VSF humor

Got a laugh from one of my web comics I follow on a VSF theme:

http://www.twolumps.net/d/20091120.html

http://www.twolumps.net/

its a 2 parter, second part on Monday.

Pulp Action Work

Build scenery and such is basic work for most of my gaming needs, but time to grind some of the people and creatures to actually run some Pulp Action games soon. Break out the mini's and paints! Here's some of "where I am" figures works in progress.

On the left are plastic zombies and on the right are plastic ghouls, primed and some base coating done. The Ghouls are primed and have a blue green wash on them only at the moment. The zombies have an assortment of washes and inks for skin and corruption, still have the clothing to work out, to be done with more wash and dry brush. Not to worried about the final look of these guys, a slightly bad job will get the viewer into more of an "Eeeeewwww" frame of mind rather than "these are soo cool" . Fear those monsters!

Works in Progress

Thought I would post some pics of whats taking up my hobby time currently.

So first are interior corner roof supports for my long delayed brick buildings. Followed by the Tar paper roof sections.

So here is a foam core roof section assembled. Paper masking tape layerd with a slight overlap, then painted black. Light dry brush of grey. Edges of the foam were coated with pva and then taped over when dry.

Checked the fit of the roof to the inset corners design, just a bit of trimming and also marked the underside of the roof panels with a number to coinscide with the number on the interiro wall of the building, along with guide marks on which way to position the roof to fit the same way every time.

This shot is a bit to close for the figure, came out a bit blury, but shows the roof dry brushed for the over lapping tar paper effect I am trying for. Might try doing a dark grey surface and black wash for a different effect.

Here is a tar and gravel look, in scale gravel is larger than sand but gives a game scene look of sand... Also the PVA curled the shape of the roof placard, so if I do this style again I think it would be cover the top in Tape, side by side and then use a Spray Tac Glue, sand, and then use a matt finish sealer to help hold t he sand down or simply paint stain it to help hold it down.

Lastly is my photo buddy who followed me around, to and from the cpu to download various photos. Machi really found the Flash worth trying to chase down.

Cthulu Art / Props Site

Found this to be quite inspirational overal, nice prop works of investigators and scientists.

http://alexcf.com/blog/?page_id=6

May have to cut and paste the link but definetly worth perusing.

Small Curving Stream

So pushing along with the river making idea to test it for a smaller creek, fast water setting. This time I thought to lay out the waterway with lots of small pieces of masking tape to get lots of curves in the 6 foot length.

So moving along, here is a shot of the beginning layout of masking tape. Using lots of small pieces of 2 " tape. I tore many small pieces and hung them on the edge of the work board. I tried not to fall into a fixed back and forth pattern for a more natural look to the creeks bed layout.

Now the picture of the basic layout after much pulling up and relaying tape, I smoothed the tape down but did not press it hard to the board, as I will have to pull it up to turn it over later. So, overall a good start to the creek. I am fairly sure that the thin coats of KS will still tend to curl the first surface upwards, so that when dry it will make the edges cup downwards when I flip it over to do the Water side.  Thoughts are that I will use a putty knife to smooth the KS onto the piece after a fist brush application. Might try pressing the river gravel into the smoother coat as most creeks are loaded with smooth rock.

Hmmm edges of the creek sides are not smooth, they are jagged pieces of tape sticking out this way and that, so out comes the box knife. I also applied a bit more tape over the joints in a few places where I had not given much of an overlap in the first place to help insure that the tape will pull up in one continuous piece.

 Next shot is the process of smoothing the Inside curls of the creek. Which while slowly cutting excess tape off it struck me that I didn't have any widening spots in the creek. Most creeks widen and narrow along their course, so out came the roll of tape with some more trimming.

Sample shot of a widened piece of the creek tape bed along with a reinforcement of the section. I thought about and then decided not to put in a pond on this piece. I am also thinking that I will need some 4 foot and a 5 foot section of creek. I use a 4' x 6' play board matt and the 5 foot will be long enough to allow me to place the creek in an angled direction rather than straight across the board.
First coat of KS went on with a brush, but due to wanting to keep the KS On the tape, I used my finger to smooth it out.

On to the spreading of the thin coats of Kel Seal brushable caulking, same as I did on the roads and large river project.

So here is the flip side after the top side received its 3 layers of caulking and dried. Not much noticeable cupping of the topside when dried. This particular picture is before the last coat, which I tried to apply really smooth, so that it would not appear to be flowing fast but slower.

The smooth coat did not go on a smooth as I was hoping, I used a flat stick to pull over the entire length of the creek in one pass once I had the coating applied. A mix of blue and green paint in equal amounts, thinned with water was brushed on and left to dry. As an aide to keeping the creek "flat" to the board I added small pieces of tape here and there where ever it seemed it wanted to not cooperate.

On with a new experiment. Silicone caulking can be clear, so wanting to know what a "wet" look would do to the piece, on with the experiment. I used a caulking gun to squeeze a line of clear down the middle of the creek, then it was time to get sticky with the finger and spread it over the entire surface of the creek. I deepened the muddy color that I had applied as a was from the previous picture. The gloss coat of Silicone made the color become Darker, when I had tried to Lighten it this go.

To show the glossy finish I took this overhead shot to show the light reflection from the flash. Very shinny indeed. Overall, smaller is not better than the larger 4" wide river compared to the 2" creek pictured here. Is more finicky about lying flat and staying there.  The clear silicone is being slow to fully cure, still a few very slightly tacky places, though I might break out the verathane spray and give it a sealer coat to end that problem. Final thought is that the creek will still be a usable addition to the fast terrain box I take to games. Still have to find a way to apply a coat smoothly without the ripples or streakiness. Also Discovered that its best not to lay one road / river on top of another and then place a heavy object on them Unless both sides have been painted and fully dried, or else the un painted side can stick to the other piece where the weight was. Live and Learn, I painted And applied a new coat of TAPE over the back to make SURE they do not stick to one another :)

Fast River, really

Using the same procedure to make the roads in the fairly previous article on making roads, I made a fast water river section. I laid out a curving Masking Tape river outline and then applied 3 thin coats of Kel Seal brushable caulking to the top of the masking tape, covering nearly all of the tape with those 3 thin coats. When fully dried I carefully pulled up the tape from the work board, flipped it over. Next 1 very thin coat was applied over the sticky side of the tape that was now the "top" side. Let dry, then a second thin coat and after it was on I dabbed the surface in various ways till I got patterns I thought looked "right". Still to be added with be river bank rocks, some plants etc to help visually define it better.

Click on the picture to get a better look at it. I figure to shave off the spiky bits, add a few river rocks here and there, an a touch of white water color

So far I have resisted tearing the excess tape of the edge of the river as I did on the road section, water just seems to have a smoother edge from flow than a dirt packed and worn road surface. Updates on this project as I get to them.

So here's a shot of a dressed river edge setting using some of my "edge filler" brush mounted on Popsicle sticks.  I didn't trim the excess tape off of the river as I did on the road sections to keep it smooth and also was able to use some of those areas to glue on smooth river rock, Aquarium gravel, here and there, plus a few scattered stones sticking up out of the water course.

Here's a close up of the a river rock section. Its just pva glue with the smooth gravel applied, may go and apply another coat of pva over it, give it a very slightly wet look and help to prevent the rock from falling off when I roll up the river for a test of portability.

And a final distance shot of a longer stretch of the river, which has a total length of 6 feet. Still a bit of dry brushing to do as I found that shaving the spiky bits of the dried caulk to be necessary to improve the look, but shaved After I had used the blue wash.... well, it is an experimental piece!

Clash of the Titans, trailor, remake of a classic

Here you go, right to it with out any further fan fare

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcBNHZEiX0g

Dirt Roads

So the attempt of putting the Kel Seal over the tape on a pine board to keep it from warping the edges up.... did not work. The KS when it dried still tended to curl upwards... So what the heck, I flipped the entire length over and thought I would slap some more KS on the back to warp it back the other way so the first production side would provide me with the finished road surface.... which did not make it change shape...

Then I said, well, the underside, with a coat of KS on it made a nice surface anyways, and it is shaped sort of cup sides down, but the Tape straight edges were not desirable. So pulling carefully and not so carefully I stripped off the excess tape.                                     

So here is a shot of tape stripping in progress. The blue color of the tape came from a quick idea to see how it would look as a stream... Not very well, though I have ideas now on how to use the same process to make streams with slightly raised edges.

The whole strip is a bit over 6 feet long. I plan a storage box tray slightly over 6 feet to keep them in and keep them flat, even though the dried KS is flexible, and can be rolled over a tube to store it in a smaller place. Stored flat there is no, "going flat" time required when setting up a game.

Here is an overhead shot of the edge, its lying flat against the wood board under it, and has an apparent rough edge to it. After painting I think I will try gluing a bit of rock and such along the edges to give it character? Though that would make it difficult to stack and store in my long flat box idea... hmmmm And a final "down the road" shot.

Here's another picture of 2 roads done at the same time, both are 4 foot in length.