Sunday 23 April 2017

East African Garrison Post

Today I put the finishing touches to the last of the European structures for my East African building set.

This is intended as a German garrison post or Bomb. I wanted it to contain the regional headquarters building, a barracks, a kitchen, a gatehouse and an observation tower. It has to be entirely enclosed in a high wall. 

The outer wall is a solid white washed surface, but on the inside I  wanted as many different textures as possible. To achieve this mix of textures I chose to give the headquarters building, with its inbuilt observation tower, a stone surface, so after making the cardboard basic shape I covered it entirely with stone face plasticard. The windows were made from plasticard strips. The observation tower was perhaps bigger than it should be, but it was made to have a 50mm by 50mm interior so that a fighting element could fit inside it. The cover over the observation tower was made from matchsticks.

Below, the headquarters buildung before fixing to the main base with the observation tower cover removed.
 
 
Above, the headquarters in position with the observation tower cover in place.

The kitchens were built open to the front. The ovens and worktable were detailed using plasticard off cuts.
 
The barrack room had a stone base with timber and corrugated iron face, giving the right amount of texture.

 
The gatehouse was the simplest structure with a large wooden door. 

 

The surface of the courtyard was created by applying a fine sand. By chance the sand I used was black sand from the west coast of the North Island - non-New Zealand residents will not be aware of this, but many of the west coast beaches feature a fine iron sand with a black appearance. The advantage of this black sand that all I needed to do to provide a final finish was to lightly dry brush some light brown over the surface.
 
 
Finally to finish the whole model I applied some water stains and some foliage on the outside wall. 
 

18 comments:

  1. Realistic and superb, most impressive details!

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    1. Thank you Phil. I hope this will make an interesting feature to fight over.

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  2. Interesting - a trip to Kawhia or Raglan could be on the cards. I can't wait to see all of this come together Mark!

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    1. I am looking forward to it too. east Africa will be a feature game at Tarawera lster this year. I hope we can get a few games in before then.

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  3. Really like this one Mark, even more than the water mill and Russian church you've featured in older posts, and that's saying something 'cause they were brilliant!

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    1. Thanks John, as much as these are fun structures, the watermill is still my favourite.

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  4. Mark, this is a fabulous piece! This type of construction could be seen in the Transvaal too, no?

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    1. You are probably right, Jonathan. I think similar construction would be common through most of the colonial world after the invention of corrugated iron.

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  5. Another stunning piece of architectural modelling Mark - cant wait to blow the crap out of this structure with our RA guns then send in the KAR with the bayonet to finish the job!

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    1. Ah, but in the scenario I have planned it might not be as simple as that...

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  6. Those corrugated roofs are fantastic, but I must admit I like the ovens most of all. Can't wait to see all this in action.

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    1. The real shame about the oves is that I actually spent quite a bit of time in them...making hinges, handles and hot plates, but you have to get get right down and look really close to see them!

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  7. It looks fantastic. I would have sworn it was commercially manufactured, just from the photos.

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    1. Thank you Michael. It was an interesing build that came together over a month...adding bits and pieces here and there to add interest.

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  8. Simply brilliant. It really captures the look ...

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    1. Thanks Roly, but that Japanese castle of your's takes a lot of beating!

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  9. I have only just stumbled across your blog. But could I ask how big the structure is?

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