"The Ultimate Sacrifice: Quinto, game 4" Topic

The Ultimate Sacrifice, Quinto game the fourth, wherein walls are toppled and many men perish.

Enjoy!

link

That was a fantastic battle report, lots of fun to read, and a beautiful table too!

V/R,
Jack

Thanks, glad you enjoyed!

Excellent AAR!

Thanks for sharing.

Those grass fields are fantastic looking.

Thanks! Nothing to the fields – just off-white teddy-bear fur mussed up with scissors, green spray paint, and some yellow spray paint highlights.

Teddy bear fur? Now I've heard everything :)

I'll have to try that, thanks!

I keep wanting to try teddy bear fur, but I read one TMPer's explanation of how he did it, and it really sounded painful.

Sounded like the first thing to do was spend a tremendous amount of time shaving the fur down, then he spent a tremendous amount of time painting it (numerous coats and then some form of sealant I think).

It sure looks fantastic, and would be incredibly useful for some Pacific/Vietnam games.

Primalucem – so, if you don't mind sharing, what exactly did you do?

V/R,
Jack

Ha! The first time, I tried something like you describe, but using a beard trimmer on teddy bear fur is a nightmare!

Here's what I did: got a very short haired fur to start with (about 4' total, but cut down into the shapes I wanted) and then just savaged it with scissors (borrowed my wife's good sewing scissors for this), purposefully making it uneven, and turning the piece as I cut, so that the tufts would tend to stick out in different directions. It does make a terrible mess, but doesn't actually take much time if you're not being super careful. For this, I think being too careful with the cuts leads to it looking too uniform, so just go to town. You can always go over it again and trim it to soften any overly sharp edges.
Give it a good shake outside before you paint it to free up as much of the lose fur as possible. Cutting it results in something similar to the little bits of hair that inevitably gets everywhere after a haircut, and you don't want too many lose tufts when you paint it.

Painting: I used two colors for the above, but three would be better if you feel ambitious. I've also done it with a bit of black fur, but it requires far more paint, leading to a harder, matted look, like the yellow field in the pictures above. The white fur worked out much better, as it makes the "grass" a bit pale if you don't overdo it with the paint.

When I applied the first layer (green), I hit the edges pretty hard, to make sure I got down to the "root" of the fur, as that would be visible from the sides, but sprayed far less paint on the top. Best to make slow light passes rather than a heavy coat, as the fur clumps less. In fact, ideally, take it in several light coats, with maybe 10 minutes of drying in the sun between them. Then, after the green is totally dry (I waited overnight with one, and a couple of hours with another), lightly spray some yellow/ochre highlights and leave to dry. I don't use any sealant on these, as I want them to remain mostly flexible. Like the cutting, you want the color to be uneven, not uniform, but layered and organic.

I would suggest getting a good quality art spray paint for this however. I've tried this with regular Rust-oleum spray paint, and even Design Master brands, and the paint just isn't fine enough, or adhesive enough, I'm not sure. But I sprayed most of a can and barely changed the color, and it becomes a matted mess. Use a high quality art spray paint like Liquitex acrylic. Even a light spray really gives a lot of color. I've also seen it done with an air brush, and I have a feeling that would give a lot more control and detail, but would take significantly longer. Color choice is key as well, and Liquitex offers a lot of really good organic-looking shades to match a variety of terrain types.

Overall, I believe it took me maybe 30-40 minutes total to do two of the green patches like you see above. That's broken up to allow for some dry times, but the painting is super quick. Most of the time is in the trimming, but I don't its too onerous if you're not a perfectionist about it.

Hope that helped, and that you give it a try. I have some fur kicking around waiting for warm weather (definitely an outside job), so maybe I'll post a tutorial with pictures in the Spring.

Very interesting. Thanks man, I'm afraid I'll have to give this a try! My wallet and wife are not as happy as I am, but it shouldn't be too bad for some fur and better paint (I've got plenty of the Wal-Mart khaki, green, and desert sand, but I'll look for the stuff you're talking about).

V/R,
Jack

It's not too bad. The fur was about $20 USD/yard, and the spray paint runs about $12 USD at my local craft store.

Good luck and if you can, post a picture!

Cool. Do you get the teddy bear fur at a craft store (like Michael's or Hobby Lobby), or at one of those mall Bear Shops?

V/R,
Jack

Very suspenseful narrative. I liked it a lot

Thanks sumerandakkad!

Jack – finding the right stuff was actually kind of the toughest part. The craft stores in the area only had small individual rolls of (mostly black) long-haired fur which did not work as well. I ended up getting mine in the garment district of NYC, where you can pretty much get any kind of fabric imaginable for pretty cheap. I did see it online somewhere as well, by the yard.

Went to Michaels, no teddy bear fur, and I found Liquitex Acrylic paints, but not spray paints.

The quest continues!

V/R,
Jack

At my local Michael's the good spray paint is kept in a locked case. You might have to ask for it.

Unless you have a sizable fabric store in your area, you may have to buy online. Here is one place:

link

Good luck!