Warmachine: Cryx Kraken

This thing looks freaking cool. Since my army of choice for Warmachine is the Cryx, I definately want one or maybe 20. They look like they are going to be fun to paint and will cause massive destruction on the battlefield!!! Alas it will probably be sometime before I get my hands on one. Way too many projects in the pipeline that are going to take up my time...

What do you guys think? Anyone bought one yet?

Painting a Greenskin

This isn't a how to but more of a realization. I don't think I ever painted an Orc or a Goblin when I did 40k. Eldar, Space marines, Tyranids, Undead and other stuff sure. Just never a green skin. The only reason I thought of this was because of this post on a fellow bloggers site. So what do I have to do? Paint a greenskin.

I happen to have a few sitting in a bin that came with a paint set. I decided to take about 30 minutes and see what came of it. Not my best work and I see some mistakes that I want to go back and fix but not too bad either. Need to do some weathering and highlights and maybe a little inking... But anyway here are a couple pics.

Adsense

Ok, so I have been wondering why no ads have been showing up on this site. It appears that i never submitted my PIN when I setup my Adsense account several years ago. Oops... I have requested my PIN be resent to me so hopefully that will arrive soon and I can start generating some Ad revenue. I need to make some money from this so I can buy more molds!!!

40k Titans

So I was browsing youtube looking for more tips and ideas around casting Hirst Arts molds. While doing that I ran across a couple videos of titans from 40k.



Not sure if this was a scratch build or not but it looks really cool. Reminds me of a terminator crossed BORT from the day the earth stood still. Pretty cool if you ask me!!!



This one is a scratch build and not a kit from forgeworld or one of the other manufacturers. Amazing what a little creativity and vision can build.





These last 2 are definately forgeworld or some other kit build. The reason I added them is because the paint jobs are pretty amazing and the detail is awesome. I really like the flames on the titan in the last video. They look pretty cool. Almost makes me want to get back into 40k just so I can paint up a titan!!! Maybe I'll mess around with making my own versions of the titans later who knows...

Harborf Freight

Let me start off my saying that I love this store :) I bought a bunch of tools for really, really cheap. Granted they probably won't last me forever or anything but they will last me long enough to get better tools. Here is what I got:

http://www.harborfreight.com/13-piece-precision-knife-set-32099.html
http://www.harborfreight.com/hand-tools/pliers/4-1-2-half-inch-diagonal-cutters-40695.html
http://www.harborfreight.com/hand-tools/precision-hand-tools/5-piece-test-probe-set-1816.html

And Finally the main reason I went there...

http://www.harborfreight.com/5-lb-metal-vibrator-tumbler-67617.html

The tumbler in its current form is not of much use. However I plan to take off the bowl on top and create a table that I can put 6 or more molds on for casting. This will help ensure that each cast is of high quality. Since my cost for materials just went way up this definately desirable!!! I may have an article up soon about this conversion.

Merlins Magic

So I did some more reading last night and decided that I would just order Merlins Magic online. It costs about $21 for a 10lb box of it which would make it roughly 4 times the price of the joint compound. However, since the only place to get the stuff from seems to be online I have to pay 14 dollars in shipping making the total cost 7 times that of the joint compound.... ouch.

After reading the reviews on it though it appears to be the best stuff to use for this type of casting. It is significantly harder and has less loss then other plasters while drying. Hopefully this stuff gets here this weekend, but if it doesn't I do have other projects to work on!!!

Joint Compound Problems

So as you all know I have been using a quick set Joint Compound to fill the hirst arts molds I bought. While my initial results were positive, it took the detail well and seemed to setup nicely, the more I work with it the more problems I am running in to.

The first problem is finding the right mix. I don't think there is one really. If I go with a dryer mix (more powder) the bricks turn very brittle after drying. If I go with a wetter mix the bricks don't seem to dry properly or are simply taking a REALLY long time to dry. If the dry time is just extra long I have no confidence that the bricks won't turn brittle. I had hope that any brittleness would be easily compensated for by a good layer of paint for protection. However the bricks are so brittle that they will sometimes break when I am glueing them together or glue just won't hold.

The next problem is the set time. I mentioned yesterday that I let a set of bricks dry overnight in the mold and by doing so I was able to pop out the face brick with the thin ledge without a problem. Last night I tried letting the bricks dry for over an hour before popping them out. They were still too wet to prevent the face brick from breaking. I can't wait over an hour set time for each mold or I will never be able to complete a project.

Since I am running into so many problems with the joint compound I plan to change my method and go for a new casting material. Right now I am considering the dental plaster. This seems to be the recomended material for the best casts according to the hirst site. I am going to look around at some hobby stores to see if I can buy it locally. If not I will just have to buy it online.

A couple other thoughts I have had is that I think I am going to move this production out to my shop. It is rather cold out there right now but I need the extra space for the production of the blocks plus I can be a little more messy out there without too much of a problem. The second thing is I want to try and get some heat lamps setup to allow for a faster dry time of the blocks. Maybe set them up in my paint booth. Finally I am going to build a vibration table. I have found some designs online that have given me some thoughts on how I want to build it. I might try and get to that this weekend. So stay tuned for a how to...

Other Molds

So I was doing some more reading on the webs and looking at other designs people have made when I found a couple cool sites. The first is http://www.gamedecor.com/abasworld/index.htm. This person has put together some good information on building minatures and has some really good pictures of models he has built. They are pretty inspiring for my own creations. While browsing his site I came upon a link to another site that creates silicon molds http://keeblerstudios.com/. These guys seem to produce some detail pieces I wasn't finding in the hirst arts mold sets. Specifically I liked this mold http://keeblerstudios.com/?product=cathedral-window-mold. Not only does it look cool but it is specifically designed to be the inserts for the belltower and cathedral molds! Awesome!

Importance of Dry Time

So as I mentioned yesterday I started building a couple things using the hirst arts molds on sunday. I was running into problems with the detail face pieces cracking at the top. I did some reading online and found that this will happen if you don't let things dry enough. So yesterday evening I did another cast. This time I let it dry overnight in the mold (Probably overkill but I was kind of busy with other things). When I popped the pieces out this morning I had no problems removing the detail pieces.

Another important aspect of the dry time is painting... The octagon tower I built on sunday I painted almost immediately. This seems to have trapped the residual moisture in the pieces and it now can't dry entirely. Granted this was just me being anxious to build something but it is good to know the after effects of rushing the dry time.

New Author

I would like to announce that my brother has agreed to write some articles for this blog. He is a phenominal artist and likes to paint minatures. He will be writing some articles on painting techniques. Expect to see the first article sometime this week. I know I look forward to reading it!

Next Molds

So needless to say I am impressed with the hirst arts molds. I want more of them... heck I want all of them but that will take time. Time to plan my next purchase though. I want to get a 5 mold set so I only have to pay the $7 shipping once for all 5 molds. On top of that you get a 10% discount if you order 5 molds at once!!! Score.

So here are the molds I am looking at:

1) #40 Basic Block Mold
2) #55 Bell Tower Mold
3) #54 Gothic Church Mold
4) #235 Gothic Roof Mold
5) #201 Floor Tiles

This will give me the capability to build the bell tower plan and the church plan with the roof. They will also allow me to start work on the main building of the Citadel as well as the white tower. The citadel will need a couple other molds in order to be complete. I also may start work on some of the outer wall sections.

In order to help raise money for this project and for the terrain projects in general, I have decided to setup an etsy shop and auction things on ebay. I will be taking my time on this terrain and will probably fully paint it. Some of it will likely be custom designs as well. I already have some plans in my head about making a nice center keep at about 2ftx2ft. We will see how this goes.

First Casts

So as I mentioned on saturday my molds arrived from hirst arts, so sunday morning I made a run down to home depot. I was looking for the 25lb bag of plaster of paris that I saw online but no dice on finding it. Instead I saw a 25lb bag of joint compound that was supposed to be quickset. For 8 bucks I figured what the hell I'll give it a go and see how it turns out.

Now I get home and immediately realize it is going to be way too messy trying to work with this stuff out of the bag. So I find myself an old plastic trash can that is about 8 gallons maybe less, clean it out and dump the bag of joint compound in that. Next I run downstairs and get a stack of plastic china cups (about 8oz cups) and a couple plastic forks for stirring. I also found an old carboard box and cut out a large chunk of it to put over the desk to protect the surface. I should probably put plastic down on the floor too but didn't...

Reading online I found some tips and tricks on how to do the casting. The hirst site recomends that you soak the molds in a combination of jet dry and water before each cast. This acts as a mold release. I didn't have any jet dry available however and since a mold release is not required for casting with plaster I just went right along. I rinsed out the molds and set them on my table then I half filled up a china cup with water. Grabbed a scoop of the plaster with another china cup and slowly added it to the water. I went for about a 1 to 1 ratio of plaster to water. This seemed to produce good results. I mixed the plaster gently so as to reduce generating air pockets.

Note: Air pockets are evil!!! They happened a lot... Nothing was more annoying then finding a big old air pocket right in a piece of detail that you couldn't easily hide...

I gentley poored the mixture into the molds and allow it to overflow. I then pounded the table to attempt to get out some air bubbles. Now for the waiting... I need to wait 5-10 minutes before I do a scrape of the excess on top. Once that is done it will be another 10-15 minutes before the plaster sets enough to be popped out of the mold. Now it is on to the fun part, popping the pieces out and seeing what I got. The first few bricks pop out fine and I notice a few small air pockets but nothing major. Now to pop out the trim faces... crack... the little ledge on top breaks off. Son of a... ohh well it is my first cast problems are too be expected (It ended up being the norm I only had a couple that did not break). I set the pieces to the side, clean out the molds and start my second cast.

I tried using the same china cup but the left over plaster just made it hard to mix properly. Never the less the pieces popped out without much problems. You are supposed to let the bricks dry overnight before using them but I am much to excited to start building for that. So after I start my 3rd cast I go to the hirst website and pull up the Wizard tower plans and start building. I get a little ways into the project and decide that I don't need the plans I will just wing it. I also decided to make my own little octogan tower.

I did about 16 casts for the day and overall was very happy with the molds. I will note that it is important to let them sit overnight to fully dry. There are pieces that got a little big and they cause pieces to not go together as smoothly as they should. Trying to sand them down with a file to clean them up is simply not an option until they get nice and hard, they end up getting smooshy and crumble a bit.

I am going to wait until I make a good version of the towers before writing a post on them! In the end though I learned some lessons.

1) Let the darn things dry before using them
2) Mold release will help
3) A vibration table is necessiary
4) I need more molds to cast at once!!!