to get things finished, kudos to you! It's a pitfall for all modelers I guess. And I would love to play on such a table, it all comes together very well on the tabletop.

Nice collection and variety of shapes you have going there.

Great table Skalk! I'd love to play on it!

Great work all round. That table looks amazing, the walkways etc are looking great.

CommissarKhaine- My driving motivation is to be done with my terrain projects and everything I'm doing is moving that decision forward. I'll never stop building fiddly piles of junk on 40mm square bases but (aside from one last grand project I have my my "to do" list) my large builds are over.

Dr H- Square, rectangular, uhm... square... yes, I have quite a collection of shapes.

Dave- It doesn't travel well. Come visit and we'll get a few games in.

Cam- I appreciate acknowledgement from anyone on Dakka, but it's a different kind of compliment when it comes from someone who's work I respect and admire. Thank you.




If necessity is the mother of invention, then desperation must be the mother of inspiration. Long ago I found a 40K fan site that had a section dedicated to building terrain. A portion of that was Necromunda, and many of the models were built using a cross-lattice cake decoration that looked perfect for the Underhive. I searched for them online and at local retailers but found nothing. Later I discovered the company that made them had gone out of business years ago and finding those pieces was unlikely.

By pure chance I found some in the free pile at a yard sale a couple years later but they were quite large and had an oval in the middle of the column that gave the piece an unwanted aesthetic. I simply could not figure out what to do about it so I put it in my supplies drawer and there it sat. Over the years I've pulled the out many times trying to find a way to finally put them on my table. Every time they would wind up back in the drawer.

About a year ago I started culling my supply collection down due to limited storage space for completed projects. Last night I hauled out my building supplies drawer again. It wasn't long before I realized the supports were never going to be used and had to go. That's when my hoarder separation anxiety went into panic mode and inspiration struck- just break them in half:



10+ years of this stored in my bitz bin and all I wound up doing with them is breaking them in half. I think it's a brilliant idea.







I also went through the train set bitz bin that I've collected. I'm considering what to do with these. I'm thinking Necromunda Underhive shanty town / 40K post-industrial collapse survivor camp.



I have some time off coming next week and I'm planning out a couple projects that will fill the last few spaces of storage / display for my 40K universe. Once those are built my efforts will focus on detailing everything I've done to this point. This thread is far from over but it will end someday and honestly I'm looking forward to it. Building and collecting are exciting activities but ultimately it is the satisfaction of completion and displaying on the tabletop that I strive for.

Great scratch building, table looking very cool now

Snapping them in half is perfect! They look just like metalwork lattice pillars sheared off. You could even encase most of them in resin and have them looking like the reinforcements of ferrocrete pillars

Yep, the broken halves are perfect as they are. Good (re-)find.

bobbuilder- Hello, and thank you for the compliment. I checked out your power generator and I'm impressed. Excellent modeling and paint. I appreciate that you checked out my thread. I'm hoping you have the opportunity to post more of your work.

Ynneadwraith- I gave some thought to doing something similar to that, may revisit them in the future. For now I'm giving them three colors and some weathering to get them on the table as is.

Dr H- No doubt this will happen many more times. I'm looking forward to more and as progress continues.



I do appreciate the feedback you all offer, and I do consider it. One thing that stuck with me was this:

 CommissarKhaine wrote:
Looking promising. I would've added some more non,-square buildings though, but I'm a sucker for irregular shapes

I agreed with you but it didn't seem practical. I thought more about it today and realized I had to do something different. After a while this is what I came up with:





Same storage footprint, much cooler "sci-fi" feeling, walkways can connect at 45 degree as well as 90 degree angles... I like this so much I'm doing the same to the remaining large piece. Having two of these on the board is going to offer so many setup opportunities and now that I have these I'm going to pass on the parallelogram walkways- I don't need then anymore. Today has been a good day.

** later last night I realized that I also made these last pieces modular- they all have the same dimensions for I can stack the main platforms on top of each other and then add walkways. I stopped once I reached 24" but could have gone higher. Pics later. **

Winter 2015 the game group I'm part of decided to do a Mordheim campaign and we immediately ran into an issue- no scenery or terrain suitable for the game. One person had a few of the cardstock buildings. Good enough to get a game in but we needed a lot more terrain as we usually ran 2 tables at the same time. Being the only person in the group that builds terrain I took on that massive task. Almost everything I'm posting is still WIP and needs a lot of work to finish but considering the majority of work and paint was done in about 2 months I'm happy enough with it to share it here. I will be revisiting these over time to finish them.

First up are a buildings originally intended for WFB. 3 were already done (2nd pic), the rest in various stages of build before the Mordheim project started. Many were without paint and a couple were just bare wood. They are all made from cheap bird houses from a chain craft store covered with coffee stirrers from Starbucks and cardboard shingles for the roof (when applicable).








Everything from here onward was built specifically for Mordheim. Posting the buildings in order that I made them. Many are damaged right now and I haven't made the time to repair them yet.

My first ruined building came out very well except the windows. I wasn't thinking about it and didn't realize what I'd done until it was too late. As a result I'm not as happy with the piece as I would have been had I done the windows correctly but I already have an idea how to correct that when I revisit this piece to finish it.







The next 2 buildings I built at the same time and frequently used them as one building with debris in the gap between them. I like how these came out. Not sure why I added the other ruined building to this picture but there it is. Another very fast build.







The next building is a couple failed projects combined. I like how it came out.





This needs a lot more work but it served a purpose and went together quickly.





Next is one of the rare finished pieces I have. I really like this one a lot.







It frequently wound up being placed in the middle of this next piece. It made for an excellent town square.





Next up are my grand projects, the terrain that made our Mordheim games awesome. Yes, a LOT of work to be done still but I'm quite impressed with myself for building these as quickly as I did with the results I achieved.









This next piece is my 2nd favorite of everything I did during this project. I really enjoyed building this and it's going to be an awesome piece when complete.










And finally, the flagship of my Fantasy collection. I put the most work in of any other piece, and there were many nights that turned back into day when I was working on this. They are all bird houses and are modular, the set comes apart into 4 separate buildings. I haven't decided if I want to keep it that way but for now it makes things a lot easier to work on. There are stairs, doors, and walkways missing but I have a few of them built already, they just need to be added once the rest of the building is ready for them.















I really like these models and I'm absolutely going to revisit them at some point. Right now they have nowhere to live in my hobby room so it's back the box for now but they will be back.

great work skalk.
i wanted to ask about something that you use.
it looks almost like screen and when applied to flat flooring looks a lot like grates or diamond plate, what is that?

i was also wondering what you use as a good source of scifi doors and windows?

Lots of nice stuff in here, and I think the non-square building will add some nice variation. That Mordheim stuff is awesome, let's hope they'll find a use at some point!

Any chance of a quick tutorial on the Mordheim stuff as I'm planning something similar for Frostgrave.

Those are just terrific! Love them!

Great work, Skalk.

Great show of the Mordheim Stuff! And I really love the lattice pillars. Each intersection needs a rivet. Makes me want to dust off the old stuff too.

Awesome buildings Skalk, I've always been a fan of mordheim, I used to read about it in white dwarf but never got to actually play it.

usernamesareannoying- I have a few things like that so I'm not sure which one you're asking about. If you post a pic or link I'll figure it out and gladly answer your question.

CommissarKhaine- Thank you for the compliment. Another non-square building is below.

Llamahead- Check out https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/360/403974.page it's something I did a while back. It starts a few posts down the page. If you have any questions feel free to ask.

Gits / Dr H / Dave / OneManNoodles- Thank you. Fantasy terrain has always been the most challenging for me because I can't gob together a pile of techno sci-fi looking stuff and drop it on the table. That said, I genuinely enjoy it because it's one of the few times I will completely scratch-build something.

Dave- re: lattice pillars- I'll be honest, those pillars won't see rivets while under my ownership. I did consider it after I read your post and while I completely agree it would make the pieces exponentially cooler, my skill set with rivets would make it look like they were drilled and hammered in by an Ork hopped up on Squig juice. Maybe I should just give them to you. As in to have, to keep, do something awesome with.



Clarification of phrasing- when I say "final build" or "last one" it isn't cryptic foreshadowing, it's simply due to my collection having reached the absolute limits of available storage / display space. Because of that I'm very focused on building right now. I've figured out what can go where and that's what I'm building. Also, I'm building because I've owned most of these models for *years* and all they have done is sit unused in a box or a bin. If it is built and primed I'll have the opportunity to put it on the table.

Lots of stuff to share today. First up is my final Necromunda structure. Originally I had planned to make this piece another oblong hexagon building but decided to make something truly different. I think this design will help break up the visual of 90 degree angles on the board and also provide more opportunity for crisscrossed walkways.









Next is a small side project I'm working on between my other projects. I found these while cleaning out a box of unfinished scatter scenery and thanks to some inspiration from Flinty's industrial terrain thread I decided to get started on them. You'll see these show up again in the next couple weeks.



Next is from the Mantix line of urban warfare terrain I'm building for a friend. I'll say directly the finished product looks excellent but the build is even more annoying than the Pegasus Hobbies kits and will require glue if its going to survive being used frequently. This is the least enjoyable project I've worked on in a long time and the frustration with the build is redoubled when considering how absolutely cool this line could be if it wasn't such a hassle to build. My recommendation for this product is to avoid it unless you are really into the appearance and functionality of the model, that might make the build process less infuriating. I'm only finishing this because I said I would. The lesson I learned from this is to not offer to build a kit for someone if I don't already have experience with it.





My last offering for the day is the complete opposite of the Mantix kit. This is likely the last GW kit I'll build for myself and decided to go big. Really big. I started this back in '13 and about 1/2 way through the build. When I'm doing my initial builds I usually only tack the plates with a couple drops of super glue because I change my mind frequently when building. Once I'm satisfied with it I go back and glue everything in place for a strong bond. I hadn't reached that point yet with this model and applied too much pressure when I was trying to cut a channel into a plate. The model collapsed into multiple pieces and my reaction was less than optimal. A week or so later I scooped up the pieces and here it is 5-ish years later:



I had already designated the space for this model by the size of the base and decided it was time to build it. I had an excellent time building this, no question the most fun I've had modeling in quite a while. I've missed working on GW buildings and it was great to see this again:



The end result of this build is outstanding. Flooring etc still needs to be done but the main structure is complete. I'm very happy with this model:





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That's a long way down:



The next pieces are going to be scatter scenery made from the remaining bitz I have left over. I'll have at least 5 or 6 more, all will have the same flooring, idea is to simulate a *gigantic* Imperial building that was savaged centuries ago and only bits of the foundation remain. I'm already thinking I made a mistake by shaving off the floor plates to match the cut of the base. If enough of you agree with that I'm going to redo the flooring so it has overhang, maybe some re-bar or piping exposed... you know, real modeling hobbyist stuff that real modeling hobbyists do.







That's it for this update. More work coming soon. I'm never sure what I'll be working on but no matter what I'm working on, it's progress.

Ooo sick cathedral.

though it feels like it is asking for a statue or 10.

Desubot- It used to have statues but opportunistic Cultists stole them all and sold them on eBay.

Spectacular cathedral, everything is looking good. Looking forward to seeing where you go with the tanks.

No! you must rivet these! It is your Thesis, your Destiny!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
No! you must rivet these! It is your Thesis, your Destiny!

Great work, Skalk. All looking nice. :thumsbup:

I feel I should point out that when I said about the variety of shapes you were building, I wasn't being sarcastic: While they were mainly rectangular in footprint they had a good variety in profile, height, etc.
Most buildings are rectangular to aid fitting together and by roads and paths.

But some unusual footprints are also good.

Cheers for the tips Skalk.

Cathedral looks awesome - I really like that tiling floor you've got. What is it made from? Overhang might be better, but you could also edge it in debris if you don't want to pull it up.

Cam- I'm going to use the salt weathering method on them once it warms up here. I've been having issues with hairspray and -12 degrees (c).

Dave- I started to put rivets on one this weekend. It does look better but I'm not committing to it just yet. If the next LoER contest challenge is "use as many rivets as possible" I'll for sure have a project for it.

Dr H- Text is a poor form of communication. I was attempting humor as an acknowledgment the compliment.

Llamahead- You're welcome. If you have any questions feel free to ask.

kestral- The tiling is a square tile sheet from Plastruct. I don't remember the gauge but it's available at most hobby shops I've been to and certinally online. The squares in mine are maybe 1/2 inch by /2 inch? re- overhang, I'm going to junk the edge up on this one and overhang the rest.



No photo updates today, forgot my camera at home. Got a lot of work done this weekend but it was spread out over many projects. My Shadow War terrain saw some detail to a walkway and platform, I based all of my new Necromunda terrain black and then criss-crossed different colors of rust to add variety to the salt weathering I'll be doing later, put some rivets on the lattice pillars, built another Imperial Sector ruined wall bit, and primed a base I'll be using for some Necromunda / 40K scatter scenery.

I've been going through everything I own lately. This weekend was no different and I came across another bucket of terrain supply junk I had forgotten about. I have decades worth of bitz and pieces of supplies that I'm not ever going to get around to using. I've gotten rid of the easy stuff (things like empty soup cans, cardboard tubes, etc) but having a harder time throwing the "cool" stuff in the recycle bin when I know someone else would love to have a go at some of these failed projects.

I've been thinking about this next part for at least 2 years and have finally decided that I'm going to do it. I'm offering the bulk of my supplies to my terrain-minded Dakka friends. DCM LoER members have first pick (membership has privileges) but I won't be saying "no" to anyone so long as I have stuff left. My collection varies from wee bitz like brake pads for a 1:35 scale tractor trailer to large chunks of plastic. It'll be a grab bag of surprises (not listing specifics but it'll include HO train junk, broken kids toys, Grecian cake pillars, 1/35 military stuff, just lots of stuff). Disclaimer- it won't have GW plates etc, it's is all genuine reclaimed junk. If anyone likes working with wood (balsa / bass... Llamahead this might be what you're looking for re: Mordheim stuff) let me know, I'll be sure to send a few sheets. I know I could try selling this on eBay or giving it away on Craigslist but I'd really rather see it go to someone that will use it. All I ask in return is that once it has arrived you cover my postage if you can.

Clicking submit, no backing out. Let the purge begin.

 Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:
...Dr H- Text is a poor form of communication. I was attempting humor as an acknowledgment the compliment. ...

That's alright then. I didn't think too much about your initial reply, but then you started on non-rectangle footprints and thought I should clarify.

Keep doing what you're doing.

Good luck with the clear out.
I would jump at the chance of more building materials, but I'm struggling to house all the useful junk I already have (I don't go through it quick enough). So I don't need more... at the mo'.

Nice builds man, clean, good technique, nice design choices!

Dr H- to both.

MajorTom- Thanks for the compliment. Of the entire hobby, terrain is my passion.



More Mantic progress. I have buildings #3 and #4 to offer. These buildings are the result of having no idea what to do. When I'm simply stuck for ideas I'll do prep work like filing burrs off the edges, sort plates together in separate piles, etc, Eventually inspiration strikes and I start building. These are both from last night. The first structure intended to be a hub for walkways I'll be making later.





Second structure was intended to be a power-station sci-fi whatever, it just looked cool so I built it..



When I turned it upside down to add clips to the wall and interesting thing happened- the model completely transformed into something else. I'm going to paint both sides of this so it has maximum versatility as a model on the game table.



I have some builds left. Once I'm done with those I'm going to trade my glue and pliers for paints and brushes. I have many models that need at least basic colors to see the tabletop, and they will require multiple hours of detailed attention to be finished. I'm far happier when I'm building, but the paint defines the model and it's worth the effort if done well. The next phase of this project (fine detailing and paint) is going to be my terrain thesis. Everything I've learned will be going into these models. I'm intimidated by the scope and expectations of the project, and also excited to have made to opportunity to see old models finally finished and used on my tabletop.

That's it for this one, thanks for reading. I'm headed back to the hole to get some more work done today.