An Article by Quase

 

So… I need a piece of defensive Orkish terrain…

 

Where to start?

With some cardboard of course!

 

These are the basic cut-outs, scored where I’m supposed to fold them

 

 

I made 2 identical ones to avoid a basic, rectangle structure.

 

From one of these cut-outs, I removed the short side and I started to draw out where the windows and door will come. One wall hasn’t got a window nor a door; that’s where the second cut-out will be added (the cut-off part and the featureless wall are both covered by the tape).

 

 

With the exacto-knife, I firstly cut out the windows and the door. Then, from the same cardboard I cut out two doorframes and glued one on the inside and one on the outside of the door. I used greenstuff to even out the inside of the door, between the different cardboard doorframes.

 

 

For the windows, I first cut out a windowframe that was bigger than the windows i cut out in the walls, but the hole in the frame has got the same measures as the window itself.

After that i cut out once again windowframes that are bigger than the windows; but the hole in the frame was this time smaller than the window itself. These frames were glued to the inside of the windows.

 

Now I started to add cardboard rectangles here and there to represent repairs/reinforcements. These plates were, of course, rivited into place with 1) pieces of cut-off Dark Elven spears 2) pin-heads (the flat ones).

 

The edge of the roof received a small strip of cardboard, just to cover up the scored edges, and because it looks good.

 

In the picture you can see the first add-ons on the roof : a small wall made from sprue (I filed it in irregular intervals to create the stones to hide behind and a barrell (this one will be removed and replaced with something more Orky later).

 

 

On one side i decided to make a great big hole. So firstly i cut out a star(ish) shaped hole. I held a piece of cardboard under the hole and traced its contours on to the cardboard. Now i recut the same hole, only about a millimeter smaller on all sides than the original hole. This new hole was then glued to the inside of the previous hole, with some bits of paperclip sticking out, representing the reinforcements of the concrete.

After this, I did a third layer of the hole. As with the doorframe, i used greenstuff to even out the transition in between the different layers of cardboard.

Behind the hole, I glued a piece of bent metal mesh, giving the impression of a hasty repair job.

 

 

Ok, that’s it, the basic form has been made, with a bit of details added here and there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, experience has taught me that cardboard, although about the most EZ material to make bunkers or buildings, isn’t very sturdy. And word is i might have to ship this one to the US of A… this calls for reinforcements (balsawood in my case)

 

 

As you can see in the pic above, I made a similar hole in the roof, only no metal reinforcements and just a metal plate on the outside for repair.

 

Next step? Add a base, so some thick cardboard is called for.

 

On the enemy-facing side (not the side with the door), I wanted to have some extra defense against footslogging attacks.

After some brainstorming I decided to go for pikes; EZ to make and downright Orky if you ask me.

Now first idea was to greenstuff the upturned ground and stick the balsa-pikes in there, but a quick look at the surface i wanted to cover in this way made me realise quite quickly that Greenstuff ‘d be ridiculous : too much to cover hence too expensive.

So I decided to improvise : I cut off a long strip of an old (washed, of course) handkerchief and dipped this in a 50/50 PVA/water mix. I put this sticky mess on the ground, put my spikes on in irregular intervals and folded the remains of the cloth over there, pushing the pikes upwards.

This is a really fun and messy part of the construction works.

 

On the roof, I wanted to have some extra protection, so I decided to make a row of sandbags next to the little wall. I made small blobs of greenstuff, all sandbag-shaped and folded a piece of handkerchief over here. I applied a small blob of PVA on the underside and put it into place, continuing this process up to 3 layers of sandbags. When this had dried, I applied a 50/50 PVA/water mix over the whole surface of the sandbags.

This is when I decided to loose the barrel and replace it with a new, opened up barrel that will eventually become a BBQ.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A side-view…

 

 

 

Of course, since I decided to add details like cover and a BBQ to the roof, i now have to provide my Orkses with a way of accessing the roof (stands to reason, dunnit?). So I made a ladder out of 2 pieces of round balsawood, with paperclips as steps. These were “bolted” into place with the same pin-heads I use to bolt the plates.

 

I added some rubble on the floor, mainly sprues and wire, with some GWS treads, vehicle pieces, …I also added a lone jerrycan and a heap of Ork boots (dunno why I did this, but it looked cool).

 

2 Night Gobbo spears have been positioned next to the doorframe to make it more of an ofishul entry-point.

 

On a whim, I decided to glue the Night Gobbo plastic musician arm next to the door. This has two reasons of being : announcing of visitors (a doorbell as it were) and the sounding of an alarm.

 

On the inside of the door I glued a piece of the same handkerchief; on one side I cut out triangles to make it look ragged. Once again the whole piece of cloth was soaked in a  50/50 PVA/water mix.

 

 

Now, with all of these nice ’n nifty details added, it is time to add some texture to the whole construction; question of making it look less like a bunch of cardboard glued together and more like a piece of Orky defenses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First off, I covered the base in a mix of sand and pebbles to create a rough and uneven surface.

As a small extra, I modelled a Rokkit that has impacted, but didn’t explode and some mushrooms in between the spikes…

 

 

On the other side, where there’s a lot more of ground surface to cover, I decided to have patches of a gooey, sticky fluid.

For this, I PVAd some small balls of greenstuff and then applied undiluted PVA around the balls. No sand will be added to these areas.

 

At some places, I added a second layer of the sand/pebbles mix, thus making small areas where the ground is a bit higher.

 

When all had dried, I added a piece of the tank-trap sprues we get in our orks-boxed-set, a question of having enough protekshun wot?

 

 

Now, before I textured the bunker itself, i first had to make clear it belongs to my klan. Hence da big glyph.

 

I also added a barrel with a tap; this’ll be the funghus beer XXX supply.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, on to the texture of the bunker itself. The material is simple : a very fine sawdust mixed with PVA and water. This is applied to the whole bunker, with the exception of the repair/reinforcement plates.

 

 

The same effect seen from the front; I also covered the arm holding the “doorbell” with the sawdust mix.

 

I also added a ripped up piece of plasticard (the big white rectangle in the front) which will eventually look like a door that has been ripped out of it’s hinges.

 

 

OK, we’re closing in on da finishing touches now…

 

First, my Orks have food & drink on da roof, but no ammo; so I added a small ammo case and some Stikkbombs.

 

Next I added some details to the ripped-off door : some reinforcements that are bolted into place and some hinges, both on the door and the doorframe

 

And last, but not least, a “drumstick” made out of bones to work the “doorbell”

 

 

In this pic the details are a lot clearer :

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, I do have a BBQ now, with a grill and all, but no meat yet. So off to the Xenos-bitbox and lo and behold, 2 minutes later I have got a juicy Bug-leg and a nice tail all ready to be grilled.

 

 

Unfortunately, somewhere through the painting progress the bone sticking out of the tail fell off and I couldn’t find it anymore. Since I had no Skeleton legs or arms left over, I decided not to greenstuff a new bone and leave it at that.

 

So, on to the painting stage. I started with a Chaos Black primer. For the ground, I applied a layer of Bestial Brown which was inked with Brown Ink. Over this I drybrushed a layer of Bubonic Brown followed by a couple of mixes of Bubonic Brown with Bleached Bone, adding more Bleached Bone at every step.

 

The oil-blobs on the ground are painted as follows : First a 50/50 Goblin Green with Bestial Brown. Once dried, I highlighted the greenstuff bubbles with Sunburst Yellow. This was washed with a 33.3/33.3/33.3 Green ink/Brown Ink/Gloss Varnish.

 

For the walls i started with Graveyard Earth, highlighting this by adding more and more Bleached Bone. At the end I added a nice blob of Skull White to the mix. This last colour was applied there where I wanted the Orks’ walkways to show.

 

All of the metal reinforcements/repairs were started with Tin Bitz. Over this, I painted Boltgun Metal, highlighted with Chainmail followed by a final highlight of Mithril Silver. Over this, I applied a wash of 50/50 Green ink/Brown Ink, with a tiny brush-point of chaos black (the paint, not the ink) to get a smokey finish.

As for the vehicle parts on the ground, all were painted in colours of different armies present on Armorgeddem. The scratches on those follow the same procedure as the metal repairs described above.

 

The orange goo flowing out of the JerryCan lying on the ground is just PVA mixed with Fiery Orange.

 

Here and there I added glyph-tags warning the Orks of nearby explosives, claiming the bunker to be property ov Da Golden Teef and, smaller and lower to the ground, some markings left by Gretchin that are too big fer their boots. The ammo-box and funghus-beer barrel were labelled as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is what she looks like when painted :