Over the Bridge and Through the Woods: Some 6mm Scenery

It’s been a good week.  Madame Padre has been home since Thursday last and is getting stronger every day.   I finally spoke to my military career manager today and the posting message, without which nothing happens, arrives tomorrow, so we can finally begin the relocation process and finding the right new home with the right wargaming space.

There’s been precious little figure painting accomplished of late.    Since my last forays into Blucher and 6mm Napoleonics, I’ve resolved that I want my battles to look good, which means I need more scenery and terrain finished.

To that end I’ve finished several small projects, including painting two river sets from Baccus, their GSC2 River Straight Sections and GSC3 River Curved Sections.  These sets are composed of rubber components, the longer ones of which are about 4” long.   Here’s what they look like on the table, with some of my infantry bases for scale.

I washed them in soap and water, primed them in flat back spray paint, then dry brushed the edges.  The water is a Vallejo 70.979 German Camo Dark Green from their Panzer Series, treated with Vallejo 76.512 Green Wash.  Once it dried, I brushed on Woodland Scenics C1211 Realistic Water to get a glossy look.

Here are the contents of the two Baccus sets.   I didn’t measure the total length but the two packs provide a satisfying amount of stream for a reasonably sized gaming table.

 

Of course, one needs bridges.   I had already painted three Timecast resin bridge models, but decided I needed to base them so they would integrate with these river sections.  Here’s that work currently in progress.  For the first two bridge models, I decided I would build up the river banks using strips of rubber (from a kitchen shelf liner product) covered with plastic wood.  

Then I wondered if I was overthinking the problem, and if I simply needed to represent the banks using model railroad ballast.  I think it looks just as good.

Once everything dries I need to paint and flock.  I’ll use the same colours for the water that I did for the river sections, and I think it should all go together well, as follows.

 

Finally, my friend James is of the opinion that one can never have enough tries.  I’ve already made several small stands of woods.  I wanted a larger one and had the idea of road running through it.  The base is MDF, painted and flocked, and the road is textured from plastic wood.  I left convenient gaps in the trees to allow a stand of infantry to be placed on either side of the road to show possession of the wood.

Austrian grenzers stalk their foe.

One of the things I’m enjoying about 6mm is that it doesn’t take a huge amount of money or time to create good looking terrain features.   I can feel the larger scales calling me back to them, but for now I want to bear down and get some more scenery finished for my next Napoleonics battle.  

Blessings to your brushes and die rolls!

MP+