Wednesday, March 28, 2018

Imperial Terrain: Small Desert Home

Legion is finally out and I have to get my terrain ready for some proper games!

My table still needs a couple of larger terrain pieces and since time is scarce I decided to fill the board with some 3D printed buildings by Imperial Terrain. I had these at the edge of my table for some time now but never fully decided on how to finish them up. Thorin over at arts-n-more wrote a brilliant tutorial on his Batuu tower that does the fine detail of these prints justice. Although I originally intended to follow a similar approach, I settled with a simpler texturing method now, which will help the 3D printed buildings to blend in with my homemade stuff.

As described in my previous tutorial, I coated all plastered areas with a mixture of sand coloured acrylic paint, PVA and sand and drybrushed the whole thing by adding some white to my basecolour.

Halfway in, I decided to replace the original doors though... The prints are nice and I quite like the design but since I wanted the building to fit the aesthetics of my homemade structures I felt that some simple cardboard doors would be the smarter choice for me. I just needed to fill the gap in the doorframe with some pink foam and do some touch ups to the plaster. Although I was a bit worried when I just eyeballed the doors, I'm actually quite happy with how they turned out as I think they add a nice handmade touch to the printed structure.

Although the plastered areas are ready to go after the drybrush, I like to give them a couple of washes with some drops of my basecolour and some yellow, green and red pigments. This is not only a great way to give you building some character by simulating layers of dirt that would build up on an actual building over time, it furthermore is very forgiving. If you don't like our results you can just soak up your wash with a wet brush and try again.

Final step was some detailing. The doors were basecoated in Reaper Rust Brown which was highlighted by gradually adding white to the basecolour and applying it in thin coats. Metallic elements like vents and boxes were painted in Vallejo German Grey and dabbed with a mix of PVA and red pigments in an irregular pattern. The chimney got a copper finish using GW Hashut Copper and Nihilakh Oxide. All these elements got a final wash with slightly thinned down Vallejo Sepia Shade and dark brown was dabbed on the lower edges of the building to help it look natural on my gaming mat.

And that's it... This is a fun building to paint and I love how easily it painted up and how well it blended in with the rest of my terrain pieces. I fell in love with the Imperial Terrain Moisture Vaporators right away but the houses are in no way inferior and can be easily customized to fit your gaming table. Having in mind that this is a very quick and dirty method of texturing I'm very pleased with the result and can fully recommend getting these.

1 comment:

  1. Looks great, what kind of sand did you use and where is everyone finding these miniature posters?

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