A bit of Washington - My whirlwind trip part 1

I had a meeting in Washington DC last week, one of those places that I have never been to. Since it was part of a business trip I didn't really have a lot of time so I couldn't actually visit the museums and monuments the way I would have liked. So a fast walking trip was the plan. 10 miles and two hours late I made it back to my train. I have never managed to get lost when I have walked but the DC streets are very confusing. Today I'm going to focus on some of the buildings and architecture that struck me as interesting, the monument pictures can follow on another day.

Building the boards for Calamity - Part 1

Building the actual boards for Calamity is likely to be a long process since work is restricting my free time so much. While I have decided that I still like to travel I have decided that I don't like to travel for work and being out of town 3 out of every 4 weeks means I don't accomplish much.

But I would really like to have the boards for Calamity done for Tacticon which takes place on Labor day weekend. I figure I better get started with something to show a little progress. In this case I have some issues I need to solve one how the support for the boards will be built and how everything will go together. Since I want to include both a small creek or river (so I can build at least one bridge!) as well as a slope some planning is definitely in order. The best way to visualize in three dimensions is to build a model. So that's what I'll build first a model of the supporting structure for the boards. For this particular model I decided I would go with 1/8" = 1" so 1 1/2 measured inches is equal to a foot. Its easy to measure out and it won't be huge, but will be big enough to show some detail.

I'm building this out of strip styrene from Evergreen. The base supports will be cut from 1x2 so in my chosen scale these will be cut from 1/8"x1/4" strips. Since I need to show some change in elevation as well, the outside will be made from 1/4" plywood which scales out to 1/32" (again my chosen scale of 1/8 makes the measurements easy). Of course they don't sell plastic strip like this so what I actually purchased was pack 189 (.125x.250) and a package of sheet styrene 9030 (.030 thick).

This is what I ended up with:

Marking out 16" centers for the center supports

All three 2'x4' sections finished. They are pretty close to being identical and they will certainly work for modeling purposes

So with the basic frames in place (which are actually 23 1/2" x 47 1/2") I'm ready to add the "plywood" side pieces.

On the left side its 5" in height on the left its 4" in height so the longer side pieces will have be cut at an angle to match the ends.

Here you can see how the foam will rest on the 1x2 supports and have the edges protected by the plywood. I'm considering going with 1/8" plywood instead but it may not be strong enough for traveling if I do that.

I think I like the slope, but I realized if I go with the current measurements of the plywood sides that I won't be able to include one of the features that I had wanted to add. I may add two more inches to the height but keep the slope the same.

So that's part 1 hopefully there won't be such a long gap in posts in the coming months.

Aspen Modeling Company Horses vs Calamity Miniatures

It has been a long time here without a single post. Traveling for work has really killed my hobby time. While I have managed to get a miniature painted here and there I haven't really been able to focus on getting anything completed. From a request on the Lead Adventurers forum I managed to find my Aspen Modeling Company S and O scale horses. Aspen's products are geared towards model railroading but a lot of their components are quite useful for gaming purposes as well, especially if you are doing a little extra detailing on your western buildings. I was hoping that their horses would be a good scenic item as well. They are nicely sculpted and the price is pretty good. I started off by ordering a couple of S Scale horses which arrived promptly. These horse were cast in beauty and look like they will paint up nicely, not that I have had time to paint.

I think that overall they are going to be to small for my purposes. Compared to most of the miniatures they are closer to ponies than horses. However, miniatures vary a great deal from manufacturer to manufacturer so I have some side by side comparison shots for you to make your own opinions from. As a side note when looking at the pictures, I have removed all the original bases from my western miniatures and re-based them on lower profile bases so side by side they can all be measure from the same ground zero (there are a few differences in height for those mounted on "interior" bases because of the green stuff used to carve the wood floors).

Here are the S Scale (S Scale is 1/64 or one real inch is equal to 64 scale inches):

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

Knuckleduster

Dixon

Reaper

Black Scorpion

Wargames Foundry

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

With the horse mounted on its own base it would base for a smaller horse for some of these miniatures a mid sized horse for others and a small horse or pony for the largest (Reaper and Black Scorpion). I decided that S Scale was probably not the right choice, so I ordered a couple of O Scale horses from Aspen to see how those might work. The O Scale horses are cast in resin and are a little rough but should clean up okay.

Here is how the O Scale horses stack up (O scale is 1/48):

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

Knuckleduster

Wargames Foundry

Dixon

Reaper

Black Scorpion

To be honest I don't remember who makes this mini. If you know drop me a line.

As you can see the O scale horse is going to be large even for the tallest minis and gigantic compared to the smaller ones. While I can see getting some use out of the S Scale versions I think the O Scale ones aren't going to work at all. Someone on the Lead Adventurers forum mentioned that Perry Miniatures had both a pack containing a horse holder and four horses in their ACW line. I think that might be the best way to go to get some horses to tie up outside the various businesses of Calamity.

Leaving on a Jet plane

Its been a busy traveling month for me. These are shots from my last flight back from Sacramento to Denver (the flip side of the gremlin ride out). This past week I was back out on the east coast in Baltimore again. The whole experience has really gotten more worn out and I haven't really found any serious opportunities to paint. This is a bad thing with Reaper Con coming up towards the end of April I really need to buckle down and get my entries started. Right now I have three picked out and we will see how they go. I would like to do a vehicle entry but I don't now if I can pull that off as well. I have plenty of 15mm vehicles around that I could work on but they typically don't do well in painting competitions, at least not something like ReaperCon. I need to see if I have any mechs around that I could paint up or maybe a larger vehicle kit to work on.

Anyway here are the shots coming back from Sacramento to Denver, it was kind of depressing flight.

A beautiful day in Sacramento

Heading east into the mountains

This is an open pit mining operation. You can see  two of the pits which much be huge since we are currently flying at 38,000'.

Crossing some snow capped peaks

And now the clouds of hidden everything, this does not bode well.

Yep, here we are in Denver, getting to the gate while the snow falls. I still have to hike out to my car after this too!

Cue Twilight Zone Music

I'm back in Sacramento. I flew out on Monday night and I was an early boarder so pretty much could take any seat I wanted (A 02 for you Southwest flyers). So a window seat up front just forward of the engine. At some point I was looking out and I took a shot of the engine out to the tip of the wing as we were cruising along at 38,000 feet. All I could think about at that point was William Shatner and his episode in the Twilight Zone; Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. It was raining as we descended into Sacramento and I kept expecting to see a little gremlin on the wing above the engine. I think I may have been a little tired.

Waiting to leave from Denver International Airport

38,000 feet, clear sky

Descending to Sacramento in the rain, is that a shadow out there?