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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (10/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Tue Feb 11, 2014 5:46 pm 
Elven Elder
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Do you use a releasing agent?

With one part molds and the Smooth on I do not. However, you must use it for two part molds.

http://www.smooth-on.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQ1A7ZjTsx8

There are food safe releases for making candy that are very easily to remove from the models with just soap and water.

I am not sure what product Celevue is using. It is often best to check the manufacturer's recommendations.

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (10/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Tue Feb 11, 2014 10:54 pm 
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Thanks for the kind comments, everyone!

@Harfoot, releasing agent is not needed when you are casting plaster / hydrocal parts with molds. I considered using my ancient bottle of Micro-Mark releasing agent for the master parts, but the liquid looked suspicious (there were little flakes floating in it) so I decided against it. The bottle is really quite old, so perhaps I should throw it away.

I've been casting parts with my new molds, and seem to get better details with plaster rather than with hydrocal. It took until my third casting when I started to produce eagles with beaks intact and wings unbroken.

Image

I've also worked on the Anduin shoreline - here's a pic of dry-fitting of parts littering the shoreline:

Image

Some filler added to smooth the shoreline and close the gap between two layers of styrofoam:

Image

Here's a close-up of the forked things protruding from the water - docking system of some sort?

Image

Time to get some sleep now - relentless work continues tomorrow. I will get some lumber for the board understructure in the afternoon, and should start putting all the terrain pieces together soon. I still have no firm idea what the top of the hill should look like, but once I have the understructure, I'll start experimenting. Stay tuned!
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Tue Feb 11, 2014 11:21 pm 
Elven Elder
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Those forked stairs are a bit to the point...

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 2:27 am 
Elven Elder
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These are some very good details! 8)

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 3:28 am 
Elven Warrior
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Nice work - maybe they were docks for supplies or building materials?

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 6:15 pm 
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Having just sat and read through this entire thread in one sitting I can safely say I've seen very little as awe-inspiring and full of entusiasm as your project. Thank you for giving me a much needed kick up the hobby rear end.
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 7:33 pm 
Elven Warrior
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Would love the dimensions and instructions of how to build your transport cases!!!! Are they drawers or just stackable?
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (11/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 10:29 pm 
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@CraigHallums, happy to provide inspiration!

@ste271276, the transport trays are only stackable. Here's a close-up of one (other nine are identical):

Image

The base is a 33x49 cm piece of plywood (5mm thick in my case, but this can, of course, vary). The end pieces are cut from 95x15mm lumber, and the long & narrow supports are 46 cm long cuts of 15x15mm wood (four pieces needed). The lower ones are just glued in place; the upper ones are also screwed on the end pieces. Here's a look underneath:

Image

You can see that the end pieces are also screwed onto the base board. The final pieces, two 27cm long cuts of 15x15 mm wood are only glued on. These allow stacking of the trays so that one above another fits snugly in place and does not slide off. So, in sum, this is what you'd need:
- a piece of plywood cut to 33 x 49 cm
- two pieces of 15x95 mm lumber, 33 cm long
- four pieces of 15x15 mm lumber, 46 cm long
- two pieces of 15x15 mm lumber, 27 cm long
- wood glue & eight screws

Using these measurements yields a tray that fits 4x5 War of the Ring infantry movement trays or 5x5 cavalry movement trays. If you use lumber of different thickness, change the size of the baseboard accordingly so that the actual storage area is about 30 x 46 cm.

Then, today's progress - I procured lumber for the Amon Hen support structure (no photo, sorry - just a dozen bits of 45x21mm lumber at different lengths). In addition, I sanded smooth the layer of filler in the Anduin shore piece, painted the shoreline with a neutral grey basecoat, and the river with different shades of blue. After the basecoats had dried, I spread some glue on the shoreline and added Woodland Scenics earth blend fine turf, WS yellow grass fine turf, and grey ballast from Asoa and Tillig (German model railroad scenery manufacturers).

Image

The scatter material was sprayed with wet water (water + a few drops of detergent), and I then used an eyedropper to soak the shore with Woodland Scenics scenic cement. Boat tracks were pressed on a suitable spot:

Image

An insider tip: I have a large collection of one litre latex paint cans with an equally large range of colors specifically mixed by a local hardware store. I start with a screen capture from the movies, open it in Photoshop and use the eyedropper tool (3x3 or 5x5 pixel average) to determine the hex code of the color I need for a terrain piece. Say, I need paint for the river Anduin water at Nen Hithoel. I take a screen cap, open it in Photoshop and determine the hex code of the color I'd need. Then I go to this web site:

http://www.perbang.dk/rgb/B3ADA7/

...and look for the closest match in NCS color system (in the case of B3ADA7, NCS S 2502-R is a 97% match to the brownish grey shade of the Argonath statues). There are also plenty of other color systems available; I use NCS because the local hardware store can mix any NCS code color for me.

Finally, I've continued casting parts - plenty of Helm's Deep columns, and I should have now enough parts to finish building the Seeing Seat. I still need a couple of flawless eagle halves for Oldman Willow, though. That's a job for tomorrow!

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Wed Feb 12, 2014 11:19 pm 
Elven Elder
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Quote:
An insider tip

Great Idea 8)
The light gray sand looks good too. Did you get a better feel for the Hydrocal?

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 12:02 am 
Elven Elder
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Taking shape nicely. Are you planning to use water effects to cover your painted river ?

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 6:31 am 
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@Gandlaf: yes, indeed, I will cover the river with Woodland Scenics Realistic Water and add bit of Water Effects near the forked stairs at least.

@OMW, I watched the Scenic Express video you linked to in your thread, and read the Hirst Arts casting instructions - and had an epiphany. I am using lightweight hydrocal, which is different to the regular hydrocal (to which I do not have access). No wonder the mixing instructions in the video showed stuff that behaved quite differently to the very poorly mixing and floating hydrocal powder that I was using. I'm still happy with lightweight hydrocal when casting rocks with WS rock molds, but get too many air bubbles and miscasts in tiny parts like the Seeing Seat eagle halves. In rock castings, it does not matter if some detail is missing, nobody will notice.
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 10:13 am 
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Just read through the entire thread and I've come to the conclusion that your mad.

Seriously though this is awesome. So many mini's and your boards are amazing. In fact looking at your campaign thread the first bat rep (the one with the rangers against the ringwraiths) instantly brought back the sense of excitement and nostalgia I had when I saw the first ever LOTR bat rep in White Dwarf (I think it was Elrond and some elves and men attempting to break through an orc force, set in the second age). I've yet to read further than the Weathertop scenario in that thread but as shown in this one, I've got some awesome terrain and battles to yet read.

Can't wait to see more finished terrain from you.

Cheers

James
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 4:11 pm 
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looks awesome. the shoreline is just fantastic.
I really need to look into mold making and plaster blocks. I have enjoyed my foam core stuff for years, but I would like to branch out into new styles of terrain.

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 4:13 pm 
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Celevue - I've just sent you a PM about a Watcher in the Water scenario I've written. I was thinking about what we could do to help your awesome enterprise and well-crafted scenarios came to mind.

Ross
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 8:07 pm 
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@JamesG_89, yes, I know I'm quite mad! Being mad is fun, especially if the madness is of a creative variant! You should see the finished Amon Hen board within two weeks (or I'll miss my deadline), after which I'll turn my focus on the terrain-intensive "season three" of our campaign, starting with Helm's Deep.

@Sithious, I guess OMW has far more experience with molds; the ones I did for the Seeing Seat and Helm's Deep were the largest I've done so far, and as you have read, it was not without challenges. But in some cases molds are very, very useful - I've focused on making the Seeing Seat parts, but had always enough plaster to fill in the Helm's Deep mold. Without almost any extra effort, I suddenly have all the pillars I need for the Keep.

@Ross, thanks for the scenario - we shall use it. I've sent you an email with some additional thoughts & questions. Looking forward to sharing ideas about other scenarios, too.
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 11:12 pm 
Elven Elder
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I am having some difficulty deciding how large a table the scenario is going to require. Your thoughts?

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Thu Feb 13, 2014 11:35 pm 
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You mean Amon Hen? I guess it depends on whether you play the whole thing as one large scenario, or whether you divide it into sections like in the Journeybook (3 separate scenarios) or in White Dwarf (two separate scenarios). Our board will be at least 2.8m x 0.9m, but if needed, the length can be increased slightly. I think it will be enough, though.
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (12/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Fri Feb 14, 2014 4:11 pm 
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The Anduin shore section is done apart from adding Realistic water - I'll do this during the next few days.

Image

Image

Image

The Seeing Seat is also fully assembled; I need to spray more basecoat black on the added parts before painting the greys.

Image

Here's a close-up with Aragorn for size comparison:

Image

Extra eagles and seat backs for Oldman Willow - I will ship these on Monday:

Image

All these eagles in the Seeing Seat make me wonder what did they have in the Hearing Seat atop Amon Lhaw... Mumak ears? Too bad the movie only shows it from afar. Speaking of distant views, the first view of the entire Amon Hen just before the Fellowship lands on the beach bears little resemblance to the location seen further into the movie. The rocky top with the Seeing Seat, for instance, has no trees anywhere near the top. Yet, when Frodo and Aragorn are at the Seat, there are plenty of trees in front of it... my board will attempt to show the spirit of the area, but obviously, the hillsides would be far too steep for gaming if I made it resemble the distant view.

Next steps: painting of Parth Galen stairs, the Seeing Seat and other bits of ruin & statues, followed by the actual terrain layout planning. I hope to have a pic or two showing the entire terrain for you by mid next week (even though some of the ground probably will still be unfinished at that time).
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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (14/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Fri Feb 14, 2014 4:36 pm 
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All looking good mate and very nice to see the parts for Charlie.
I've often wondered about the seeing seat and how overgrown with trees the area was. My only thought was the empty years since the kings of old had left the area to nature and as a result trees grew where once there had been none.

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 Post subject: Re: Celevue's LotR campaign - behind the scenes (14/2 Amon H
PostPosted: Fri Feb 14, 2014 5:09 pm 
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The Seeing Seat and other bits are some of the best I have see 8)

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