"Making 10mm terrain" Topic

I've now started 10mm wargaming after moving from other scales. Getting hold of suitable terrain has been surprisingly difficult. I've had to make hedges myself as commercially produced ones are all made for larger scales and look over sized. I did this by getting very cheap green scouring pads (cheap means thin so just right for 10mm) cutting strips and using a glue gun to stick them to lollipop sticks. Coating the scouring pad hedge in wood stain then dry brushing with two different shades of green. The bases were coated in sand, painted brown then highlighted in cork brown.

I made walls by gluing a length of mounting card to a lollipop stick then coating with Quinoa (I have since found that kaloonji seed gives a better look in this scale). Sprayed black then highlighted in shades of grey. The bases were done the same as the hedges but looked better with a good deal of flock on them.

For wheat fields I was going to use welcome matting but even short matting ends up taller than the figures and looks ridiculous. They are almost too big for 15mm. I found a roll of wheat field for model railways which I ended up getting shipped over from France but looks superb.

I'm not sure whether to use 10mm or 6mm buildings and may end up buying. What do you all use?

I find it surprising that even 10mm figure manufacturers only seem to produce building for their preferred scale. Does anyone have any suggestions for 10mm terrain?

N scale items from the Model railroad servicing shops is a great source. There are also card stock buildings made to 1:160th scale that not only look great on the table, but are also pretty easy to construct. (A new #1 Exacto blade and a metal straight edge when cutting out the parts will make the structure so much cleaner looking, too.

I have purchased a LOT of Heiki, Busch, Faller, etc. trees, bushes and even make my own for vegetation. Cobblestone street plates and flex roads also are a decent investment.

There are lots of possibilities out there.

I make all my own terrain -hills, trees, buildings, walls, hedges, roads, rivers, the lot. This months MWBG has the second part on how I go about making them for 6 and 10mm or you can have a look at my blog at:

link

and check the Labels marked terrain. All are made from readily available materials.

Short Teddy Bear Fur for the wheat fields.

I'm going with 1/144th scale for my Moderns, which is apparently close to 10mm, as opposed to 12mm.

Due to a lack of funds, I'm working on making some custom buildings using MS Word, and plan to print them out on thin cardstock. So far, the test pieces seem to look pretty good.

Need to do a bit more research on building colors, styles, etc. for post-WWII, West Germany, but I'm pretty pleased with the effort thus far.

At this scale, since the buildings are so small, and the plastic kits so expensive, it's a great option.

I suspect I'll be saving a ton of money, which can then be used for troops, vehicles, and other stuff not so easily produced in miniature.

For buildings especially, try TimeCast, Pendraken and Total Battle (North Africa / Med only). Paper Terrain has most of their kits in 10/12mm scale -- and Scott's having a sale right now.

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paperterrain.com

Card buildings dont do it for me. If your going to print your own then use picture quality card or they will look washed out. Simular to printing your own flags.
I tried teddy bear fur and trimmed it down to fit the scale. It looked naff. Railway model mat simular to the grass mats you can buy is far superior.
on a previous project i made my own 6mm masters for buildings. Used the clear mould material that becomes flexable when heated in cold water then made the buildings with modeling putty.

I used n guage fences which look good but railway model stuff ends up pretty expensive. I have heard that a cheap HO guage fence cut in half would have been as good.
I looked at the mwbgs article and they look a bit cheap to me. The buildings looked ok but i could get pro made ones at a reasonable price. Buildings seem to be the one thing that everybody makes.

In the past I have used 10mm buildings but I find they tend to be overwhelming – eg using a couple of 10mm buildings to represent a farm really ends up with a footprint of a fair;y latge village. Because of that I am coming around to the idea that 6mm buildings would probably be better. 10mm buildings are better if your figure to men ratio is 1:1 or 1:2 (which I do for some WW2 stuff, company level actions) but for ratios of 1:10 upwards I am slowly converting to 6mm for SYW and C19th Europe

I've started producing 10mm buildings:

link

and there's a 10mm bridge there, too, and a 10mm castle coming soon.

Lots of 10mm terrain chat on my blog, as well:

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Cheers, Michael

Brown/Tan corduroy for plowed fields.

White glue brushed onto the "ridges" and flocked will give the impression of low growing or young crops.

I'm coming round to the 6mm building view as well but I probably will buy them as I don't need many. Some nice looking projects there.

Corduroy ploughed look a bit oversized in 15mm so are no good for 10mm.

To get you going in Europe theater:-

link

Print and assemble quick and in largish numbers looks fine and it is cheap. It still what we us, but we do publish it.

Ploughed fields – we got an artist to draw plaowed fields. They look 3D, at shows folk have to touch it to tell. Must get it online one day soon.

Welcome to the perfect scale for Tanks and Grunts.

Whereas my corduroy looked undersized for my 1/72 – maybe there are different cords available?

WeeWars

Excellent buildings! I have visited your blog many times, a first rate showcase for 10mm Napoleonics.

If you go to my blog – link

I use 6mm paper buildings from Paper Terrain for 1866. Figures are Pendraken. Terrain is special built with felt and painted cloth. Teddy Bear fur works great for wheat fields also.

I carry a full line of 10mm buildings and bridges in 10mm as well. In addition to these buildings, I will soon be adding Brompton Manor, Fredericksburg and Elkhorn Tavern, Pea Ridge. For full details, see my "Between the Lines" range on the link below.

link

I keep mine simple (felt) and use a lot of the ideas given by the Altar of Freedom folks. Since I game grand tactical rules mostly (BBB) I use 3mm buildings for my towns, and generally scale down to 6mm for terrain. Its really up to your aesthetics

ACWBill. It's nice to see someone do something other than buildings in 10mm. Although I made my own bridges that look pretty good I might still end up getting a couple of yours as they look so nice. As for buildings I might only need 2 or 3 on the table and there are hundreds on sale in 10mm. Where are the walls, fences, hedges, roads, rivers, trees, hills, etc. etc. that are freely available in almost every other scale?

I have already said that I am not a fan of card but I wouldn't mind a look at that ploughed field

Excuse me for shameless self-promotion.
Look at the terrain shown at my blog:
zealandbayonets.blogspot.com
(mainly posts about Perryville wargame)

It contains many of features mentioned in this thread.
If you have specific question, don't hesitate to ask.

Nothing wrong with shameless self-promotion, Maciek, when it's this good! Lovely stuff as always.

Where are the walls, fences, hedges, roads, rivers, trees, hills, etc. etc. that are freely available in almost every other scale?

The N Scale market is huge. As for walls, fences, hedges and trees, 10mm manufactures may feel that is unnecessary to produce what is already available in large quantities.

Made to measure N Scale trees, for example:

link

WeeWars

Excellent buildings! I have visited your blog many times, a first rate showcase for 10mm Napoleonics.

Thanks, Thomas! I'm kick-starting the 1809 Blog again after a break designing models for other gamers.

On my blog:
- terrain cloth made of fleece blanket (it masks bases thickness)
- all trees from German manufacturers of railway models
- bushes, hedges etc made by me from elements of tree models mentioned above
- ploughed fields by hotzmats.com
- wheat fields from various pillow covers, old teddy bears etc.
- fences by GHQ, some enhanced by me (stone-wood fences)
- buildings by different manufacturers (cracker line are exceptionally superb)
sometimes 6mm buildings are also OK, and 10mm are too big when Grand Scale rules are used (our base equals 400 men)

The green/grass ground cover is a fleece blanket?

Is it distressed somehow to make it more textured?

Well, its rather microfibre blanket. (I don't know English name for it, here in Poland it comes under different names but is rether cheap and can be found in homeware stores)
It's something like this:
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It's put on the 'left' side and brushed a bit with plastic brush.

We call them synthetic, fleece blankets.

I've seen the hotzmats before and they look great for 10mm. I was planning to get the club I go to to buy in bulk so that it's cheaper to buy otherwise I'll have to wait until I get to a show that sells them. These days a very rare occurrence.

More shameless self-promotion, but I thought I would re-introduce myself since it seems some people don't know about me or forgot about me or thought I was out of business. I just released my newest building earlier this year.
The Forney Farm was located on the northern part of the Gettysburg battlefield.

You can see my full line of 10mm ACW Buildings here!
Buildings-in-Turmoil.com
I will continue to work on new buildings in the future, but I now have 1 full time job and 2 part time jobs, so I'm a little slower!

John

Nice buildings. Do you do anything other than buildings John.

Who would have thought a micro fibre blanket would look that good. Not sure if I'll game with one but I might get one for pictures.

ddon1234, I make stone walls and I have a Devil's Den piece. I will make anything just about, if someone is willing to front the initial money!
Not sure what you are talking about-(micro fibre blanket)? I didn't use one in any of my pictures if that's what you mean!

Heres my website for making 10mm terrain.

Making Scenery & Terrain

hope its of some use.

take care

Andy

I just finished a big 10mm terrain project:
link

Houses are Brumbaer's. Walls are just gravel piled onto white glue, in several courses. Furrows similarly with sand. Roads cut from architecture-model sheets of stonework. Hills pink foam and felt to match the ground cloth. Water features hand-painted and varnished with thinned white glue, two coats.

For cheap trees check out ebay a Chinese company called "we honest" (believe it or not) great service less than a week from china. I got a bunch for micro armor but would work well for 10mm-THE true scale for ACW.

pigasuspig,

I am digging your livestock herds!!