Medieval Guildhall - Thaxted

This one proved to be a total headache..not only the fact it has Jetties on three sides  but the open area underneath and the shape of the Roof!! Adding the tiles/shingles was "fun".

As ever..the planning stage.
It started well but as it went on the positioning of the uprights on the top two floors had to be changed three times and trying to space the large Posts for the open area took half a dozen attempts.
Worse came when putting the finished walls together......First, some idiot had forgotton about the jetties  between the bottom and second floors for the side walls. Luckily it´s not the whole length of each side so a Piece could be added.
Then due to the small supporting area of the ground floor, the upper floor sagged towards the front,  similar to a concertina,  which meant adding extra bracing pieces inside.
Then..as the Roof was being added it caused the front and back walls to bow inwards which meant adding even more internal bracing pieces.

Underneath.
I´ve left out a couple of crossbeams and (it can just be seen in some pics on the web but not 100% clearly) the "kingspost" , which should roughly be (in this model) near the middle but it took up space and wasn´t necessary so got left out.

What next?. A break from houses...maybe?
Or...Stokesay Castle gatehouse or Bayleaf farmstead ? Or a freestyle made up building?

Leigh-Pemberton House

Leigh-Pemberton House, Lincoln 

As with the "King John's" Hunting Lodge -Axbridge  some bits and pieces have been altered..the White shop Windows for instance or the Stone base and the rear and right walls (In real life they are attached to adjacent buildings) are entirely made up.

Roof tiles/shingles and Dragon Beam Ends plus Dragon Posts added.
The Roof has roughly the same surface area as the King John´s Lodge but this time I added 9-10 rows of tiles instead of 7-8 (reduced the area of overlap)
 It means more  snipping  but the result is better.

The "planning stage"

Basically this one is a mirror Image of the King John's" Hunting Lodge -Axbridge  building (the jetties are on the other side) which makes it good for creating a "Dark alley" Scene.

Next one? The Guildhall, Thaxted  looks interesting..

"King John's" Hunting Lodge - Axbridge

"King John's" Hunting Lodge -Axbridge  or as near as I could reproduce it from photos found on the web.
Re-creating a reallife building is way more time intensive than just making one up, measuring etc so it will end up looking near enough in porportion (the plans below) but the result is, IMHO, way better.

I´ve made a couple of changes from the real life Version;
1. The shop Windows I made smaller as the construction was impossible using Card.
2. The back wall and right Hand wall I´ve made up , the original back wall is a massive Stone affair.
3. I´ve left the chimney off.
4. I left off the fretwork above the Windows.

Basic history and info on the original can be seen HERE

Rough sketch (to scale) to plan out how it will actually Transfer to the model..and it allows for small changes now rather than wasting  time and cardboard later.



 

 

Roofing tiles made from thin Card , strips 1cm wide, marked at 1/2cm intervals and the edges snipped with scissors. In the pic the Strip is 2 cm´s wide which makes easier to Hold during snipping. The snipping can be toe curlingly boring but way easier than sticking the tiles individually.  

I´m pleased with the way it´s turned out so the rest of the houses will get the same Treatment...so hours of "fun" ahead :-)

A slightly sterner Version of the kings head sculpture that adorns the original building.

The Windows are made using mesh from a bag of oranges, cut to size then painted black and thin pieces of scrap plastic from Containers behind


.............and just to Show it´s virtually all  made from scrap Card.....

I reckon I´ll Need to add a Pub to the town, so I might have a go at this one,  Leigh-Pemberton House,

Card houses

What can you do over the Weekend whilst drinking red wine and watching films? Build some generic medieval houses that´s what :-D
I never really liked the look of my first medieval village and needed something that would be usefull for Bodstonia as well as a medieval Setting so..a couple of Shops and generic  houses later...

They fit well enough alongside my two Fredericus-Rex houses

They are easy (and quick) enough to make. Thick Card, ruler, pen to make the Patterns. The two three storey ones caused a headache or two but now I know how to create the "overhanging floors"  it´s easy.
A  sharp Hobby knife, scissors to cut them out and woodglue to stick them together.

Walls painted with acrylic wall paint, the lead glass made using strips of fly net with bits of CD case glued to the back, roofing and walls printed and glued on with Prittstick.

Townhall, Coachhouse, Gatehouse, barns, storehouse, more Shops, a couple more three  and double storey houses planned.

Jaw Jaw or War War ?

Is an Attack immenant? Will the Forces of Bodstonia clash with the natives? What will become of James Forrester and Adahy?

The last part of the tale HERE

The Winds of war?

What´s this? A Meeting of the great and good of Bodstonia. A War council  Perhaps??

The "Burning Dispute" is continued  HERE

Airfix Waterloo RHA (re-based)

Another bit of my Airfix napoleonic excursion. This time the 40 year (plus) old R.H.A set
Originally painted as part of the "paint every pose of every figure set airfix has released" quest and made up as a dio as seen HERE, all I´ve  done is rebase them.

The bod Holding the cannonball is likely to lose a couple of toes when the gun recoils

The whole lot, British, highlanders and artillery support

I think that is enough Napoleonics for  now.

Trouble in Bodstonia!! (pt1)

What´s all this!!!? Gunfire!! A cabin in flames!!!

There´s something afoot in Bodstonia!!!

Horse-Powered Ferryboat

Paddle boats powered by animals  have been around for a long time..the ancient Romans had them, powered by Oxen and they were highly popular in 19th century America. Apparently, at least eight different horseboat ferry routes operated from docks in southern Manhattan in the years between 1814 and 1819. One in New York, was powered by eight horses and could carry more than 200 passengers across the East River in 8 to 18 minutes.. as fast as a steam paddle boat.

The earlier ones had circular walkways in the middle of the deck for the horses which took up a lot of deck space or, to avoid this boxes were built on the sides, catamaran style,  to house the horses.

My Version is based on an innovation by Barnabas Langdon in 1819 -- the treadwheel-propelled horseboat whereby the drive wheel is placed horizontally under the deck and is similar to the design of a  "horse boat" wreck, the "superior horse boat EAGLE",  which was discovered in 1983/4 in Burlington Bay, Vermont.

I haven´t worked out how the nags can be Held in place (what type of harnesses etc I can use) but seeing as horses are treated well in Bodstonia they do their Job happily so no restraints are needed

The Basic structure - pre-painting.

Foam core with Card cladding scored to represent planking. The Roof Frame is made from toothpicks and the Roof canvas (on the painted version) some old material

 Obviously this will end up crossing the waterways of Bodstonia and can be seen with Crew and passengers in situ HERE ( along with my solution to steering)

Airfix Waterloo Highland Infantry (Mk2)

Still carrying on with the Napoleonic theme and as part of the Airfix Tribute Forum Waterloo GB I´ve added another stand of infantry, another centre Company but this time a centre company of the 42 Regiment,  Royal Highland - Black Watch.
As with the Airfix Waterloo British Infantry they are  100% Airfix, but this time I used bits from the British infantry set.
I´ve painted the set before (HERE) using the Airfix Boxart as a reference. Back then (2 years ago) I used more  "false" blacklining than nowadays...but I still like the look of the Blacklined ones.

There´s 23 bods on the stand, only 2 less than the Waterloo British Infantry stand with 25 but it still Looks a  bit empty in comparison.

The conversions (I didn´t take pics before painting)

This Waterloo Diorama from the 1970´s  is worth a look..virtually all 1/72nd Airfix !!

Airfix Waterloo British Infantry

As part of the Airfix 2015 Waterloo 1815 GB (Group Build) over at the  Airfix Tribute Forum
Rules;
"Any and all Airfix Napoleonic, no matter what scale, 1/76, 54mm or 1/12. They can be displayed as vignette, diorama or singly. In diorama; a depiction of Quatre Bras is permitted too. Conversions are welcome too, as long as the result is still at least 51% Airfix plastic."

My part of the GB with all the stages, from removing the paint to the final stand can be found HERE

Without going over the top and creating buildings or an exact historic Scene from the battle, I  decided to make a line of british infantry in Action and Keep  to using 100% Airfix  and using parts from within the set itself for conversions.

Instead of a set up of strict lines, firing, loading etc I´ve gone for a more fluid look, no strictly defined firing , reloading  lines.  They were going to be based as part of a small dio but I eventually based them as a unit for  wargaming. It was a Change painting napoleonic bods, so maybe I´ll add one or two stands when I get the urge to paint something different from my usual themes...

The set is pretty generous with the number of poses but I don´t really like painting the same pose over and over to get enough bods to create a decent enough grouping and, as it´s said, Variety is the spice of life,  so some knife work was called for.

Conversions.

After painting and basing I came up with another 4 conversions but adding them would have overloaded the base, making it too crowded for my liking. 

The Flags. They  Come from the Nap Flag site, a site set up by Alan Pendlebury who very generously has made loads of napoleonic flags he´s created available for free download. Please observe his conditions of use.

The flags (as does thier uniforms as far as possible) represent those carried by the centre Company from the 1st Battalion 1st Foot Guards Regiment, but as Alan notes on his site;
"I have been unable to discover which of the 24 possible Regimental colours was carried by the 1st Battalion 1st Guards at Waterloo. I have opted for that of the 2nd company which had the red and white Tudor rose as a central device."

If anyone is looking for a decent resource site for uniform plates for the 1815 campaign;
Les uniformes pendant la Campagne des Cent Jours - Belgique 1815
In French but it has (as far as I can see) every Regiment represented with line, Grenadier etc companies

Goblin slavers (2)

Follow-on and additions to the Goblin slavers.
The raids in the borderlands  have  increased in number and now, having made a deal of Money from  sales of recent aquisitions, the goblins have bought some Transport for their prisoners.

Another village Comes under attack!

The prison wagon from the strelets Roman Transport 3 the wargs from one of the dark Alliance sets. Goblin from Linear-b´s Roman Transport.

Goblin on the left with captive from the Linear-b Spartacus uprising set, Goblin with the Flail from the Linear-b Roman peasantry set.

Woman from the Linear-b Slave Market set, the man from the Roman peasantry set.