F-82 War Game wall art

A moment of inspiration struck one day while reading some war game forums on Board Game Geek.  That is making wargame chits as wall art.  Board game chits range from simple with only 2 or 3 pieces of information to the absurd, with up to 25 pieces of information.

Examples of Clash of Giants II and Mustangs game counters.

Because these counters can have so much information on them by abstracting actual data down to single-digit numbers, shapes, and symbols they fascinate me.  I thought it would be a fun project to take the abstracted data and re-insert the hard facts about the represented vehicle onto the chits and use this as wall art in a game room.

There will be several installments of this type as I'm currently working on several different counters.  The ultimate goal is to have them printed on high quality paper at about 12"x12" and inserted into a record frame for display and maybe sale on my Etsy.  I've also kicked around the idea of using paper cut-outs and hand crafting the simpler counters like in Clash of Giants.  Stay tuned for more of these later.

For today: one of the coolest airplanes ever built (in my opinion): the F-82 Double Mustang.  One problem I ran into with this project is the bad quality of free-use images so I've had to start making my own (no trouble with that, it's actually quite fun).  So here's my process to take a line drawing to counter-ready.

 So here's where I'm starting from.  This is a basic line drawing top view of the F-82.

 First step was base color.  I made a new layer below the line drawing and applied a mask to the white areas to make them transparent.  Using reference photos I laid down grey, red, and black on the body and black, yellow, and blue on the props.  You can also see where I used white with a broad feathering to give the illusion of shine on the rounded high-points of the wings and fuselage.

 Next I put blue over the canopy glass, added the white glare to the black cowling, and used an airbrush technique for fuel seepage on the wings.  Very importantly in this step is the shadow-shading on the leading and trailing wing edges and fuselage sides.  This, combined with the white glare, provides the illusion of depth on the rounded parts.  Notice that the sharply rounded leading edge gets a more pronounced effect than the slowly tapering trailing edges.

 The canopy gets it's own white glare and the panel lines get shaded.  This is a model-building technique where the panel lines are airbrushed dark before the base color is sprayed on to give the model better definition and the effect works well here.

Finally, the USAF letters and logo were added and that's it.  The real aircraft had a white box around "USAF" but I found it unsightly and used artistic licence to dispense with it.  Next time I'll show you how I integrate this image into my F-82 wargame counter style art and what I'm doing with the whole design.

Chevy 1500 Cali-cruizer

So I went through a fairly long phase when I was super into custom trucks (still am to some extent) and as a result of that I wanted to build a custom truck myself.  Unfortunately, I didn't have the cash to turn my F-150 into my vision of perfection; so I settled for building a model kit of one instead.  To that end I acquired a truck model kit (from a HobbyTown USA I think).  I started scheming and cutting and building and out came this heavily modified California cruiser style truck.  The process took over a year, off-and-on, but I took relatively few pictures.  I'll show you what I can and explain the rest.

The diminutive brake rotors and calipers were replaced with drilled out plastic disks with carved-down calipers made from the struts of an old Millennium Falcon model.

The back seat was ditched in favor of two 15" subs.  The awesome thing here is the "subs" are actually tiny speakers out of a laptop computer (salvaged by a friend of mine).  These were soldered to a headphone jack and I could plug this into a phone or mp3 player and the truck would play its own music (albeit quietly).

Lots of work to talk about here.  The frame and bottom pan were all one piece which I cut to pieces and reassembled slightly narrower to fit between the rims & tires taken from a Dodge Charger kit.  This necessitated a lot of scratch building, especially between the back wheels where I used several pieces of sprue to build up a cage around a scratch build rear-differential / axle assembly.  The engine has been assembled and installed mostly box stock and the exhaust pipe has been cut way short.

Here is the finished interior assembly, the (mostly) finished frame, and body-in-progress.

Here are the same pieces in the same condition but all put together.  Of note is the compressed air tank in the bed that got ditched once I decided to make the suspension static, instead of hydraulic.  You can also see how stock the interior is except for the subs, amps, and cut-up steering wheel.  You can also notice I haven't added the audio jack yet.  The most striking change to the body, of course, is the lack of roof and B and C pillars.

Again, everything all put together, this time with paint.

Here's a good shot of the completed rear frame / suspension assembly.  I know it's asymetrical, but I couldn't make myself tear it apart to fix it.  The springs came from a Ferrari F40, the first car model I built.  You can also see where I had to cut out the fenders and bed to make room for all of the new stuff.

 And the final product.  Not happy with the paint quality but I'll live with it.  This is one I wish I could build over again (like the Yellow Integra) but I won't.  Maybe I'll get another truck and try again, who knows.

 Side profile showing how low I got it.  No, I don't think it would work without airbags to raise the front fender over the wheels.

The hood up to show off the engine.  You can see how I cut off the windshield to match the A pillars and the tiny side mirrors I added late in the game.

Power Grid Africa Map

So I love playing board games.  Not just Risk and Life and old standbys like that but really the new wave of hobby games of the past few decades.  One such game, a favorite since I first played it, is Power Grid.  A game of economics, supply and demand, and budgeting and trying to power more cities than your friends.  The game comes with a two sided board with Germany on one side and America on the other.  There were subsequent expansions that included boards with more geographical locations and slightly tweeked rules appropriate to the area.  But, to my great consternation there was no Africa map.  Everywhere else, but not Africa.  An inquiry to 2F Spiel (the publisher) about a future Africa map got me a poorly translated "not a chance".  Of course, that was my perfect excuse to go all diy on this problem.  To the PhotoShop!!!

I started with a satellite image of the continent, which I overlaid with a map of the largest urban centers.  With this I mapped out my power connections between the major cities (central to  gameplay).  You can see an abandoned connection above Nairobi.

Step 2 was a big one, graphically.  The ocean got replaced with a textured color pattern and each of the regions got their own color.  These regions are also important in gameplay.  I carefully traced the boundaries between countries in each region to make a mask and then did a color shift to colorize them.  The whole landmass (including the non-Africa area) also received a filter, possibly watercolor or oil paint, to abstract out the satellite image.

Next I dropped on all of my cities.  Each one consists of city artwork swiped from another power grid map scan then modified to look less European (I think it was the Benelux map) and a name over a banner colored to match its region.  These are not exactly geographically correctly located but its mostly just a ballpark.

Here we can look at the cities up close as well as the connection costs, which were also scanned from another Power Grid map and pasted all over the map.  But this really shows how I built the power connections themselves.  First I laid down several strips of different colors and shaded them to look like wires.  Over that went a shaded grey bar to look like a pipe.  Those were placed and scaled to connect all of the cities.  Then, I used the eraser tool to remove that grey pipe in places and the cutaway was outlined in black; just to make the connections look colorful.  (it sorta takes ideas from other Power Grid maps).  Finally, some of the longer pipes got fancy brass fittings with rivets; again, inspired by other map artwork.

To finish it up the last few elements went on, including a frame from the Japan Power Grid map and "no nuclear power" icons which are both important to gameplay.  I also wrote a short rules sheet outlining minor changes to the base game but, alas, I have yet to actually print and play this map.  Hopefully someday I will, I'm rather proud of my little project.

Ghost of Midway

This was a project that came from an article in National Geographic many years ago.  The sight of downed planes sitting on the ocean floor still somewhat preserved and in some cases covered in new sea-life was just so cool to me.  I had a SB2U Vindicator model kit that I had gotten for cheap and there were a few shot down in the battle of Midway so I decided to make it into a seabed diorama.

This is the kind of thing I was looking to replicate

This was my starting point.  I had cut the flaps, aileron, and elevators loose and positioned them.  I also damaged to aircraft very mildly.  I wanted it to be damaged enough to have crashed but whole enough that the pilot could crash-land it.  I decided to put a bit hole through the fuel tank, you can see splatter from the fuel leaking out which forced the plane down.

For the base I used a combination of carved insulation foam (something I will never use again) and cast plaster rocks held in place with sculpting putty.  There is a deep notch cut out for the left wing.  You can see some of the weathering I did on the airplane.

The base was primed grey to take the glue I used to hold the sand on.  I used watered down Elmer's white glue brushed on then sprinkled with sifted dust (to make it more fine).  The rocks have been painted grey, given a dark grey wash, and dry-brushed light tan and a very light brushing of white.

The plane nestled in it's place, this was a test fit partially through the sand process.

The wing has been locked in with sculpting putty, after this I would finish putting on the sand.  Here you can also see the lichen I used for seaweed.

Then there's our intrepid diver.  For a base I used a mechanic from a P-61 kit.  I sanded down his bulky clothes to look more like a wetsuit and painted it accordingly.  The flippers were scratchbuilt from sheet styrene.  The goggles were carved from clear sprue and the regulator is a modified 200lb bomb fuse.

The air tank is the business end of a missile topped with part of a helicopter control stick.  Thin wire was used as the air hose.  

To keep our diver swimming I ran painted, copper wire through holes in his hands, through a "dive weight" and into the insulation foam.  The wire was curved into the foam so the diver won't spin.

And here is the final product from two angles.  This is one i'd like to strip and rebuild, there are several things I'd like to try to make better.  Except for the diver, he's my favorite part.

Arch 550 photography Pt. 2

Now we have part 2 of last weeks post from my grad school photography class

I don't remember exactly what the assignment was that produced this photo but it had something to do with looking at the world through different eyes.  To create this I laid several scissors on an overhead projector and projected their silhouettes onto a metal cabinet where I worked.

This image, and the next two, were from a similar assignment where I had to use perspective and scale to subvert how we see the world.  This image looks a bit like a planet but is actually a macro image of a dish-washing sponge.

 

Another planet looking thing but is a macro image of bass wood.

This was a bit of a cheat (though I submitted the original too) where I photographed my carpet at a shallow angle with the sun coming through blue curtains.  I then added a ship and reflection in PhotoShop.

Our last major assignment was to photograph 100 strangers (100 pictures, not 100 people) and this photo was taken at breakfast in our hotel of a man and woman.

This gentleman (same assignment) was a construction worker doing something to the front of this building.  We weren't required to do these in black and white but we were encouraged to look at them under different treatments and I liked these in b&w.

Art 550 photography Pt.1

When you are in grad-school you have to take electives.  Some are extra baggage, some are real joys, advanced digital photography was the latter.  This week and next week I'll show off some of my highlights from each of the assignments and talk about them briefly.

One of our special guests was the imaginative Thomas Allen who uses images and cover art and Xacto knives to make stunning composite photographs.  All of his effects are done in frame and take time to compose.  He gave a lecture then we got the opportunity to replicate his style as best we could.

We were supposed to look at texture for this assignment and this peeling paint really caught my eye.

I took these photographs of my grandfather in his garden.  It was early in the morning and the light was just perfect.  We were doing a character study.

We did several light trick assignments where everything had to happen in frame on long exposure.  I spun a lightsaber in a circle while walking past the camera for this one except I inverted the color to make it a light color.

Here I used a pin-light and drew a bicycle.  It took my many, many tries to get it right and my bicycle got a little more complicated and accurate each time.

This neat picture was done by first flashing the lightsaber behind me then spinning the pen-light on a string around where I had been standing.  Because it was on long exposure the lightsaber created my shadow and the spiral appeared to go around it even though I had moved.

Bandai Y-wing

I have wanted, for years and years, to build some good quality Star Wars model kits.  I have build a pretty good cut-away Millennium Falcon when I was younger and a passable 1/48 X-wing and un-scaled AT-AT.  But they all left something to be desired, then I discovered the Bandai Star Wars series.  They absolutely blow me away with their accuracy and attention to detail and the precision with which they go together.  They are amazing!  I built this Y-wing and put my heart and soul into it.  I weathered each piece as I put it together and even filled in some detail here and there.  The canopy mounted ion cannon didn't seem to be tied into anything so I coiled wire and bridged that gap.  Another error is the model came with "studio correct" (ie. no glass in the canopy for filming purposes) and "real-life correct" (with glass) options, but there was no glass piece for behind the drivers head.  I took a brake-light lens from an old tuck kit and carved it down to fill that hole.  One thing that bugs me about Star Wars as a fandom is once something exists no other example of it can also exist.  For example, almost everybody that builds a Y-wing builds one from the movie.  I built my Y-wing to represent some ship out there somewhere, just not one that appeared on the screen.  So there are quirks like a silver dome, some stripped paint (which was covering an accident), and yellow trim.  The end result is I won second place for sci-fi models in a heavily contested category at River-con 2016 in Bossier City.  Here is the finished product:

 From the rear.  Not much clearance from the landing gear.  Requires flat ground to land.

The silver dome can be seen here as well as some serious damage to the starboard dome.

The tail-light lens and coiled wire can be seen here