Terrain For Hippos: Reviving the art of Cardboard Cottage Construction!

[puddingwrestler]

Deathjester; that's exactly what I did for my Orky drop ship.

And now... pretty pictures.

[Weaver]

The very best, most hi tech material I have found for this sort of thing is....paper.  And PVA glue.
Both of which are non reactive with polystyrene, and will seal it against whatever paint you choose to employ.

The paper on PW's drop ship is creased and crinkly where he's bent it to fit the ball. This is fine because that's the look he's after: roughly metal-bashed Ork-tech. How would you get it to conform to the surface to give a smoothly curved surface? Thin paper (tissue paper?) Small panels? Thin strips?

[deathjester]

Yes, exactly right!  Use thin strips, well soaked in PVA , and smooth them round the contours.  I used this technique on a dropship myself, turned out pretty smooth.

[puddingwrestler]

Was thinking again; are you sure you can't just get a plastic ball shape?
There's a company called KitCraft (I think) who sell clear plastic hemispheres in a range of sizes for reasonable prices. They are in the US but sell worldwide. They come in pairs so you can made a full sphere out of them, and they come in quite large sizes. The one I got was 120mm I think, cost about 15USD for the pair and I only used half of one.

[philp]

Checked their website and biggest I can find is 6".  I had thought of a large plastic Christmas ornament, the kind they put on those big trees or in Malls.

[puddingwrestler]

Plastic fishing bobber or bouy or whatever they are called... the things wot they stik to nets so they float (he said, lapsing into Ork spelling)? I'm sure I have seen such things...

Or just wait until Boxing day and buy up plastic christmass baubles on the cheap.

[Weaver]

I was thinking of something quite big, maybe 6" by 9" (egg-shaped, remember), because along with these "scout-ships" goes a "crawler", painted by Fred Gambino but featuring in the same stories, which is begging to be made from an Airfix Buffalo LVTP (the egg-scout doesn't carry the crawler, but they'd make a nice display pair). The scout ship is the nose section of a larger "pods and girders" style vehicle, so a smaller-scale model of the whole ship could use a smaller plastic egg.

Another possibility is to wait for Easter and then see what packaging materials present themselves.....

[puddingwrestler]

[puddingwrestler]

You may have been wondering where the hell I've been for so long. Well, I moved house because the guy who owned the one I was renting decided to sell. The advantages are that my car now has a bedroom (okay, it's a carport), I have aircon and it's much closer to work. In fact, I can see parts of the school from my front windows. The disadvantage is that it took the famously indolent Telstra ages to get my phones sorted, and then took me some time to get the internewt sorted...
What does a man do in such times you ask?

He writes two more Ishoos of his blog and posts the next reader's choice poll of course.
http://terrainforhippos.blogspot.com/
So now you can see how to make Polystyrene boats (at last) and follow along with the making of a complete terrain set. And vote on what you want to see in Ishoo Sicksteen.
Because you know you want to.

[Weaver]

Splendid PW - nice to have you back!

These articles are really interesting! 

[puddingwrestler]

Ishoo Forteen has just gone online hippo fans!
Straight from the river horse's mouth

[ChernayaAkula]

Most interesting!  Yet again, one could say.

[Army of One]

Awesome.....even I could follow those intructions.......I think

[puddingwrestler]

Further updates have occured.
Go look at them.

[puddingwrestler]

Gentlemen; the Troll Whacking Season opens tommorow.
Only on Terrain For Hippos!/