Thursday, July 26, 2012

The Road to NOVA 18 Penultimate session!




Hello all,

Well another powerful build session has come and gone. Once again the team has not only answered the call but went above and beyond and showed why NOVA Staff are at the  top of the food chain! In this last session we continued to construct center pieces and knock out tons of painting for the 40K GT. We are so close to finished that we can taste it. So for those keeping score that would mean that since NOVA 2010 (Yes I meant 2010) NOVA staff have built over 1000 pieces of terrain for 3 different systems.  40K, Infinity, and Warmachine/Hordes.

The Infinity “Shanty town” is really coming together. Team Infinity figured out an assembly line process that is allowing them to build hobo houses at an alarming rate. These buildings are going to give some of the Infinity tables a real “District 9” feel. I can’t wait to see them finished.

Warmachine/hordes got a boost as 30 hill were constructed using the NOVA foam cutters along with 41 fence and barricade pieces. These things are really cool and could be used in just about any 28-30 mm systems. I liked the fences so much that I am including a short tutorial on their construction below. We also managed to finish the WM/H tree bases from last week. A good week for Warmachine!

Building the fence

Materials:
Thin Balsa rod
Wood Coffee stirrers (Craft sticks could also work)
4 inch X 1 inch base* (We used MDF board but cork, plastic card or even foam board could work.)
Glue- Elmers, Tacky, wood (Pick your poison)

Figure 1
*The size if the base is important for games like WM/H and Infinity

Cut three 1” strips for the fence posts from the balsa rod
Using the Coffee stirrers make six roughly 2” strips for wood slats
Figure 2
Lay the three fence posts as seen in figure 3
Figure 3
Glue 2” wood slats to fence posts as seen in figure 4
Figure 4
Let is set for a few minutes then flip the piece
Figure 5
Glue the other three slats in place making sure that it is the reverse of the other side (See figure 6)
Figure 6
Here are two completed sections.
Figure 7
*This is such a simple design that I recommend building several at the same time. At the build session we made 31 of them in one sitting*

Next up is attaching them to the base. At the build session we used a hot glue gun to speed the process but for this tutorial I decided to use Tacky glue as I had more drying time this go round. Simply glue it to the base as seen in figures 8 and 9.
Figure 8

Figure 9

Next time I will go over painting and finishing the piece…

We have one more build session to go:  Sunday July 29th. See if you can be there!

BTW: Take a look at the NOVA FAQ (Most current version) here

Till Next time

Later

RGH

*Notice the lack of build session pictures? I walked right out the door without my camera. Doh!

Monday, July 16, 2012

The Road to NOVA 17 We can see the light!

Hello All,

This past Sunday's build session was nothing less than brilliant. I am not sure just how many people showed up, but it seemed like everywhere I looked there were folks working on all kinds of terrain projects.
Lets just say there were enough people in attendance to work on 40K, Infinity, and Warmachine/Hordes at the same time!

Pieces waiting to be dry brushed

One our new "Center pieces"

Check out these remastered hills.


Stuff from NOVA 2011


At one point we had 5 airbrush stations going at once. All under the new pavilion that is keeping safe from the evil that some call "THE SUN". Take a look at this...

Yea were that cool (under the sunshade that is...)


We also had our top notch build team hard at work building you a better NOVA!

Like  a boss!

Terrain Build theme


The Infinity team hit the ground running with their "Shanty town" terrain that will be featured during Infinity's premier  at the 2012 NOVA! Check this out.

Shanty house


Wait till their painted


Not to be left behind the boys from Warmachine knocked out a ton of barricades and small hills.



Lastly here is a progress pic of the Lincoln memorial getting all wired up for the narrative... This is going to be cool!

This is ether the monument getting wired up for lighting or plans for the heist of the Lincoln statue right out from under the watchful eyes of DC's finest. 


Well till next time

RGH