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Hi, I've decided to put together a display board to kinda keep all of my models together. I have various Cadian & Dark Angel bits and bobs so I've decided on a rear entrance of a (or thee) Dark angels fortress. I absolutely love the Forgeworld Realm of battle stronghold tile, so the plan is to build it around that. I already had a skyshield landing platform, so the plan was to incorporate that and the backdrop would be a mountain.

This is where I was toying with the layout:



I then bought some 10mm mdf to cover my max display area. At this point, as I didn't Have the ROB tile, I had to contact GW to find the depths of the rob tile, at the corners. I was told it was 10mm at 3 corners, 60 at the 4th. I also brought 2 pieces of hard board which would fit in the space not occupied by the rob tile. 1 would have the mountain and fortress mounted on it, the other would be for the landing Platform and raised walkway.

At this Point I could start chopping up the Polystyrene off cuts I'd managed to get hold of from work to form the land scape.

More to follow shortly.

Well I've got my layout planned now and picked up the Honored Imperium set for the space marine statue and the Shrine of the Aquila which i got all excited and started to paint.

The Poly was stuck down with wood glue to the hard board, but then poly to poly i used 'No-nails'.

I ordered some large pieces of cork bark to give the mountain back drop some texture and character:



I started to glue the cork bark on and filled the gaps with Woodland scenics lightweight hydrocal. while picking the hydrocal at my local hobby shop i noticed woodland scenics also sold some interesting looking rock molds, so i picked a couple up. The hydrocal really is lightweight and sets very fast:



The level with the Shrine of Aquila on was a little un even, so i packed up the corners with some poly and ordered some rolls of plaster of Paris bandage to give a level, but textured finish to the ledge.

Here i started to focus on completing the left hand side of the mountain including gluing the completed molded rock pieces:

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Here i've started to blend the gaps between the cork bark and the molded rocks with pieces of plaster of Paris bandage, which worked really well, but i did need to paint on some light weight hydrocal after as the bandage did have small gaps from the weave of the material. all in all a good result was achieved. I've also started to focus on the surrounding backdrop above the shrine:



I had an aegis defence line for my birthday recently and had a play with the positioning and space on the ledge:

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Things are starting to come together now with the addition of moulded rocks above the Shrine and I've tidied things up on the board. Now the back drop is in place, which is forming a hard stop[user] for the shrine, which will allow it to be removed for use in other situations:



the next step is to tidy up any gaps in the rocks withN hydrocal, then spray all of the rocks with watered down PVA glue to seal all of the surfaces ready for painting......i can't wait another week to get hold of the ROB tile, so I'm hoping to focus on undercoating the rocks this week.

Cheers,

Stepee

Looks great so far. Nice use of existing scenery pieces with some actual modelling work.

Just a blogging tip... try uploading your pics to the Dakka Gallery and then link to them via the img tag from there. This means people can see your pics straight away with minimum clicking to other sites.

Good luck

Thanks for the advice.

I initially started the blog from my phone and it was a struggle.

Yep, works better now

Out of curiosity, what are you using to glue the molded rocks and cork to the polystyrene?

Wickes instant grab adhesive ( no nails). It holds really well immediately, and is pretty solid after an hour or so.

Right.....I've finally managed to get hold of the Forgeworld ROB strong-point tile. It took longer than anticipated, as when i went to pick it up from Warhammer world, the guys who would usually dispatch the piece were helping out at the open day. I was gutted. They did however dispatch it early this week and didn't charge me for the delivery (to help me deal with the pain i did pick up a Contemptor dreadnought )

First thing to do was to see how it matches with the work already complete:



Next step to start matching up the edges that join........apart from a minor issue where i hadn't made sure i had enough plater of Paris bandage to make the final surface D'oh! Straight onto Ebay to order some more. Its not the end of the world...after all i do have the ROB tile, so I've made a start:











I'm really surprised how easy painting the tile is with the Citadel scenery pack and the more I work on it the more features i find. The tile itself is a bargain @ £70 (btw i have no affiliation with GW ). I've still got a long way to go, but its really starting to come together. I plan to heavily weather it all once painting is complete.

Looking really nice so far, the FW tile fits in perfectly.

Well I got all excited about painting the ROB tile, and have barely made any progress on the scratch built stuff:











Since the last update I have liberally applied a wash of burn umber oil paint/paint thinner to most things. This helps to give more depth and give a used look to things. I then used some FW weathering powders, firstly to add scorch marks around shell damaged features, and now I'm starting to add the aged rust. A couple of areas around the generator and cargo doors are a little overly rusty, so tonight i will lightly wash them over with thinners to reduce the amounts of rust. I'll then get the new rust powder out and apply in selected areas.

The grassing stage came out really well, although i had picked up some of the Middenland Tufts to add some interest to some of the flat areas. Unfortunately this was too close in colour to the scorched grass that i was using, so had to pop back to GW to pick up some Mordheim Turf. As you can see from the pictures this works quite well, but i think i need to add a little something else. Not sure what yet, but as the rest of the display board comes together, the solution will most likely present itself.

While the scratch built stuff has taken a back seat recently, I'm hoping to get the final skim of lightweight hydrocal on the surface around the join tonight. the next step will be to seal the surface with watered down PVA glue before undercoating black.

Its certainly starting to come together now, i've dropped the focus on the landing pad section for the time being, but hope to pick it up soon.

Stepee.

Looks awesome! Keep it up, Stepee.

Well i have been busy over the weekend and did manage to achieve everything I set out to + I also managed to have a play with some water effects. I used the Citadel water effects, but mixed in some thinned burnt umber oil paint. I got some quite good results. I didn't mix the burnt umber in too much and it seems to have given an interesting effect to the puddles:



I started undercoating the mountain feature Saturday, but rain held of completion until Sunday. I managed to dry brush with light grey and again with graveyard earth to add some flavour:



I then used some of the Middenland Tufts to add some interesting colour to the rocks, it worked, but i think i got a little carried away

I also managed to undercoat, dry brush and shade the brown under layer. Hopefully I can get the scorched grass down tonight.



Its all starting to look quite good, but the statue looks far too shiny now, so will have to be weathered tis week to match. I still need to take the rust effects down a notch as i went too far with that.

This bloke has come to have a look at the progress:



Until next time....

That looks so awesome - I wish I could make something nearly half as good as that display board!

Just a quick update to say that, I am still working on the project, but a few things have gotten in the way. The Dark Vengance boxed set being one. I have completed the grassing, etc… on the back component and have started laying out the bridge to the landing platform on the third component. It's likely to be a month until I get back on the project. I hope to kill it off before Xmas ( chaos & dark angel releases permitting).

Awesome work! Very well done. I can't wait to see it finished.

looks great.. i like the contrast of the black and green

This is looking really good i wish i could have a display board this cool, keep up the good work

Young Logan