HOW TO: Sandbag terrain

Hi Everyone!! Just a quick "TUT" of sorts for all of you aspiring guardsmen out there. I had to build up a piece of terrain for my local club and I decided to put a sandbag emplacement on it as the Original had a small crappy one on it. Anyway here is how I did it.

First off I got my base and planned directly on it. I got a piece of scrap plywood I had and put Foamcore on it with a hot glue gun. The foamcore is so I can actually hollow out an area for the emplacement. After that I drew out the area for the actual building to set so I can place it back later after I build up some areas. I then cut out the emplacement area and used filler to smooth out the edges.

After then I made a pattern of the hole I cut out to have a place to build up my sandbags. I do this as not to smash the foamcore while trying to texture and build the wall. Also the filler was still wet and it gave me a dry area to build on.

From there I decided to make a "jig" so my bags are all around the same size. I just cut a square out of cardboard about the size of a dime. 

From there I just roll out sculpy and make a snake. I cut off enough to be manageable and go to town.

From there I roll it out some more and then flatten it out to form a flat snake.

Then I lay my jig on the Snake and cut out the bags.....

I then take these squares and use my fingers to round them out some to soften the corners and make them more "bag-like".

After I round out a bunch of them and have a good supply I then start to build my wall. I build in a "true" fashion and interlock the bags. this adds stability to the bags wall and realism.  If your needing help with this Google Sanbag bunkers and the like and you should get some good pictures. Anyway interlocking them makes them look real and remember they are NOT PERFECT so dont be afraid to misalign them a tad bit. SOME people texture them either by pressing cloth into them OR putting cloth band aides on their fingers and pressing their fingers into them. Also a good idea is to take a sculpting blade or knife edge and score a "seam" into the edge of the bags. I did not do this in these because I was in a rush and forgot. Oh well its only a club peice and when I repair it I will do it next time!!! LOL

Here is the bunker wall I made and then baked to make it hard. I then glued it to the base and painted it. I will show pics of that in the next day or so.

And Thats it!! Thats how I built the sand bag wall!!

SO Whats been going on the past MONTH??

Ok well it HAS been almost a month since I have updated BUT this is my Busy time of the year with my Work and real life. Not to make excuses though I have made a LITTLE progress on some projects and will share those now.

Dark Hunter Marines
I have made very little progress on them. I have sprued the pads for casting and Will be casting them soon, HOPEFULLY later today. We will see.

Commission Painting
I have made a little progress here. I have assembled and primed them and decided I do not like the way they are attached to their "Tabs" so I am cutting them off the tabs and going to make special bases for them all. I am going to start with the Dwarf or the Assassin And go from there. Both were sawn from their tabs and mounted to a painting holder. I will have pics of these sometime soon.

Steampunk chest
This is where I have made the most progress here. I have torn down a old paper shredder we had for some Large gears and little "oddities" and I will cast these in Resin (they are metal!!) so I can shape them easier. I have bought a reproduction  license from Dragon Forge to use his Gears in the sculpt and have assembled quite the collection of Gears and bobs to make the sculpt. I also have purchased Bronze powder for it and have a good idea of what I am going to be doing. Now that  I have most everything at hand I will be sculpting the box as soon as I get some scrapbooking foil. I am using a method I learned from a friend who scrapbooked and its a texturing technique that looks Just fantastic. Here is a pic of how it will look

The sculpt itself will be mostly foamcore as a base and will be then cast in resin once sculpted. It SHOULD be a cool little chest for nick nacks and I am considering making 2-3 sizes and shapes. Maybe a pencil holder also... Dunno. We shall see here too....LOL

Terrain.
I have made a couple pieces of terrain for the club in this month. Nothing real fancy but I built a generic building and a building with a sandbag pit. I will post the sandbag pit one after this post as I made a little tut for it.

Comp Painting
I have really not done much here, but I am Gearing up for it. I found an old Ertl model of an ATST i had and think I might build and paint that as well as the Dust stuff and other ideas I had. Im running out of time for sure BUT Its for gencon so i do have some time. I just might not be doing everything I wanted and concentrate on a couple of projects.

Work and real life
THIS is where most of my time has gone. Im working alot as everyone wants to take off from work to Hunt and spend holidays with Family SO I have been doing alot of OT. ALOT!! Also as My Wifes family will be coming down to MD for the holidays We are cleaning and digging in storage to get all the Decorations out and all of the extra stuff IN. The Family sleeps in the spare room and that unfortunately is where my paints and such are set up SO But getting ready for Family I am having to bury my hobby stuff.

Anyway Thats whats been going on around here so Keep you Thought pure and Purge the Filthy Xenos!!
Munkey!!