Trial of the Grasses

Well, the trial set of bamboo is done, except for some growies (flock, some small plants, such things)  on the edge of the base:

Looking at this, I'm ready to go into mass production, I think.

I misted the bamboo stalks with some matt varnish and then spray-primed the base in black. Naturally, this hit the lower part of the bamboo as well, but this wouldn't be a problem.
Then I painted the base with Vallejo Burnt Umber and drybrushed German Camouflage Orange, Desert Yellow and finally Iraqui Sand. Again, this hit the lower sections of the bamboo, neatly covering up the primer overspray, as I had planned. There was some minor flaking of the paint on the thinner bamboo stalks, but nothing too noticeable. Finally I roughly hit the bamboo stalks themselves with very watery English Uniform, to get rid of the uniform green colour.
Looks good to me, I'll be cutting bases for the larger bamboo bushes tonight or tomorrow, hopefully I'll have a complete grove by/over Easter.

See you next time!

I want another shrubbery!

And who am I to argue with the Knights who say Ni? :D

My second order of scale bamboo has arrived:

Twice as tall as the batch I already have, plus these have a wire core. I should be able to build a fairly decent bamboo forest now.
That is all, carry on...

Daï-Bakemono, Die!

Today a package arrived to correct a years-old mistake of mine. You see, years ago, I missed out on the chance to buy a brand new box of Rackham Daï-Bakemono.

With the feudal Japan flame rekindled, I went on a search and found a site that still sold them, but in resin. A transaction was made, and today the fruits of that exchange arrived:

3 big 'orrible ogres, together with the goblin samurai that I ordered at the same time (shown in the top of the picture) they will form the command and muscle of my little band of Bakemono. The troops will come from the Goblin Ashigaru command that I did manage to snag some years ago.
The miniatures are great sculpts, full of character and detail. I'm especially pleased to finally get my mitts on the Daï-Bakemone, wonderful figures! A few details are less "Japanese" than I would like, but that is what conversions are for. One of the Goblin Samurai will get a backbanner and a more fancy helmet and will be the commander of the warband, with the other two armored Goblin Samurai becoming his lieutenants.

These may be next on the list, once I finish my villagers and get started on some terrain....

Trimming the bush and skinning the villagers

When Samurai/Feudal Japan reappeared on the radar locally, a few weeks ago, I ordered a set of blossoming Sakura trees ( to share with Gunbird) as well as a set of bamboo. The bamboo arrived earlier on this week, but turned out a bit on the small-ish size:

Sufficient, but not quite imposing enough for the bamboo maze/forest I had in mind. So an extra set of larger bamboo stems was ordered the same night...
While waiting for those to arrive I set about trimming the excess flash off these bamboo stems. I've got a hundred of them to go, so I'm doing it in little batches, clipping a few every time I have a spare few minutes, like when waiting for the teawater to boil, etc.:

 I'm already a quarter of the way through the bag...
Once they are all clean (enough, with this soft plastic, I can't expect to get it perfect, and they're supposed to look good en masse, not being inspected individually up close), I'll start making a test bush, so I can start serious production once the larger stems have arrived. I'm hoping they'll arrive in the next week, so I can do this in a couple of days off I have heading my way.

Today, after a leisurely stroll in the forest, I painted the skin on my first 5 villagers:

The painting is a bit rougher than I would have liked. Apparently, I'm more out of practice than I thought... Still having a little bit of the shakes from a flu earlier this week may also have contributed.
I'm not too worried as they're essentially just set dressing/ objective markers.
The wash on the hats and woven basket are currently drying, maybe I can just finish those before supper?
Hopefully next weekend I can get the most of them dressed.

See you next time!

It takes a child to raise a village

In this case, my son needing someone to assist/supervise him with his homework.  As sitting there, staring at the ceiling until he needed me isn't my thing, I took my cutting mat, some tools and a batch of mini's along:

Luckily (for me, not for him!) he had enough homework that I could also get around to basing them:

So, I have been a good parent, had a nice father-son chat as we both worked on our own things and I gained a batch of mini's ready for primer and (start of) paint tomorrow. Win-win-win!

These are a sort of spontaneous collaboration with Gunbird, as he has enthusiastically started building a samurai village. As we both have an interest in medieval Japan wargaming, I might as well provide the population!

The project is (unsurprisingly, seeing my track record) threatening to escalate a bit though. My original plan was to limit myself to the Gempei War miniatures from The Assault Group, with some supporting mini's from Perry to fill the gaps, but I've already ordered a Koryu Buntai from the Ronin range by Northstar Miniatures, and find myself eyeing other buntai and more "modern" samurai figures from Perry, Kingsford and Northstar... We'll see how far this goes...

See you next time!

Geta job!

Job done, that is! 😁

With the help of my lovely wife (and her fabric collection and sewing machine), the geta got finished:

I just need to fidget around with the straps, get them neat, and find out the right length before I permanently attach them.

The wood is  "steigerhout" from a local DIY, which seems to be a low grade of pine. It's light, but not very sturdy, and hard to get really smooth and neat.  I finished it with boiled linseed oil, in the hopes of protecting them from wet and dirt at least a little bit.  The straps are terry cloth wound around sisal rope, held togehter inside a black cotton tube.
These are just a quick test of concept and construction, to see how they would be to walk on. If they work well, and I actually manage to wear these out, maybe I'll make a pair of decent wood. Maybe, someday.

They're a bloody hazard to walk around with on wooden flooring, but on carpet I can manage a (careful and nervous) run. Hopefully I'll get to try them outdoors sometime, the type of terrain they are intended for. We've got some inland dunes nearby so I might get to test them out on both woodland soil, some light mud and loose sand. Plus I get to confuse the locals...

See you next time!

I feel like sushi tonight.

Our  DnD Campaign set in mythical Japan has picked up steam again, which has gotten me looking at my medieval Japan references again. At the same time Gunbird started building Japanese houses and a second hand copy of Daisho came along on the LAF. Apparently Samurai are in the air... So why fight it?

Especially as I have a Pappis box full of the belligerent little dudes. :D A couple were already paint in progress and I had a basecoated Torii. As good a point to start (or continue) as any.
Here's the results of a day's painting:

 I tried to get the Torii to look like a simple, weathered, rural one, the design just lent itself to that. No idea where it came from, it was a gift from Gunbird.

And more of a close up of the Samurai themselves:

The mini's are from The Assault Group, Gempei Wars era Samurai.
I've got a few more primered and ready to paint, but those will have to wait for another weekend.
Once my Daish rule set arrives, I'll have a root through my box and assemble a warband/Buntai. I should have some ashigaru as well. And if I have the right mix of weapons and gear, they may even visit Frostgrave?
For now, it's just fun to be doing hobby stuff again and sharing enthusiasm with Gunbird.

See you next time!