18mm Austrian farm

Good evening!

The last post was quite a while ago, unfortunately. As I mentioned, we were completely busy renovating our new house, planning and carrying out the move, and so on. A lot of work and even more work, with no time for the hobby. But it was worth it, I would say! And now, I am never, ever, ever moving again.

Although I don’t know exactly which moving boxes contain about 2/3 of my collection and tools, I decided to dedicate this weekend to the hobby again. It only worked out reasonably well, but hey! It’s a start.

What did get finished is an Austrian farmhouse, circa 1800. Since we are planning to start an 1809 campaign at our club soon, this was a perfect fit. And I realized that I didn't have any terrain for 18mm at all! Scandalous. Well, we are changing that immediately.

The great models are by my friend Jens Najewitz from 3D Print Terrain. I printed them in 18mm and resin (at about 50% size) and filled the edges a little bit.

This is what it looked like during the first fitting test:

I cut the base out of thin plastic card. After that, I moved on to filling the gaps, sculpting the mud on the ground, and adding a few small details:

Actually, I took some inspiration from an old White Dwarf article from 2009 and adopted some of the techniques. Empire Coaching Inn by Chad Mierzwa (?). I’m not sure if the last name is correct, as the article only says Chad... But it could well be.

 

Incredibly good, isn't it? Unbelievable. I think I will soon copy this one-to-one for my own Warhammer collection... So this was a good exercise, I think!

But back to the historical part, Warhammer will return soon enough ;)

After filling the gaps, I glued on some sand and primed it with Zandri Dust. By now this has really become my favorite primer for everything that isn't supposed to be pure white.

The first base coats are on! I dug out the stippling technique again. I had mainly used it for my Legions Imperialis tanks and planes (more on that soon, hopefully), and I found it incredibly fun and effective back then. And wow, the plaster worked better with it than expected!

And then the buildings were already as good as finished. The roofs cost me some nerves; I think I repainted the roof of the living house three times... But now I am quite satisfied. After that, I moved on to a few small parts.

I believe all of them are from Tabletop World. I didn't know for the longest time that they also make STLs, unbelievable! Probably the most realistic fantasy models I have seen so far... But also very expensive, especially for STLs that you might only use once. But that's the quality! I could say a lot about the pricing model of STLs in general, but perhaps another time.

In any case, I also printed the items in resin and painted them very quickly:

After that, I moved on to the greenery, but I didn't take a picture of it. I recently ordered Coarse Turf and Green Blend from Woodland Scenics, and that actually worked out quite well! And this is what the finished piece looks like:

 

  

I must say, I am quite satisfied! I learned a lot and wrote everything down so that I can paint the next buildings in a similar way. 

A big thank you goes to Frank Becker from "Figuren und Geschichten," who gave me several tips for painting terrain like this.

Next, I would like to do a small chapel with a graveyard. We'll see! But I think it’s Warhammer again for now... The Citadel Wood is already primed!

All the best

Lucas