Category Archives: Work in Progress

Zavod 311 – Post 1: New Project Planning and Ideas

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I’m a regular over on the DakkaDakka forums, and since I’m often too tired to actually paint or do anything useful after work, I like to spend time in the Painting & Modelling Blog section to shoot the shit, share ideas, give encouragement and occasionally be inspired. It’s like the blogosphere, but more moderated and a bit more conversational. Not better, but a different aspect on the discussion and hobby of toy soldats – and one I equally enjoy to blogging. (And easier!)

One particular friend, Grimdork picked up a toy tank from Hobby Lobby for 6 bucks. It’s a 1:48 Revell snap-together kit that apparently usually retails for $10-12 bucks in the US. Grim made an offhand remark about using it for WarPath and then later rusting it up and using it for scenery. Later he made a comment of maybe making a tank scrapyard out of it and a few more. Unfortunately for me, this started a chain reaction that’s going to take months to settle…

GrimDork’s stupid tank.

I thought it sounded like a spiffy idea, and proceeded off to Google image search looking for “tank graveyard”. The main two sets of images that came up were of an actual Tank Graveyard in Ukraine that some clever 18-year old broke into and took a ton of photos of, and the Battlefield 4 map – Zavod 311. Well, I started looking, and while I did, I got more and more inspired. The fact that I’ve been a battlefield series fan since the Beta of 1942, and that I’m one of those weirdos that sees a kind of beauty in rusting and rotting armoured vehicles probably helped. Not to mention that Zavod 311 is probably my favourite map in the game.

http://imgur.com/gallery/JDIGm
http://shiftedplay.com/threads/battlefield-4-real-life-zavod-311.1805/
http://ftr.wot-news.com/2014/03/05/tank-graveyard-in-ukraine/
https://goo.gl/maps/YUIEI

Tank Graveyard. Kharkov, Ukraine.

So then it was decided. I was going to do it myself. Or at least look into it. After all, it would make for a brilliant battlefield for 40k, not to mention moderns or Bolt Action. You see, I’m one of those weirdos that doesn’t think that all of the architecture in 40k needs to look the same. Even allowing for STC, etc, the Imperium should have a HUGE range of architectural styles of everything, since it’s a “recovered” empire that spans a huge chunk of space and so forth. Not everything needs to be skull-encrusted eagle-mounted flying buttresses with skulls on the skulls and looking like John Blanche’s drunken napkin scrawls made solid.

Zavod 311 Aerial View – Showing the rough area to be converted to a Wargames Table.

To me at least – flat, unadorned austere, decaying Soviet-style architecture and fortifications are just as apt for the Imperium. To me, brutal and overblown Nazi architecture and well-engineered buildings covered in eagles and flags are just as apt for the Imperium (though actually very conservative compared to the actual aesthetic). Likewise, Ancient Greek and Roman-style buildings – from villas to the Parthenon and the Colosseum are just as apt for the Imperium.

And of course, then we get to Gothic architecture that actually looks like Gothic architecture – surely that’s as apt for the Imperium as anything else – but including more than just spires, arches and flying buttresses. (look up some pics!) And then, why not include Romanesque architecture, and descriptions of places like Ultramar always make me thing of an ultra-modern 20th century city – skyscrapers of glass and steel, – thinking Singapore or Hong Kong or Dubai.  – And that’s all before we start talking about how Space Wolves live in space-viking space-longhouses and so forth.

So Zavod 311 and it’s real-life counterpart fit my 40k aesthetic sense perfectly.

Zavod 311 Map View – Showing the rough area to be converted to a Wargames Table.

I looked online for awhile to see about these six-dollar tanks, but to no avail. Not available at all here in Australia, apparently. I could eBay them, but they’d cost a fortune. And I wanted twenty tanks, dammit! I then realised that I’ve bought 1:48 scale tanks to use for 40k before from Korean sellers, and that I should check those out. At this point I traded in the idea of M60 Shermans for the T-72, which just fits the theme so much better –  and while they all sell them for the same price, give or take a dollar or two, NewLangleyShop also had the magic “make offer” button next to it’s T-72s. I was able to sort out a batch order of 20 T-72s and 4 Merkavas (for hull variety, I’ll probably take the turrets off) in 1:48 scale for a very decent amount. Since they’re all going to be junked, I wanted to go as cheap as possible. I also lucked onto a bloke in Melbourne who happened to be selling off some 1:48 armour kits for $10 each, so I grabbed all 6 he had for sale.

Academy 1:48 T-72

Academy 1:48 Merkava

So, with it all happening, I gave Andrew’s Hobbies a call, and explained my vision for a wargaming board, and asked a few questions about materials he has and can get in, as well as train scales that could work for our odd little mix of 1:56/1:48. I’ve always liked the idea and look of having some rails, a few flatbeds, rolling stock and freight locomotives on a wargaming table – Andrew happily spent 20 minutes on the phone to me (pretty much a stranger) giving encouragement and advice about materials and train scales. Apparently “O” scale is approximately 1:48. And it’s also hard to get hold of (especially here in Aust) and trains cost approximately eleventy bejillion dollars. (which I kinda knew, but wow… worse than I expected!) While I’ve bought the odd bits and pieces of modelling supplies off Andrew in the past, I’m not one of his mates and I doubt he’d even recognise me, and so I was very impressed at his being willing to give me that much time and advice. I’ll certainly be down there to pick up a lot of the parts I need.

I’m recognising from before even starting that this is going to take months. Much of the work will have to take place over the Christmas holidays when I can get stuck in during good weather, long hours of daylight and no work-weekend cycle to keep winding my energy and enthusiasm to paint and model down. In the meantime, it’s something else to work on between trying to finish the various army projects that I want to get finished – KoW Ogres, KoW Elves and Dark Elves, KoW Gondor, 40k Dark Angels, 40k Iron Warriors, 40k Imperial Guard, 40k Tyranids and 40k RT-themed Crimson Fists (amongst others) – no tot mention boardgame figures and random cool-looking models.

I’m also going in expecting that I should take my best time estimations for every bit of the project and quadruple it at best. I’m also not one of those guys who is a scratch-building genius, or even especially decent at stuff like that, so it may end up looking as rough as all hell. Let’s see how it goes…

 

 

 

 

 

The War Room

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So, last time I showed off this WIP room was back in January, where we put a ton of work into the space. That link also shows the development of the shed from “full of junk” to the start of what it now is. Also shows many of the first shelves go up, for those interested 😉

By request (and let’s face it – it was gonna happen anyway!) – here’s the (virtual) grand tour:

Bike Racks, out-of-the-way shelf, closed terrain cabinet.

Finally got the bike mounts installed and got them out of the way – giving us much more floor space. Likewise with the high shelving that I finally got finished which gets those detolf boxes out of the way – even more floorspace freed up. Continuing on that theme, the cheap pine shelf will be disposed of. The boxes that fill it are all basically empty. Just being kept for now to rebox stuff that comes out of storage inside much larger boxes after culling. There’s a set of shelves with Rackham prepaint models behind it.

Scenery!

Yep, the metal cabinet is filled with scenery. The GW boxes in the pic are filled with things like fences and hedges and such so they take up less storage space. I reckon it’s about time I finish painting those bloody adobe buildings. At least doing them now, 10-15 years after buying them they will be painted as more generic buildings so they can fit into modern and historical middle-east gaming rather than being covered in checks and dags to become Ork buildings. (though they can obviously do double-duty!)

Shelving!

Two new metal bookcase-style shelving that replaces the old, shitty MDF bookcase that we had for 20 years (and was falling apart). Allowed me to move some of the boardgames out of the inside of the house to a more appropriate place to store them – so I chose “large tabletop” ones to bring out. The Sedition Wars box has been gutted and just filled with 3 copies worth of floor tiles. How I wish I could get my money back for that Kickstarter! The white crate is filled with bottles of homemade pasta sauce which my parents still do every year or so. The bottom right shelf is filled with old roleplaying books from my youth. Cthulhu, Twilight 2000, Judge Dredd and others. About half of that shelf is filled with MERP and Rolemaster (Rulemaster!) I’m wondering if I should palm those off on my friends that I used to play RM with, since they take up a lot of space, and I’d like to have my old WD mags out here.

Alien, Predator, Jeep, models, scenery.

On the neighbouring shelf there’s a bunch of scenery kits that need to be built (some really old now – from the Necromunda era of plastic bulkheads and card). A 1:6 scale 21C Jeep that needs me to find some troops to crew it, and a duo of the Kotobukiya Alien and Predator from AvP. Nice statues, bad film. Top shelf mostly contains resin and metal scenery bits, as well as oversized models that I’ve gotten assembled/primed from eBay – DE dragon, a griffon, and a couple of other things. The LED Lantern was bought on a lark, but I’ve actually found it useful, and should I ever play Cthulhu again it’ll be making an appearance. The lower shelf has a bunch of resin and metal scenery – which like the Fleshhounds just above them were planned for my next set of blog photos about a month ago. So I’ll hopefully get those pics taken in the next week since much of the other work that was stopping me has finally been done.

The other shelf!

And yes, I finally found a place to display some of my Star Wars Kotobukiya statues. They share the space with the Star Wars miniatures AT-AT. It was quite a decent game, and even as a longtime painter and miniatures collector, having a game with prepaints is no bad thing. While it’s a shame that the game was discontinued, I picked up the VAST majority of my collection once the game had gone into liquidation. I was lucky enough to pick up most of the rules (that Sith box is filled with maps and rulebooks) so I guess it worked out pretty well for me in the end. Other than that, it’s the partially-painted KoW Ogre army who have featured in these pages before, sharing space with the partially-painted Elves, the blu-taced Basileans/Lions, some trees and a Dranei Paladin from World of Warcraft.

Desk – ready to work on!

One of our old computer desks is my new workbench out here. I’ve got the ultrasonic cleaner out to strip some figures, who are right now soaking in Simple Green. Need to pick up some cheap lamps later today to use for my light box, so I can take some better quality mini pics from here on out. I probably need to get an A1 sized cutting mat as well. The idea is that I’ll do things like dremelling and scenery building and paint stripping resin moulding and casting and things on the “large and heavy” (and toxic) side of the hobby out here, while the more delicate and arty stuff happens inside. Big box there for the recyclers. We have a fortnightly pickup. We filled our recycling bin and those of our close neighbours up, and three days later our recycling bin was totally filled up again. Looks like we’ll be doing the same again with our neighbours’ help once more when they come again. It’s been a pretty full-on cleaning operation. My old printer also now lives out here as a photocopier (if not for the driver incompatibility we’d have kept it inside – one of the best random late-night purchases we ever made. Going out to buy some blinds this afternoon for the window.

The War Room. Today.

Pretty much the “room shot” – best compared to the following image from before we started at the very beginning of this year:

The Shed full of Junk. January this year.

No need for a pile of text there. I think the two pics say it all.

Spotlights!

Not the most exciting photo – but a pretty exciting thing to have. A set of LED spotlights above my gaming table spot. As originally suggested by Chris, the awesome electrician I had in to do my work. A real top bloke and a gamer himself, though more of a CRPG/Console gamer. It was great to be able to have someone doing the work who could appreciate our hobby, and chat about shared interests like games, movies, pop culture and all of the rest.

Another flouro!

Equally unexciting from a photo perspective but brilliant if you’re actually here is the addition of a second flouro light on the opposite section of ceiling to the existing one. Really, really brightens the room. With the original, it was still quite decent, but now there’s really no comparison, especially at night.

Entertainment and Atmosphere

The “atmosphere” is supplied by a 50″ 1080p LG plasma. I actually planned to get a much smaller TV (30-40″ or so)  but then I found this particular plasma model had been marked down to less than the 40″ LCDs. So I did the only thing I could do and bought it, and rejigged the entire original wall-mount plan. The green is one of the burn-in slides that are still cycling through. Added another floating shelf, picked up a new, cheap Blu-Ray player and put it in the bedroom, brought the old one down here, added a WDTV Live box and a bunch of appropriate DVDs and Bob’s your uncle. I know it’s right next to the window, but the tv is padlocked to the wall mount, the alarm unit has been moved to right there, the “flyscreen” is actually security mesh that will apparently break your hand if you try to punch through it (I’ve declined to try it out myself) – we got every window covered in it before we moved in – much nicer than shutters.

Games table, and some junk.

Not the best photo, I guess. But you can see the shelves we put up earlier in the year. The lower level is filled with models and such while the upper contains empty boxes and some more random things that aren’t too heavy. The big white board is the games table, in storage mode. The white cabinet behind it is a cheap pantry cupboard that we bought to use in our previous shitty rental that had no clean storage space for the kitchen. Now it holds hills and unsorted scenery objects.

Spray paints and more junk.

Finally, the final corner of this long-winded panorama. Some art supplies (Ink, PVA glue, etc), latex and resin for moulding that I never quite figured out to any decent skill level, spray paints for modelling, a desk that needs to be disposed of. The remaining junk boxes of the moment that still need to be sorted through, and more scenery and things to make even more scenery with. And a bunch of HeroScape stuff.

Welp, that’s it! A bit more sorting, throwing junk away and cleaning still to go (does that ever end, though?) Blinds. A split system cooler/heater in the future perhaps, but that’s pretty much one gaming room ready to roll. After so many years of wanting and planning for it to happen, it’s still pretty unbelievable for it to actually be a thing that exists. Now I just need to make sure I use it!