Terrain Day

Today I thought I would tackle a few ACW buildings and a futuristic generator.

As I white washed the new barn I remembered a large model I had bought for my Birthday. It's a barn from Gettysburg and is a lovely model. However, the paint job could always do with a bit of weathering. At the time of the battle it was a working cow shed so I thought I would take it back to a used state 

Above is the pre painted model I bought from Perry's, nice but it could be improved. 

After painting the tiles different shades, I washed them with a brown to tie them all together.

For all of these models it was nice to spend a little more time on them and make them look nice. I used to blast through my terrain pieces and see them as less important. Now, however, I know the worth in setting up a nice board.

I put a lot of mud from the cows as they rubbed against the side of the barn.

Also I weathered areas that saw a lot of use like around the doors.

This barn would be great in a WWII battle too.

The log cabin got a lick of contrast paint to darken him up. I used various shades so the logs looked different colours in the walls.

Finally I used this model to try out paints I've been wanting to use for a while. Vallejo Mech paints, the results of these was a little disappointing. Most of the model was colored using contrast paints.

Concentrate all firepower on the main generator!

UPDATE: The matt varnish is now dry and now it's time to add some last details.
 

The barns looked good with their new dull varnish but the metal generator looked odd. I fixed this by using satin varnish to cover the metal paneling and gloss varnish on a few selected areas. It looks a lot better and much more like a chunk of heavy machinery now.

I have never done this before and it was a strangely very rewarding. Dropping some Kleer floor varnish into the tiny window pains gives the perfect glass effect. The windows now catch the light making them pop. Very rewarding!

The last thing is the lucky horseshoe on the door.