MY OWN HOME-MADE TERRAIN GALLERY

MY CRITERIA:
I wanted terrain that I could easily transport and store, allow a rapid set up, and yet give a good over all feel.  Since I move a lot, I can't have the terrain I would prefer, which would be something fantastic indeed - but much more permanent.

So you know...I am in a place where there is very little space.  I wanted to continue my miniatures wargaming, but could not sprawl like it used to.  I came up with a modular terrain system.  I designed it to fit together in many different ways, and no two sections are the same.  The whole set up consists of three basic board sizes. 

I am posting some of the finished boards here...when I have them all done.  As I get time, I will post the 'step by step' procedures so you can build this sort of terrain yourself.

I intend on developing scenarios for my campaigns where I can shuffle the images of the boards around to print actual maps of the terrain for gamers to use in their hands and also for scenario design work.  This is all based on an older idea I had...painting and flocking a large felt sheet. 

I started out with a sheet of felt. I pinned it down on a large table and then drew the design on it with a fat pencil.  After that, with the roads and fields marked off, I painted the fields and other features in place.  I used a lot of cheap craft paint, allowing it to soak into the felt and then sprinkling on flocking or other effects.

As you can plainly see, the roads and fields are clearly visible.

Here you can see the fields just before I added the roads.  I painted those on the felt, too. 

AND HERE IS THE FINISHED PRODUCT:

MODULAR TERRAIN MAKING

Here are some pics of the first of my new "MODULAR" terrain boards.  They vary from 50cm x 25cm down to 12.5cm square.

Keep in mind this is a work in progress... more to follow.

Here are the materials I used to make these boards.  What you do not see is the flocked matt, a railroad modeler's matt actually, from "Faller" company. I recommend them as they do not shed flocking as much.

I cut a sheet out to match the board.  You can see one board in the upper right of the pic that clearly shows the outline of a road junction I drew on the wood. 

Next, cut the sheets to match the outside of the roads.  I then glued each sheet down with simple (and very cheap) school glue.  I got those bottles for 50 cents a dozen a while back.  For this process that old glue works just fine. 

When I glue parts of hills or other materials together, this is my glue of choice.  It takes some time to dry but holds like steel.  I also use it glue trees down.

Then I carefully made sure the outside of the sheets line up well to the corners and edges.  That way I could make sure I did not need to trim anything later. 

I then added some different styles of sheets to each corner like so:
Finally, I dumped some old brown craft paint along the roads I had already drawn.  I poured a little of the white glue onto the paint, and carefully blended it as I painted the roads. In this picture the roads are shiny because the paint is not dry yet.  After drying, the roads came out nice, they look just like bad going dirt roads...Ideal for 18th and 19th Century Europe!.

Posted 20 FEB 08:

Here are more examples of my terrain boards.  The are modular.  I am working perhaps another 20 or so.  I also am designing a custom cabinet that I will go to the woodshop with and build.  I plan on cabinet with special shelves, so I can slide the boards in to transport and store them.  The top will be a collapsable table that I can fold up when not in use, and then fold out to provide a surface to set the boards on.  It will support the weight of elbows and miniatures.    Here is what some examples of the ones I already have done:
 

These connect together.  The next shot shows a number of the boards connected and laid out.  The town board is something I found useful to build up larger villages for the battles to rage around. Here is what it looks like with some buildings.  Then here is a series of views that show the appeal of the boards when you connect them. up.  I deliberately designed some to be dead end road boards, and some to 'swap' sides and directions.  The overall look is important, but so is the lack of space I have... I had to balance the two things.  Anyway, I like the look of the village board. If you want to know how to paint houses like that, go to my "Painting Page" (link below). This village board looks great with figures, too!  Ok, ok, the figures are 25mm (large 25mm) but the effect is the same... nice terrain helps the look of the miniatures battle.

A River section.

I built up the river banks with thin sheets of bluefoam, glued together with Rhino Glue.  Before gluing I had cut the center edges for the effect of a steep river bank.  Then, once dry, glued down the sheet of flocking.  Last, I took some water putty, mixed in some paint, then did the riverbanks.  I wanted steep banks on this board to make a "unfordable" river effect...or at least rough going for the armies traversing the river.  Note the build up in the lower right of the pic.  That is the hill generated by the layers of bluefoam.  One effect I got, was to offer a random, walled farmhouse.  This is great to fight from for miniatures battles.  I designed it to be a mid-sized piece so it could connect with the road network.

I also made some wooded sections.  These are two types.  To make the pine forest board, I glued down the trees, then painted the board with thick green paint.  Then, before the paint dried, I sprinkled woodland scenics flocking all over it.  The last thing I did was paint on the road.  I have the two wooded pieces side by side to show the difference in look and feel from the sprinkled flocking and the flocking sheets.  I prefer the sheest, but if you can't find those where you are at, the flocked method works, too.

Here is a marsh piece.  I have documented how I made that on, too, but will post a step-be-step picture lecture later.

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