Another day, another shack...

Another battered old shack to add to my developing shanty-town. I spend far too long making these little buildings because of all the little details I keep adding. "Why do they all have to be so run down and grotty?" asks Laura. "Because that's what gives them character," I reply.

The main structure is 5mm foamcore with thick cardboard roof panels. The tarpaulin on the roof is kitchen roll soaked in PVA, painted with Inscribe olive drab acrylic. Corrugated panels are corrugated craft board scraps painted with GW enchanted blue & Inscribe burnt umber/burnt sienna rust. Oil drum from Continental Model Supply Company. Also featuring here are a few balsa scraps (Inscribe burnt umber drybrushed with taupe), rocks (sieved from a bag of sharp sand), GW static grass and some reindeer moss foliage. Windows are scraps of clear plastic packaging.

Round the back it's just as untidy - more balsa, reindeer moss and static grass plus a small patch of shredded foam undergrowth. Grumpy really needs to have a tidy up.

The attached garage is where Grumpy the colonist worked on his "Z-Wagon" zombie-proof transport. (Pretend that you can't notice how I didn't build the walls high enough for it to fit in with the garage roof on!)

I've tried to have a few places where characters can hide or get some cover. Looks like Grumpy has spotted this masked felon lurking outside though.

Grumpy's Shack update

Grumpy the colonist is slightly less grumpy today as he proudly shows off the latest additions to his grotty shack.

First, we have the lovely rusty fence which now surrounds the outbuilding where he intends to conduct his zombie experiments...

It even has an opening gate - a must for quick getaways when experiments go awry!

Here are the ammo crates where Grumpy stores the "Zombie killer" rounds for his autorifle.

Here are the drums of toxic bioplasm which Grumpy uses in his experiments. Hmm... should they really be leaking like that..?

The fence is plastic mesh that I got in a model railway shop many years ago. It's had a coat of black acrylic, followed by patches of brown and terracotta for the rusty effect, and finally a drybrush of GW chainmail.

Oil drums (resin) and ammo boxes (white metal) from Continental Model Supply Company.

Shack

Looking at the various shacks and other wasteland scenery that's been cropping up on other Blogs recently (Dropship Horizon and Black Primer Paint, I felt inspired to add another little building to my collection.



This shack is based on a piece of 3mm 10x10cm MDF textured with fine sand. The back wall is a Hirst Arts door, obviously scavenged by the occupants. The corner support pillar is another Hirst Arts block, and the side wall has been made from a toy car which has been gently hammered into a flatter and more wall-like shape. The other 2 walls are sections of a plastic punnet which contained supermarket mushrooms. The roof is an off-cut of fine-corrugated cardboard.



I deliberately left the area at the back open as a sort of storage area, giving a few more places to hide in a gunfight. I have added quite a few bits of scenery round the edges; 1/76th scale oil drums and stack of ammo boxes (120mm Challenger tank rounds to be precise) from Continental Model Supply Company, plus a couple more oil drums rescued from an old airfix battlefield accessory kit. I had been leaving them as loose scatter scenery, but I've found that it takes ages to find and pack them all after a game, and they keep getting lost/damaged, so I've decided that I may as well just stick them in place on the other scenery anyway.



Painting used assorted Inscribe acrylic hobby paints:
Burnt Sienna
Burnt Umber
Forest Green
Ultramarine Blue
Snow
Raven
Holly Berry


The roof was painted around the edges with the red-brown burnt sienna for the most rusted parts followed by dark brown burnt umber added for less rusted areas. A couple of extra rust patches were added towards the middle of the roof and around the patch. The white snow & black raven mixed in 2 shades for a basic grey followed by a lighter drybrush to bring out the ridge detail.



Walls were forest green with a quick highlight of forest green+snow. A drybrush of burnt umber added rusted weathering around edges of windows, doors etc, with a few touches of burnt sienna to create fresher areas of rust.



The car received 2 coats of snow to hide the original paint job, then 2 coats of Holly Berry red. Some burnt umber/burnt sienna rust patches were dabbed on to complete the car.
The door is ultramarine blue highlighted with blue+snow plus rust patches. The pillar is mixed raven/snow grey highlighted with extra snow, plus a few patches of green algae.
Once finished, the whole lot had a gentle drybrush of dusty grey around the bottom of the walls etc. to help blend it into the base and bring it all together. When I find my bag of static grass, it'll get a few scrubby patched of that too.

Trouble at Grumpy's Shack

This little project was started around Christmas time, but it's taken me some time to get around to finishing it!

"Alright Grumpy, where's the money you owe us?"

"I ain't got it. And you should know - I've called the cops!"

"Thsi is Security Team 2 - we have the bandits in sight. Preparing to make an arrest..."

This is where Grumpy the colonist lives. You can see it's pretty run down, which explains why Grumpy looks so miserable all the time.

Walls are a mixture of corrugated cardboard and plastic mushroom punnet (Tesco value mushrooms come in a nicely textured container). All the posts are cocktail sticks, glued into small holes drilled through the base board. The base is 3mm MDF.

The building on the right will eventually have a chain link fence - hence the upright posts surrounding it.

The removable roof of each building is more corrugated cardboard. The buildings were painted with Inscribe acrylics. Base colour for the corrugated iron was Burnt Umber 1730 (old rust), with Burnt Sienna 1729 (fresh rust) around the edges. The grey colour was a mixture of Snow 1701 and Raven 1732, with a lighter drybrush for weathering. By painting the rusty colours onto the currugated metal roof first and adding the original metal colour afterwards, the rust ends up in all the crevices and grooves - where the water will have collected and caused the most corrosion. The pieces of plastic punnet were painted with Forest Green 1721 with rusty bits added afterwards. The wooden posts were given a coat of Taupe 1739. The bits of balsa around the base of some walls were painted with Ultramarine Blue 1748 and Holly Berry 1710, drybrushed with Taupe 1739 to give a suitable battered/weathered appearance.

I'ev also got a few more items to add some more character to my scenery. The oil drums come from Continental Model Supply Company, who produce all sorts of 1/76 or 1/72 scale kits and accessories for modern & WW2 eras. They also do some great ammunition boxes, jerry cans etc. These drums have been deliberately battered and damaged - the items as delivered from CMSC were in far better condition!

Unfortunately, they don't have a web site, but they can be contacted at: 36 Gray Gardens, Rainham, Essex RM13 7NH.

The concrete barriers are from the Hirst Arts fieldstone walling accessory set. Although designed for 25/28mm scale, I think they look pretty good as the sort of concrete barriers you might find in a vehicle checkpoint.

Rusty Corrugated Metal

There has been quite a bit of interest recently in metal shack "shanty towns" in 15mm scale, what with GZG's new metal shacks (V15-COL4 SHACK SET) and Battle Works Studios "Startown Slum" buildings - see the Dropship Horizon blog for a review of both.

I passed some very battered old buildings whilst driving round Essex today, so thought I'd post them as good examples of heavily weathered corrugated iron sheeting, in case anyone could use a littel reference material or inspiration.

Click on pictures for larger images (about 2MB each?).