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Malifaux City Board Build Diary


KrazyIvan

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So I have started a project to build a 3x3 city board Malifaux out of 1x1 MDF tiles. I started by creating a 3D render in Sketchup, then exported the basic shapes into Inkscape as a vector graphic. After a little tweaking the vector image went to my local shop and was laser cut.

Originally I was planning on using photo-textured contact paper for flagstone and cobblestone areas, but after some research have backed off of that idea. No matter how much I seal the stuff I don't think that the contact paper will hold up to use. So I'm going to Plan B.

 

Plan B is chopping up thin cardboard into flagstone tiles that will eventually be glued down to the MDF. I'll use miliput to form small balls that will be smashed down into the roadways to make cobblestone. Before I started affixing the stonework I tried sealing the MDF with Golden GAC100 acrylic polymer followed by at two coats of gesso. That did not prevent the test tile from warping. With the application of a little wieght and

 

I've started chopping up various food boxes for my details and I have the MDF tiles on hand. The MDF is 3mm but will be double layered. Even so warping has been a bit of an issue.

 

Here are some WIP of a test tile. Test tile has been fully 'cobbled'. I added some drains (quickly hand sculpted with Milliput). Added resin sand to areas where there are missing cobble and or flag stones. Tomorrow I will texture the manhole cover then gesso everything again. Might even get some paint on it. I've got a lot of work ahead of me, but doing a little bit every night should wrap it up in no time at all.

 

 

 

 

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That all looks both very beautiful and very tedious! I applaud your patience! The cobblestone looks great, is it all nice and flat? Or a little bumpy?

 

I also really like the look of the stone bricks, are the coloured tiles just the side of boxes with pictures on them? It actually looks really good in the pictures, like textured stone. Are you leaving them like that or will it all be coated and painted?

 

Interested to see how this goes!

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The cobble is generally level on top, but there is a tiny bit of variation. I wanted to make sure that it balanced appearce with being game-able. The stone bricks are cut up coardboard food boxes with a couple layers gesso on top. The second layer of gesso was stippled on, which created a bit of texture. The color that you see now is from the original boxes. Evertyhing, including the cobble, will be primed with gesso and painted.

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Got a little painting on the test tile done today. You can see all three "phases" that I'll be using to pain this thing up. Black undercoat (airbrush), multi-tone preshade (airbrush), then wash and dry brushing.

 For the flag stone areas I preshaded the individual stones with white, airbrushed the whole thing a medium tan, then airbrushed a dark grey. All the paints were very thin so that the colors underneath would show through. I then applies blotches of wash using every color wash I had (brown, blue, red, green) except black. Everything was dry brushed medium gray, then light gray, then very lightly white. Grout lines were then heavily shaded with black wash. The two dirt areas were painted dark brown, shaded with darker brown wash, then highlighted with two shades of lighter brown.

Comments, critiques, and suggestions are welcome!

 

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And the test tile is done. I either the beginning of a very long terrain project, or the end of a miniatures display board.

 

Pre-shading the road went right out the window when I decided to go light grey. Gutter areas are all airbrushed washes (green, brown, and black). The only other thing that I thought about doing is black lining the individual stones in the road with black wash...but I think I'm going to stop torturing myself. All in all this wasn't so bad, and I am happy with the results. Now just 8 more to go...

 

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The rest of the tile bases have been assembled and are drying. Unfortunately the shop who cut these for me had something going on with their laser. Several of the tiles are a couple millimeters to large or small. Consequently I'm going to have to sand some areas and fill others to get them square. Anyway, I have managed to press gang a couple of friends into helping glue down the flagstone and cobbles so I am hoping to finish assembly on all of them by the end of the weekend. If all goes to plan they will be painted by the 4th of July.

 

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I'm not totally decided on exactly what I am going to do for buildings and scatter yet beyond knowing that I am going to scratch build everything. My initial thought is to theme the terrain around the idea of the 'Diagon Bazaar', a "secret" market out in the quarantine zone that caters to an eclectic clientele. The buildings would a quirky mix of Tudor style medieval and Victorian architecture. Think half timber buildings where the lower half is rough cut stone, and the upper half timber and plaster, but with a Victorian style façade. Throw in free-standing stalls and a barrier wall and you kind of get the idea.

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While I did get quite a lot of work done on the tiles this week, it wasn't near as much as I would have liked to have gotten done. I partially blame starting Dragon Age: Inquisition on Thursday night for that :) . Anyway, All tiles have been sealed and counter warped so that they lay flat. Areas where the boards didn't measure square were cleaned up with some Milliput to make them square. Various sections of flag stone and roadways got done. I'll continue working on this throughout the week so that hopefully I can get some painting on them done next weekend.

 

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I've just dropped you a comment on AWP regarding the pain of individual tiles but it's awesome to see more pictures of this project up close.

These look awesome and have come out fantastic all painted up!

Bit of inspiration to get my arse into gear and finish my board.

Nice work, keep it up!

 

BM

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