Normandy Terrain, part 1 … the church

About four years ago I did the church from Commission Figurines and honestly thought I was good when it came to European churches.

But then Charlie Foxtrot released their eglise and I fell in love with that one, too. So after some thinking if I could justify buying another church (yes, as wargamers we all know there is always a justification… we just need to find one that sounds sensible 😉) I decided that the Commission Figurines one will eventually be modified for winter settings and that the Charlie Foxtrott one will be used for Normandy (and other parts of Western Europe set during the warm months).

As you can see it is an absolutely massive piece that will provide a great centrepiece for any French village. But with the roofs and the belltower coming off, it will be easy enough to store.

I went with a base coat of Vallejo IDF Sand Grey primer for the sandstone look and picked out about 80 – 90% of individual stones using the paints from the Life Colour stonewall set. One word of advise for anyone wanting to do it the same way… the kit is designed in a way that the large wings do not need to be permanently connected to the central tower. Leave them off during painting even if you want to have one coherent model in the end. I could have saved a couple of hours had I painted the church in smaller, more manageable pieces. And this would also have allowed me to use an airbrush instead of a regular brush, which would have saved another few hours.

Afterwards I hit the whole model with dust filters and washes to blend the colours in. I would usually do further weathering using oil paints, but felt that with the engraving in the MDF this might pick out the wrong spots, so I reserved those for the roofs and airbrushed on some Ammo Shaders in Starship Filth and Green colours to depict rainmakers, green decolouration for water damage and so on.

Unfortunately my printer is having some driver problems right now. So instead of printing out some stained glass onto clear foil, I simply painted broad stripes onto some clear foils using whiteboard markers and glued those into the windows. But the are only glued in quite loosely, so I can always replace them later if I want.

If you wonder… the church itself is perfectly flat… the two boards it is placed upon do create a slight bump under it.

The churchtower will provide a nice spot for snipers or spotters and inviting target for the enemy artillery.

I will probably do a few more things here. French churches are often in the centre of town / village, so I will most likely do a nice cobblestone base for it.

As a byproduct of the church being in the centre of town, the cemetery is usually seperate from the church at the edge of town. So I will have to do a seperate cemetery as well. In all honesty… I would have done that in one go with the church if I had found the cemetery walls I bought together with it. So I will probably have to buy them once more (and probably find the original ones a week later) or cut some from foam. Let’s see how that one goes! 😉

Oddly enough… I think Colin from Charlie Foxtrott was inspired by the church in Tilly-sur-Seulles when he designed the church (although that one has a small annex behind the altar and some doors are placed differently). And this is one of the few churches that have an attached cemetery.

 

French Village

Now on to the second large project for this summer and even a larger one, than the modern US terrain.

Over the past few years one thing became increasingly clear to me… I wanted build up areas, that actually felt like a village or small town, instead of just some MDF buildings tossed onto the table. 

Now long term followers of this blog will know that I have never been too happy with my 4Ground buildings due to them being easily recognisable and their proliferation across the world. Other buildings rather have a feeling like they they fit a loose hamlet. Yet others by Sarissa simply lack the footprint to give the weight I would like to see on my gaming table.

While I do have a 3D printer that I use for terrain and vehicles, I often still prefer MDF over prints. Now over the years I have grown increasingly fond of Charlie Foxtrot Models for several reasons. Colins models are fairly cheap, yet well thought out and detailed. And most importantly they all have individual features and offer a realistic footprint. So for that reason, the majority of models for this project came from Charlie Foxtrott.

But let’s start with those that did not. The first is Sarissa Precision’s Café Gondree from the Warlord Games Pegasus Bridge set. The kit itself is nice, but took a lot of work to get painted, due to all the small trim and such. I left the majority of the shutters off. While the sheets had been complete, I was still missing one shutter. So in the end, I decided to leave most of, instead of a single half shuttered window stand out. Main problem for me is the size of the building. Having been there I know that the original building is not gigantic either, but this one feels just too small (and I think caters to the short ranges in Bolt Action). But it should make a nice addition to my Pegasus Bridge as well as serving as a generic building for many western European set ups.

The other one is by Sarissa as well, this time their La Belle Alliance for the Waterloo campaign. I bought this, when I still had the time to paint Napoleomics, but have now decided to use it as a rather generic building. Maybe for the edges of a village or as part of a farm complex. Anyway, not wanting to use it in its historical role, gave me some liberties. So I added a fieldstone foundation and door / window beams, plastered up the walls and gave it all a good weathering with oil paints.

Now before I start with the completely new additions, I also made some addition to the last buildings of Charlie Foxtrot Models, namely some backyards. Again, the walls were plastered up (where appropriate) and weathered using oil paints. The plaster and oil paints will be a feature on all the following models as well, so I am going to omit that from here on. The sacks are from Stronghold Terrain if I remember correctly. The pile of firewood is simply cut up twigs.

When I did the shops the other year, I only gave them some light airbrush weathering, But I liked the oil paints version better and wanted to tie them all together, so I brought their weathering up to date as well.

When I bought the first batch of Normandy row houses from Charlie Foxtrot, I left the Brasserie out. Not sure why. At first look I did not like the building, but in the end I decided to add it to the collection. Which was a great idea, since it is as great as the other shops.

What is left now are the row houses. Obviously every village needs space for people to live in and I really liked the row houses from Charlie Foxtrot. Getting four of these is supposed to give my village what I am aiming for… gravity.

Obviously using the same large building four times means that I run the risk of it all looking cookie cutter style. To reduce that effect I made sure that all the backyards look as different as possible. The outhouses and sheds are by Charlie Foxtrot, the cold frame and chicken coop, as well as most of the chickens, are by another of my favourite companies, Warbases. And yes, I know that brick walls were not too common in Normandy, but I simply liked the brick version so much better than the plain one.

My favourite part though, is the Desire Ingouf. Once I had started on it, it became apparent that this would be a special piece. So in addition to the plaster, I also added a stone base from pink foam (which replaces the original laser engraved ones), roof tiles and custom signs / roads signs (not designed by me though)

To round it all off, I added new roads to it all, which you can see all through those post. Almost exactly a year ago (funny side story… while also on holidays in Scotland and staying in the same place I am writing this now) I stumbled about really nice cobblestone roads by Slug Industries. They were originally a Kickstarter, but if you contact Phil, he still has the moulds and sells them. They are really nicely designed and were easy and fast enough to paint. I also made some connector pieces to allow me to connect them to my existing hardened and dirt roads.

So all in all, I hope to have achieved my goal… to create a village that looks substantial and has gravity.

 

House Hunters Normandy Edition (Part 2)

So following up on the last post, some more Normandy really estate. First up two free-standing houses from Sarissa Prescisson. I have to admit, that while working on these, I could not decide if I liked them or not. They offered some nice details, like the brickwork on the ground floor level or the nicely laser cut  shutters. On the other hand some things were a bit basic, like the very simple chimney stacks, the chimney of the destroyed house actually ending nowhere or the side walls and floors forming small ledges and buttresses. In the end though, one also has to see that they cost around 15 GB£ each and for that price tag they are fine, if you are willing to put some effort into these.

Normandy houses

I added some filler to the walls, the bricks were painted in different colours to give them depth and I added a fireplace from Ainsty Castings (which I can unfortunately not find on their website right now). The thin spread of filler to mimic plaster shall now become a standard for MDF buildings, since I feel it gives them a more organic look and makes them look less like MDF.

These buildings are meant to specifically complement my earlier Normandy buildings that represent buildings at the edge of a town or larger village or small farms or hamlets. Now a couple of years back when I did the others I got a lot of fire from one user on The Wargames Website for doing the shutters and doors a bit more colourful. While to this date I still do not believe that every house in Normandy has them painted white, looking at photos from Normandy it seems that this is indeed the preferred colour for shutters and doors in that region of France, So I decided to paint them all white to raise the ratio.

But now on to the other set I work on last week and to be honest… I can not stress how much joy I had working on these. This is a set of French village buildings designed to form a row of houses / stores by Charlie Foxtrot Models. Now there are two things that made me like them so much. One is the level of detail put into them and the other is that they are all unique. You could have a street like this by designing a basic building and just adding different facades and signs to it and be done. But assembling them you already see that this was not the case. Each one is designed on its own. They all have slightly different dimensions and the windows and shutters are different, too. The angle of the roof is not the same on them all and neither are the chimneys. All in all this leads to a very natural as opposed to the very cookie cutter look we often get on the tabletop. And building these houses, it makes you want to see the end result, see it all come together. And this was a massive joy.

Row of French houses

Row of French houses

As you might have noticed, the roof on the Chapellerie is damaged. One side has a larger hole in it, big enough to provide a nice position for a LMG or HMG team (or gun if your Gebirgsjäger are in the mood to dismantle their gun and carry it upstairs), the other side a smaller one that makes any sniper happy.

 

Roog LMG position

Sniper in the roof

Now there is another building in the serials which is actually designed to form the left end of the row and which I will eventually get myself. If for no other reason, just because the end of the row looks rather blue right now.

Now there is one small “problem” if you like with these and that is that all the buildings extend to the left from the grocery. Now while you may think “what is the problem, simply put one on the right”, the grocery has an outside staircase, which would be blocked by the depth of the other buildings. I voiced that to Colin (the owner of Charlie Foxtrot) the other week and while he had previously not thought about it, he is now thinking about adding another building to the line that would allow the row to be extended to the right as well. So I guess we will see even more buildings in this line. If you want to see more details on these builds, please remember that these photos lead to larger versions.

 

Row of French houses

Row of French houses

Row of French houses (rear view)

Anyway, I think that these buildings should give me lot of mileage, since they could be used for virtually anywhere in France, making them suitable for both 1940 and 1944.

 

House Hunters Normandy Edition (Part 1)

Following up the quest for more terrain, here is some for Normandy.

Up first is the Church by Commission Figurines. I bought it as part of Walt’s Kickstater for the Berlin Buildings. I liked it at first glance for its nice clear Norman lines. When it arrived I was very happy with the detailing on it, including the fact that the mortar lines between the stones were actually engraved into the MDF instead of being just cuts between the stones. The stones might seem a bit large, but this engraving really makes sure they do not stand out. And looking at many (late) medical churches in Europe they often feature massive stones. The building itself is massive as well, making for a great centrepiece on the table. For those worrying about storage… if you do not glue the belltower to the base, you can lay it into the main building.

The large windows just screamed for stained glass windows. Which were easier to do than Ihad expected. I just looked online for a Kaleidoscopic pattern, printed it out on a sheet of overhead projector film (for those too young to remember… this is what us old people used before the spread of laptop computers and video projectors), cut it to shape and glued it on the inside.

The church can actually be assembled in two ways. You get two different “back” walls. One with a door and two thin windows and one with the larger window assembly. Depending on which one you use for the front or the back either the door or the larger window will be covered up by the belltower. You could also decide not to glue it to the base and use it whatever way round suits you best in a given game, but I decided to have the large window all the time. One word of advice though. If you do it like I did you will only have a large entry to the front and none at the back. There is a small side door on one of the long pieces, so make sure that is to the end. I only noticed the doors once I was painting on the details and did not want to rip it all apart.

While we are on the topic of painting. I have always struggled with the realistic colours for stone buildings. This is part of the reason why I had left this one lying around for 4 or 5 years now. Looking at many stone churches here inGermany or stone buildings in the UK, I found that most of the stones did not really look grey but brownish with a grey hue. Some looked grey all right, some greenish, but the majority rather brownish. And that is the way I remembered these from Normandy as well. So I decided to take a different route now. Both the church and the barn below were primed in Vallejo IDF Sand Grey which is a rather brownish grey. I then airbrushed individual stones (small areas in case of the barn with its much smaller stones) in a light grey and concrete (which is greenish). Afterward it was all given a dusting of Ammo One Shot grey primer. For those who do not know this primer, it is designed to be applied in a number of thin coats (yes, I know this is irritating since it is called One Shot). This feature meant that the primer rather changed the colours below when allowed as a thin dust, than covering them up. This gave it all the grey hue I wanted.

Now to the next building, which is a stone barn by Charlie Foxtrot Models. As with theirrazed Russin huts seen the other day, assembly was quite fast and straightforward. Just like the church it features lots of details, but in a different way. There is literally hundreds of small odd shaped stones carved into the MDF here. They never run in straight rows, making the building look like it was assembled from the rocks a farmer had pulled from his field and not like stones a stonemason had worked on to build a church. Which gives the whole barn a nice nice rustic authenticity.

The kit also comes with a second floor and a ladder leading up to it. With three windows for this second floor this makes for a nice sniper or LMG position. The kit also comes with seperate doors for the entrance and gate with a more intact and a more rotten version for the gate. I chose to leave the gates open to be able to place a small AT gun or a HMG inside, turning this into a real strongpoint. What surprised me, was the fact, that the floor was evens engraved with a flagstone pattern, which you rarely see on MDF buildings modules intact. So I felt obliged to add a little straw (fibres cut from a doormat) to both the ground and upper storey.

 

House Hunters Russian Edition

While I have some houses set in rural Russia for the Napoleonics to WWII era, it seems there never were and never are enough. So some time ago I decided to beef this up. Buying the models had been the easy part, actually building and painting them took ages it seems. So in order of their purchase dates, here they are:

Up first is a Russian Orthodox Church. Now these days there are a number of extremely nice MDF kits out there and I would be hard pressed to decide which one to use, but back when I decided to beef the numbers up there were none. So I decided to take a different route and use the Perry’s ACW plastic Church kit. I scraped off the Christian cross above the entrance, which sounds easier as it was without damaging the wooden planks, and replaced it with one laser-cut from MDF. The cross is by a small UK company. Unfortunately I can not remember their name to give them credit. The regular roof on the bell tower was left off and the resulting square hole shut off using a piece of plastic card. The onion shaped dome is from Fenris Games. All that was left to do was paint it. In real life there is more contrast to the wooden planks and also some greenish stains, but it seems the natural light when so took the photos nearly soaked that up (same also applies to the other buildings in this post).

Russian church

Russian church

Up next is the windmill. In a way this is kind of a kitbash as well. The basic windmill is by Warbases. I replaced the original tool with coffee stirrers, since I wanted a real simple roof there. Since I wanted it to be raised and of a kind that was able to turn with the winds I constructed an under structure from wooden strips and Hirst Arts stones. To make it all accessible I added a ladder from the same company that provided me with the Orthodox cross. I know a set of stairs would probably have made more sense, but this is easier to store and there is a door up on the rear side for lifting goods into the mill anyway, so a ladder had to do.

Russian windmill

Russian windmill

Up Last are two razed buildings. These are extremely nice kits from Charlie Foxtrot (you are going to see a few more of their models over my next posts). I really love their chimney stacks. They really add something to the looks of these burned down buildings. I build these two sets pretty straight forward assembling the buildings and painting them. They come with lots of separate planks and so on to allow you to mimic rubble and I decided not to paint these. Since they were thin strips of MDF they already looked suitably scorched as it was. So these were just filed in after the painting. Now once it was I all glued together this proved to be a mistake, since they looked immensely different from the way I had painted the rest of the buildings. The original plan had been to give the edges of the buildings a quick black spray with the airbrush and give it all a light black dusting to back it blend, but I realised that this would not do the trick. Something else would be needed. So I treated it all with a candle, making sure it left soot marks over the building and rubble. I also noticed that the floors looked to clean and that there was too little debris there. Thank gods it is BBQ season right now so I took some coal dust from the bottom of a bag of coals, smashed up a small piece of charcoal to get some larger pieces of debris and files that over the floor and debris to enhance the looks. And I feel it worked. If you want to try this yourselves, please make sure you are working outside or in a well ventilated room (the heat from the candle combined with the paint could cause fumes) and that you have something on hand to extinguish the fire should you overdo it. Also, sealing it all with varnish afterwards is a must otherwise you will smear things and you and other players might get dirty using the buildings.

Razed russian house

Razed russian house

Razed russian house