Urban Project - the Winchester - First floor

Hi all

welcome back to my Urban Project, as you may recall I'm building my version of the Winchester Arms from the glorious English zombie movie - Shaun of the Dead.  You can see the ground floor here. So this post is looking at the pub's first floor (second if you're in the US). As we don't get to see the "upstairs" floors of the Winchester in the film, it kind of gives me free rein to do what I like. On to the build...

Rather than go over the basics of building it, I'll just point out the differences.  This time the windows are arched, I've also used some cheap acrylic paint to paint the floor as if it were carpeted, so used a green basic block colour and then "stippled" a pattern onto it.  I also used a different colour "wallpaper" to break up the business and personal sides to the building.

I cut a hole for the stairwell from the ground floor (first floor).

I then set about making another set of stairs to the top floor. While these were drying I put some internal walls together and "tiled" the kitchen walls before making up a cooker and some kitchen units.

I even made a washing machine

before deciding to "mass produce" them with the moulds I've been playing around with along with sofas (which I showed in an earlier post) and bathroom furniture!

so instead we get these....

which I've made into moulds and produced some units made from Das, these will furnish my other buildings as well.  I haven't got any decent photos of the finished units, but they are a little rough and ready due to my inexperience with using the moulds.  They will pass muster but look a little like a kid made them for a Year 4 art project.......

I've must admit due to the huge scale of the task, I've not been as diligent as normal in taking WiP photos so I do apologise.  Instead here are the finished rooms.  First up the living room...

The sofas you should recognise from a previous post.  The huge TV is made from bluefoam scraps, with the coffee table made from mdf bases and a bit of bluefoam.  I printed off some magazine/comic covers to scatter on it.  I also printed off a cheeky little portrait and framed it with gold coloured  soft foam.

For the kitchen, I put in my Das units and some plates/cutlery as well as some homemade appliances. A cheeky breville anyone?

Finally I made an office for the landlord to do his accounts and keep his records in.  The desk is made from an mdf scrap and bluefoam and the chair is made in the same way as I did for my hospital project.

Over time, when I've got more of the other structures for the board built I will come back to these levels and start adding more detail that will make the rooms more interesting - bookshelves, appliances etc. But as I don't anticipate much interest in the interiors of the buildings at PAW, these details will be for my games and my enjoyment and must take a bit of a back seat.  I will still do some (I can't help myself) but it will not be to the level I would like just yet.

Anyway here is the overall view of the first floor, you can also see the balcony in the final photo!

"Not" Shaun and "Not" Ed battle "Not" John and family...

hope you enjoy

dGG

Zombtober 2017 - Part 5

Hi all

So a little earlier than usual but I'm on nights all this weekend (naturally), we move into the final week of Zombtober and the end of a hectic month as I try to finalise two long years of study (while working full time!), endless assessments, courses and finally an interview into a career as a registered paramedic!  So far so good as I have passed everything to date and now I await my registration application to be processed and a "change of role" start date to be arranged.  

Anyhoo enough of RL. 

Onto the zombtober post and I've reached the end of my rather ambitious challenge with success! yes that's right I managed to paint a whopping 94 zombies in 5 weeks.  Yes they are to a slightly sub-par standard, but not by much and in the end i'm really pleased with the results.  Here is the last of them, first up the 7 Zombies by Mega Miniatures.

Next we have the single Wargames Factory "Vixens" zombie I have left

bit blurry - sorry

and lastly we have the 7 Mantic "TWD" sculpts, which have been my faves by far!

So we move onto the final "oh shito'meter" photos where we can see all 94 trying to get our heroes "not" Shaun and "not" Ed.

Shaun and Ed at the very top of the pic

and if that wasn't bad enough for our hapless heroes, we have my entire horde - all 174 zombies!!

Shaun and ED on the right of shot

I think that should be enough for my participation game at PAW in Feb, don't you?

back to regular posting next week
hope you enjoy
dGG

Zombtober 2017 - Part 4

Hi all

So we are into the last couple of weeks of Zombtober and despite my own fear that I would never accomplish the very challenging target of painting every single remaining zombie in da Grotto (a staggering 94 zeds!) I have managed to keep on track.  The painting has been sub-par by my own standard but not horribly so and I'm more than happy with the results so far.

This week has been more challenging than the others though and my output has consequently suffered because of that.  This week I've had an interview with my Trust for a paramedic post, which I had to prepare for (and still to date have not heard about....).  I also attended an awards ceremony on behalf of my mum, who was being recognised for donating some of her organs after she passed away in March.  As you can imagine both of these are attention diverting and important enough for me to put my brushes down... a little bit.  

That said, like most of us in this hobby, I find painting a distraction from RL and often use it as a way of relaxing when stresses come around, so there has been some output.  So what did I manage to get done?  Well first of all I finished 8 more Mantic's TWD zeds, this time they are all women and I think are full of character.

due to my poor photography and the terrible light I get da Grotto, you probably can't see the tartan pattern on the old ladies skirt or the pop sock that she is wearing or some of the other painting details, but I did spend a little more time painting these minis than the awful WGF males.

I also managed to paint up some minis that would seemlessly slip into my zombpoc encounter.  From Dish Dash games in support of their "Zombie Ragers" kickstarter which I backed last year is a four man tactical squad, that will represent anything from special forces to police SWAT to corporate security teams.  I deliberately did not paint insignia on these guys and in fact were so easy to paint as a consequence.

The details on the figs are excellent and at 28mm they fit into nearly all my games.  I wanted to get these done as they will feature shortly in some games of mine.

Lastly, of course is an updated "Oh Shito'meter" with the 8 zeds that I managed this week.  Next week is the final Zombtober offering and with only 15 more minis to go, I'm looking good to complete my challenge.

hope you enjoy

dGG

Zombtober 2017 - Part 3

Hi all

So onto week 3 and I've managed to slog through the last of the rather soft and poorly sculpted "Male Zombies" from Wargames Factory.  On the plus side it is the last 16 of them!

As a palate cleanser I also finished off 8 Mega Miniatures Zombies and a single WGF "Vixens" zombie - I guess they upped their game when they sculpted the female zombies.

That's it for this week, all I have left is 1 WGF vixen, 7 Mega Miniatures and 15 Mantic TWD minis and that is it! With just two more weekends to go this leaves me firmly on track to finish my challenging Zombtober project.  To finish then, just a quick update on the "Oh Shit O'meter!"

"Not" Shaun and "Not" Ed on the extreme right of the picture!

hope you enjoy

dGG