1/285 Robotech scale buildings and a Chibi House

Hey everyone,
I've been neglecting my blog a bit but as far as doing hobby related projects, I've been ramping up constructive time on it. Over the past months I've been working on 2 big projects simultaneously. I took part in the Robotech RPG Tactics Kickstarter and after spending more money than I should my head started spinning with great ideas for terrain. My first terrain project for this game is a 1/285 scale gas station. It's pretty much done construction wise just needs some paint.

The whole project was constructed using a variety of Plastruct rods and sheets and all precisely cut using my new Chopper II from Northwest Short Line. This chopper is awesome!!! It was the perfect Father's Day present from my family. It's been getting so much use these past 2 months. If you don't have one, get one. You'll never use anything else so much for scratch building.

I also made a small scale Scott Bernard figure in cyclone armor. Not really useful for anything else but to get a sense of scale of the buildings at 1/285 scale. He might just end up being a statue at the gas station entrance.

so moving on to project number 2......

a Chibi House!! After seeing Scenery-Planet's awesome table I knew I had to make some of my own.

I'll post more of a write up on it but if you happen to frequent the forums at Impact Miniatures you'll see more info about it there under the chibi adventurers section. I know what you are thinking....I need one of those!! Well not to worry your little chibi gamer head....they are for sale at my etsy.com store located here-------------->https://www.etsy.com/listing/157446906/fantasy-gaming-chibi-house-kit?

so get one before they are gone.

So I got some catching up to do. Gotta post some miniatures and projects that I've been working on. So keep looking here for some updates soon. Till then....you know the drill ;)

MiniArt Store is launched tentatively!

If you noticed at the the side of my blog page there is a link to the MiniArt store. Not a lot being offered but if you want your own bases here is the place to get them. If it turns out to be successful, I might add more stuff. Again I am sorry I can't offer international orders. The logistics are too complicated at the moment, but I might investigate how to offer it in the future if there is interest. Here's a preview of what I have in stock:

and some painted examples

check it out and if you have any questions please let me know.

Keep on gaming!

Hydra W.I.P.

Well I know it's been a few months but I have been busy getting stuff done. Just want to post my hydra from Impact Miniatures. I am enjoying painting this. I'll do a more detailed write up once I am done with it. 

Anyone planning on going to CMON Expo, I'll be there. Let me know if you are going as well and we can meet up.
Keep on gaming!

How to build your own X-Wing Miniatures Senator Shuttle

My first almost completed project for the beginning of the year is a Senator's Shuttle for use in the X-wing Miniatures game. If you buy the core box you receive a card board card with a picture of the shuttle on it to use. Well that won't do. I like to represent objectives for games in 3 dimensions not 2. So I got out my tools and got to work.

After some playing around with the shape here is the finished product. It's mostly made from square styrene rod glued together to build the shape of the shuttle. I used 1/2 round styrene and flat plastic strips to add detail to the ship. The engines and the front of the ship are some blocks from the machine builder mold from Hirst-Arts. I cast the pieces in urethane plastic for durability. While I like the result, I figured there's got to be a better and easier way to build this. After looking at some pieces from the machine builder mold I found a way to quickly build a Senator's Shuttle and even create a whole fleet of them if you like.  

So unfortunately for this tutorial you will need to own, or borrow Industrial Accessory Mold #326 and the Machinery Builder Mold #327 found here. If you have never used Hirst-Arts, I totally recommend all of Bruce's product lines of molds he has to offer. The quality of the molds themselves is mind blowing and the detail is amazing. I currently own about 20 molds and use them for a lot of my hobby projects. But if you don't want to spend the money, there are a bunch of licensed vendors who sell casts of most of the mold lines. So you'll need the following pieces in the photo.

To make it a bit easier I labeled which pieces come from which mold. Unfortunately you will need to cast mold 327 six times to get the bottom pieces since they only get cast 2 at a time. 

So now it's just a matter of gluing the pieces together in the following fashion to make the essential pieces of the Senator's ship. The pieces that make up the engines are supposed to be chemical containers and have a tiny skull in the center of the diamond. I just take an x-acto knife and scrape it off, but if you want you can leave it on. 

Then it's a matter of gluing all the pieces together and done and done. So this new version is pretty simple to make. I think I glued it together in 10 minutes. Casting the pieces took way longer. But while you could use this ship as is, you can take it a bit further and add some more details to give it more of the Star Wars aesthetic.

All I did was cut up some styrene half rod and smaller styrene rod and glued it to the hull. Now it has a bit more detail and looks more Star Wars like. The awesome part is that the pieces from the Hirst-Arts molds give it most of the detail so you don't really have to do much after. 

A little paint and it will be ready to hit the table. So there you have it. Not much of a tutorial but I tried to simplify the process to make it possible for people who don't have much modeling experience can build one easily. So one project off to a start and it is still January! This might be the year of the hobbies yet ;). Any questions feel free to ask and as always....Keep on gaming!

Another year almost gone but refocusing for 2013 :)

Well the start of a new year is upon us, which means it's time to refocus on priorities. This year was more invested on my family, and with whatever extra time I had, I spent it trying to learn calculus and level up on Skyrim (which ended up taking 8 months of my spare hours at night). While the Christmas break is a great time to get some projects done for many, it usually means giving up my hobby space for our Christmas tree.

Here is my hobby space currently. I would complain but I do enjoy Christmas so it is a minor sacrifice. Although I am sure my family rather see the tree year round then my desk with all my junk on it ;).

One of the biggest realizations this year is that I will never find the time to build and paint my 3rd edition Space Hulk game. I bought it when it got released and to this day all I ever did was remove the shrink wrap. So I went ahead and placed it on ebay. Well if you are inclined to get a copy mine is listed here: Space Hulk and ends in a few days. 

So while it was a dry year for hobbies, 2013 will hopefully be more devotion to getting a couple hobby related things done in my spare time. That will also be a challenge since I am realizing that my spare time is becoming more scarce since my son is getting older and we are enjoying more outdoor activities together.  

But at the same time he is also starting to take interest in some of my hobbies so eventually that spare time will become quality time with him....well one can dream right ;).

Right now X-wing seems to be a game I can play and do easy projects for. One of those being building a Death Star board. My wife purchased a 6"x 6" mold from Combat Wombat miniatures so I can make it possible. I've already cast 4 tiles using Smooth-on 300 and they came out pretty well. 

Combat Wombat also sells a completed 3'x3' board with turrets for 99 dollars. While it was tempting to just purchase the whole thing, I want to have the versatility to build a Death Star trench if I wanted to. Of course as of this writing it seems like a lot of folks want their own Death Star so he has ceased production on the 99 dollar board till he can catch up with orders. Depending on how much you want to spend money or time to put work into, the cost of both the mold and the board will pretty much even out.  

After doing some math I figured I spend 45 dollars for the mold, I can usually get Smooth-on 300 for a 30%-40% discount and would need about 2 pounds worth of casting material so that would be about $30-$35, add the 6 turrets he offers for $15 and you pretty much hit his price point give or take. The benefit to the mold will be if you can make the mold survive the 36 casts required for a 3'x3' board you can then use it to make a trench run board.

Here is the mold I received from Combat Wombat. Now from what I read on his website, he is a Army veteran which I have the up most respect for. I gladly support someone who defended our country and is trying to make a living by selling products they made. But as a fair warning if you go the mold route, don't expect to get a mold at the level of quality of Hirst-Arts. My mold had a few defects, and while it may require some sanding to even out the tile casts, the tiny defects on the surface are hardly noticeable. Some of my casting defects can easily be fixed with putty or light sanding. My only worry now is that I got some tearing on my last cast even after spraying it down heavily with mold release. So just a precaution if you are planning to purchase the mold.

Now I don't want to be overly negative or leave on a sour note. The tile cast themselves are very detailed and with Smooth-on 300 they are durable and will last a very long time. I recommend picking up a set or a mold if you want your own Death Star. With the Falcon and Slave I release on the horizon, I am looking forward to recreating the trench run from Episode IV.

So hopefully you all got some great hobby gifts this year. Here's to a hobby filled 2013!! Happy New Year and as always keep on gaming!

Imperial Landing Shuttle

Well I can't really say I've been consistent in my hobbies lately, but so many fun games have been released lately that I've just been getting the hobby bug and no real focus to stay on one project long enough to completion. My latest project has been an Imperial Shuttle to use as an objective in the X-wing board game by Fantasy Flight Games.

It's amazing what you can do with a little bit of styrene sheets and rod. I tried to make it to scale but finding a comparison of an x-wing and an Imperial shuttle was hard to find. So hard that it is non-existent. But for an in game objective it will work.

It is a work in progress. I am probably going to add some more styrene to the wings to give it more of a Star Wars feel. The best part is that I went searching around the web and found a website that sells some bases made for the game. Eventually I can design some specs for it and use it in game as a stolen shuttle with the rebel forces or a troop lander that is trying to board a bigger rebel ship. I also managed to snag a used Tantive IV from Micro Machines that I plan to modify to use in the game as well. Too many hobbies not enough time to game. I guess that's life huh?

Weapon Modding Ninja Turtle Style

OK I know what you are thinking...Ninja Turtles? What does this have to do with miniatures? Well everything. Modifying action figures was my intro to the hobby of scale models and basically how my obsession carried over to gaming miniatures as well. I had the Turtle Fever back in the 80's and well into the 90's...heck I even paid to go to their musical concert as lame as the premise of it was. But now being a parent of a boy who is just discovering Spider-man, Super-man, and all the rest of the Marvel and DC universe I had to pick up all 4 turtles from the new upcoming Nickelodeon TV show to give a new generation the Turtle Fever. These figures are probably one of the best renditions of the radical 4 turtles Playmates has ever brought out. The articulation is above average for action figures in their price range. The one main draw back came with my second favorite turtle Michelangelo. His nunchucks were terrible. They were very stiff and the plastic stressed as soon as you made him hold one with both hands. It took 1 day of my 3 year old playing with them till one of them  finally snapped :(.
Well lucky for my son, his dad is a hobby nerd and unfortunate things like this are more of an opportunity to improve on the original design intent. So I broke out my tools and got to work and ended up with the result in the photo:

Much better wouldn't you say? Well now that one is fixed might as well make a matching pair with the other nunchucks. It's a rather easy modification, you can find all you need at the local Hobby Lobby or Michael's and the end result will insure durability for even the roughest of fights against Shredder and his Foot Clan.

You will need the following tools starting from the top: Pin Vice with a small size drill bit(sorry I didn't know the exact size but it's fairly small), Hobby Shears/Cutters, and Hobby Pliers. Not shown in the photo is a hobby file with a 250 grit. You don't really need it but it makes it easier to drill the top of the nunchucks later.

You will also need the following materials both found in the jewelry section of the craft store:

A necklace that looks like a chain roughly to scale of the action figures( I don't know off hand what scale they are but take one of the nunchucks for reference). 2 miniature eye-bolt screws. I found these attached to some potion bottles in the jewelry section. These might be harder to find locally, but just in case, you can find them here. Be sure to buy 2 since 2 come in one package and you'll need 4 of these. 

Yeah you'll be shopping a lot in the jewelry section and if you are a guy, the lady shoppers will probably stare at you with a puzzled look on their face wondering why you are in the jewelry section. I get a little self-conscience at times but the jewelry section always has some of the best items to use in a model miniature scale. It's worth all the stares from the ladies to shop for those things ;).

Now it's just a matter of snipping the plastic chains off. See how the tops look bumpy? Here is where your file would come in handy just to make the tops more even.

After sanding the tops, take your Pin Vice and drill the top of the nunchucks just enough to get the eye-bolts situated. You will need to try your best to get the pin vice centered but if you are off just a bit, you won't really notice with the end result.

Once you can get your eye-bolt situated on the hole you just made, you can then just screw in the bolt by hand till it's flush with the top. Got big hands? The pliers also work as long as you don't use too much force. Now rinse and repeat the steps with the second nunchucks handle.

So once you have something similar to the top photo, it's now time to get these nunchucks chained together and ready for some Ninja Turtle action! 

Next you'll want to grab your pliers and necklace and basically start at one end of the necklace and open one of the necklace links at the length you need. I started out with 6 chain links on the nunchucks but then it looked too long so I cut it down to 4 links and it looked better. I found the second time I did this I can open the chain link with my finger and thumb and then close it with the pliers after I get them situated. So once you get one side connected, the other side is a piece of cake

And you are finished! Like I said it is a fairly simple mod and your kids will love it now that Mikey's nunchucks look like the ones on the show. The nunchucks are now pretty durable and if they break again, you have plenty of necklace chain left to fix it again. My son is currently on day 3 of the new nunchucks and they already lasted longer than the stock ones

Cowabunga Dude! I think Mikey likes it. I also plan to modify the other extra chained weapons that were included with the turtles. I think Donatello has a chain-like bow, and Michelangelo has a chained hook. So my work isn't over just yet. 

Perfect fit. I recommend you pick up a set of the 4 turtles if you are a fan. You won't be disappointed. Of course you can also just hold off and wait since the Turtle fever seems to go dormant for 3 years after the TV show gets canceled then comes back in full force again :P. Now to go kick some shell!
Keep on playing!