Viking Ship WIP

After seeing Herrodadog's excellent job on the Revell 1/50 scale ship, I decided to get one for myself. I checked some local shops but was not able to find one so I got mine from ebay. The first thing I did was to remove 24 of the shield mounts in order to reduce the crew size and free up some shields and decals. I started removing the main body of the ship from the sprues and they matched up well so I used some rubber bands and close pins to hold them together.

I primed the ship black as usual and used a medium brown for the base color and just added a couple of coats of brown ink which came out pretty well.

I liked Hil's idea of keeping the ship simple. I was not planning on doing any rigging other than a bit on the ships mast. I was not impressed with the plastic sail provided in the kit so I decided to pick up some fabric from Joanne's. I used the plastic sail to estimate the size for my fabric one and cut to fit. I then made ruled lines with a pencil and hand painted the red stripes.

I put the mast together and added some cooking string to simulate rope and hold the cross beam in place. I attached my new sail with the provided string. I also left the mast removable so I could show the difference between at sea and ashore. I will finish the ship by adding about 20 shields total to the ship that I will hand paint so I can save the shield decals for my BTD Vikings. I also have a used hair net that I will convert to a fishing net and I have finished the provided anchor and have added more cooking string/rope. I will also add a bundle of oars just for looks. To finish the projecct I will add a nice wooden base and spackled waves.

Imperial Fleet

I have finished my fleet for Spartan Games' Uncharted Seas. They were fairly simple to assemble and stayed together pretty well during paint. I also wanted to add bases to them for stability, ease of movement, and lowered amount of model handling. I want to add some heraldic eagles to the sails and a light brown wash for their finishing touches.

On the paint table

Right now I have 16 WWII 28mm Germans on the paint table along with a pack of British Colonials from the zulu wars, as well as one LOTR Nazgul from reaper. I just ordered a Viking longship and plan on ordering some BTD vikings and a few more 28mm Germans.

Gladiator Arena

After watching Starz' Spartacus Blood & Sand as well as gods of the Arena. I was inspired to create a gladiator arena based on the Capuan arena from the series. As you can see this is not an exact copy as I made the arena more linear were in the show it is more of a mish mash of buildings. I will be adding curtains to the back of the viewing platform and I need to add seats for the spectators. I will be making some minor modifications to the model as time permits. I made the interior cell door movable and am happy with that result. The whole model is based on a large piece of plexiglass and flocked with sand.

I was able to use the Arena at HeroDaDogs' place to try out 2 hour wargames Blue Sky and Red Sand Gladiator rules.

You can see some more photos on HeroDaDog's blog.

Update

Hey yáll haven't updated in a while due to my camera turning to crap but now I have a new camera and access to my blog again I will update all of my projects over the next few days.