The Trench Terrain is carrying on on the build table, whilst happy with the progress I have been making i decided I wanted to create a strong point which would become a focus of the games on my table sometimes.
I picked up a 3D printed flak bunker from Ebay for less then £10 and figured it would be a great command bunker for my purposes.
I started by cutting a base for the piece from my usual 6mm MDF and bevelled the forward edges. I took pains to make the joins fit between pieces #1 and #3, so this is a replacement for the catered section of trench from the last post.
As usual to add more interest to the piece, things like a crater were added, and the angles for the trench walls were drawn on, diagonally leading to the sides of the bunker rather then straight like the last pieces.
Again a more organic shape was created for the base as this side is all the mud and debris which has been caused by the battle, the other "man made" side where the trench is is a straight line to delineate the trench and for contrast against the battlefield side:
Given that the roof of the bunker was removable as delivered, I then took time to add some 1mm magnets to both the walls and the roof, so it will stay in place even during gameplay:
And the basic landforms are now in place, using my usual ground of 5mm foam core with a drainage ditch and some polystyrene insulation for the landforms:
And now with the first mixture of paint, PVA and interior filler added to the "dirt" areas:
I didn't use the aluminium foil on this piece, and this photo from the 'front' shows how bobbly and silly the ground looks at this point due to the shapes of the polystyrene:
So it was on with another layer of PVA and interior filler, smooth smooth out some of the ground and make it look more natural:
Nownwith added sand for ground texture:
And i added some patches of sand to the roof and interior of the bunker to represent the accumulated dirt from boots and explosions causing flying debris as the war has gone on:
Roof:
Interior:
Again as before these are cut down coffee stirrers and barbecue skewers for the upright posts:
A step formthe side of the bunker was added for detail and the ladder was glued on at this point:
Thoughts then turned to making this piece look more "lived in" rather then just a box.
I had a lot of equipment crates I had previously 3D printed out of a collection of stowage STLs I had purchased and a selection of these were printed for the project:
A crater of rifles and a storage box added to the roof:
On the outside i added a bunch of large crates to one side of the bunker and made a tarp to cover them out of a bandage soaked in PVA glue and teased into position, a small coil of barbed wire was added for detail. On the opposite side, I added a pile of misprinted sandbags, using the worst of the misprints as the base and building ontop of them using good prints to make a supply stack:
For the interior i wanted some equipment, so kitbashed this vox station for 40k games out of the screen from a rhino APC, bits of a Cadian box and a Servo Skull:
And using four crates and some.mlre chopped coffee stirrers, I made a briefing table:
When placed inside the bunker with some more equipment:
After adding sandbags tomthebtop of the trench walls and spraying everything with a mid brown from Maston, I decided to see how the bunker was looking next to Trench section #1:
Painting then started and following a paint guide for concrete from the 4th edition 40k rulebook, I started the bunker off with a "Dark Flesh" colour, whilst picking out equipment with a military green, sandbags with an off-white/bone and the duck boards with the usual Baneblade Brown:
I didn't take a photo, but the entire piece was then washed with my homemade dark brown wash. The bunker then got dry brushed with a Mid-Grey and a lighter grey to build up the concrete colour, and finally a light dry brush of Bone which is my ground highlight colour:
On the ground front, the ground followed my usual dark - light brown dry brushes and highlighted with a bone colour, the crater was the usual black through grey up to a highlight of light grey:
The 40k Vox machine:
A historical attack map:
On the outer wall i added a warning sign, blended into the piece with dry brushing again.
At this point the build was basically complete and i was happy with how it had turned out.
But there was one thing missing I felt...some actual lived in feel...
A quick Google search of WW1 aerial photography (when it was in its infancy) turned up some lovely map type photographs which would be perfect.
With a bit of trial and error in MSpaint* I resized them and printed them in black and white.
A larger map was glued to the table, I want to go back in with some scaled mugs and mess tins to add a little more detail.
A group of spare coffee stirrer planks were glued together to make a notice board and two of the maps were glued to it and it was added to one of the interior walls.
All of the maps were given a light drybrush of bone to add some dust which would have accumulated**.
On the next wall I glued a magnet, this would be hidden by whichever piece of equipment I added for that game:
It reads "Stay in trench during daylight'
With the detailing complete, all that was left was to finish off the base with a black edge like I do to my miniatures for neatness sake and the bunker was ready to hit the field.
To that end I threw it onto the table along with a few other pieces and some miniatures to get these final glamour shots of the piece:
You can see the way the table is heading, but I need more terrain to fill it as it is still awfully bare, but the project is ongoing after all.
I'm either going to work on a fortified Observation Post crater or a wrecked vehicle for the table next I think.
Until next time, have nice day...
*MSPaint, the original and greatest image software ever.
**Given at work we can put a train list down and in the time it takes to go to the toilet, said list can already have a film of dust over it. Adding it to the maps in this case doesn't feel too much of a stretch.
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