Monday 2 October 2017

The Power Plant

When a mate pops round to your house and drops off a selection of wargames terrain because "it might fit with your Helsreach buildings", it would be rude not to take them up on the offer. What was kindly donated to me a week or so ago was a selection of dusty old resin Kryomek domes (still produced by Scotia Grendel), and a funky little plaster building.


The plaster building in question is an oddity. It has a ground floor that looks pretty decently scaled to 28mm. It has upper floors that look more like a 15mm residential tower block - check out the ladder:


If the whole building is intended to be 28mm, people can't fit in the top section and that ladder is tiny. If the whole building is 15mm, then those doors are massive. I have no idea what the manufacturer is, so can't do any research on the model. To rationalise everything, I decided that the building is some kind of power plant, and the upper section is a kind of cooling system. This means that the long, tall windows are actually vents, and everything nearly makes sense. Apart from the teeny, tiny ladder that is!

Notwithstanding a scale, the building is a paradox of sculpting quality too. The wooden doors are brilliantly realised - full of wood grain and splintered details. In contrast, some of the rendered areas have big ugly blobs and drips, where they have been faithfully reproduced from the master model.

As this will be a filler building, I didn't spend too much time on it - no more than 2 hours start to finish.

I did take a little bit more time on the doors than the rest of the building.

The base colours were given a few washes to tie in with the other buildings I've been painting.

Some damage from incoming fire? Or have there been internal explosions blowing out?


Note the odd shape to the upper section.

I'd be interested to hear any information about the producer of the building. It's got a nice, quirky shape and I wouldn't be opposed to adding more similar buildings to the streets of Helsreach.



+++ EDIT +++

Earlier on today, I was none the wiser about the source of this fine building. Thanks to David Wood of Dear Tony Blair who pointed me to the short-lived Grenadier Models terrain series, I now know exactly what it is. You can check out some names and codes over at the Lost Minis Wiki, but frustratingly there aren't pictures there. David came to my rescue once again with some photos of the relevant pages from the Grenadier Eurocatalogue:




My building is the Garibaldi Block from the Dark City sci-fi buildings line (bottom right). That Trooper Precinct House (top left) looks rather nice as well.

There was a second sci-fi range, Frontier World. Some of those look pretty interesting too.


The buildings seem to be abstract representations of buildings, rather than actual scale models - they don't really appear to be logical in terms of scale or shape. But they're fun nonetheless.

Thanks very much for taking the time to pin down an ID David!

24 comments:

  1. The work on the doors is enough to really make it pop. Looks great!

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    1. Thanks! I think it needed the splash of colour on the doors.

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  2. That's a wee bit sexy mate, good job.

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  3. It's great, the very weird shape is a clear bonus from where I stand, lets you imagine many uses for it.

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    1. I agree, the weird shape makes it much more interesting than a square box would have been.

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  4. I looks like it was made from two types of containers stuck together, then slathered in a gritty plaster mix of some sort. You don't know if it was a bought or homemade item?

    It looks pretty good either way. I like the blast damage, adds an extra level of detail. How much more are you thinking of adding to this Helsreach aesthetic Jon? Have you got a number of buildings in mind?

    Another great addition mate :)

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    1. I reckon your reverse engineering is spot on. I know that my mate bought it at a show I think.

      How many more buildings? I have about 10 or so resin adobe buildings that need adapting, another 3 or 4 tin shacks, some scrap piles, a landing pad, some walls and gantries...

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  5. Something to fight over/ around so jobs a good 'un

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    1. You can't have too much terrain, right?!

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  6. No idea of what's that, but you made it work more than brilliantly. It now totally fits in your ambientation. Nice job there.

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    1. Turns out that this might be one of Grenadier Models short-lived 'Frontier World' buildings. I'm struggling to find pictures online though.
      Glad you like it!

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  7. Looks brilliant - love your vision of Helsreach. Are the Kryomek domes the really small ones I use for 15mm from Scotia?

    https://bladesandblasters.com/2017/05/05/desert-terrain-again/

    Happy with the scale?

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    1. Yes, the self same ones. If I'm honest, the Kryomek domes are too small for 28mm, but they'll be OK in a pinch or in the background. I figure they make better sense if they're access shafts for underground dwellings, or perhaps they house equipment rather than people.

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    2. I see them as the visible surface elements of subterranean developments. Like Uncle Owen and Aunt Berus place in A New Hope.

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  8. Yeah - there're very weird scale-wise (though that works out nicely for me!). Keep on keepin' on.

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  9. It's good to have friends that occasionally drop off stuff that might be useful. And while I suspect that would have been sitting on my shelf a while as I mulled over what to do with it, you've made it work. Well done!

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    1. I'm all for friends donating stuff, and equally I hope I do the same. As long as the end result is more painted things, that's a win I reckon ;)

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  10. The ladder could have been portrayed as an additional vent maybe, or as a unique vent with individual purpose maybe.
    You could have painted it like a large power readout, like phone battery power maybe, as it would likely be shown in a video game.

    It's absolutely dandy as is too of course. Well done.

    It doesn't seem very long ago that your frontier town was just a future plan, even though now its a realised place.

    Very pleasing

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    1. I tend to be a tad too literal when I paint stuff sometimes I think. It's a ladder, so I painted it like a ladder. I suspect I can rationalise it as a guide rail for some sort of lifting device. I wish I'd though about a power readout!

      When did I start on this theme of terrain? It's evolved I think, but those shacks and green hab units from 2015 will sit quite happily alongside all the adobe and tin sheds from 2017 I think!

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  11. Beautiful painting per usual sir and it'll fit in fine with your other terrain pieces.

    Even though you've since found the range it was from, it looks closer to a 1/72 (20mm) scale than anything else.

    Regardless, I like it very much.

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    1. I agree about the scale Dai - 20mm would be a better fit. That said, I'm happy to use it and live with the visual compromises of scale :)

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  12. Power plant is a good choice. It's certainly good enough to represent other things though ... a cult meeting place and a jail house for the insane are just two I can think of from the top of my mind. :)

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    1. I won't pigeonhole it! I'm happy enough for it to act as any and all of the above :)

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