Saturday, January 6, 2018

The Carnival House

I've long been of the opinion that every good story needs a seedy side. Star Wars has Mos Eisely. War and Peace has Pierre. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock has . . . well . . . everything. It's probably not too subtle that Logansport is the border boomtown of my little space western, but so far all the buildings had been pretty pedestrian. Nothing too flashy. A couple nondescript houses, a greenhouse, a factory shed, some shacks, heck, even a church. I still need more seedy, but at least this was a start.

To say I'm a bit late talking about this is an understatement. It's a project I did nearly a year ago. I've been aware of Plast Craft Games scenery for a while, having seen Cheetor's review of their ColorED line. I decided I should give them a go and picked up a two story building from their Designed for Carnevale range. The model itself was fairly simple. The structure was mostly a fomacore material with a plastic coating of some kind. The major pieces were provided in pre-cut sheets and you just punched them as necessary and glued. The windows, doors, and railings were separate details. The build should have been easy enough, seeing as the kit had maybe a couple dozen parts at most, but it was slightly complicated by the fit. the resin windows and doors did not fit the cutouts terribly well and there was much gap filling to be done. A second minor issue was the spacing of the front door an eighth of an inch or so above the bottom of the model with no provision made for a step. To deal with the gap I fabricated one out of a couple pieces of leftover foamcore.



And of course I added a little spackle detailing to make the building look a little more worn and weary. All that said, it painted up rather nicely and the price wasn't too bad, so I can't really complain.




While my review is a little mixed, it would be well to keep in mind that these are quite a bit less expensive than some of the other options out there, and this was stock from a local hobby store that might have sat too long in a hot car on the way to a convention. (One or two things seemed a touch warped.) If everything had been a little more square it's possible things would have fit better. And for the price it's really not too bad at all.

Anyway, thanks for reading along.

Sincerely,
The Composer

12 comments:

  1. Realistic and very nicely done, great details!

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    1. Thank you Phil! Best new year to you, sir, by the way.

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  2. It turned out well. I've just found out about Plascraft from my jaunt to Great Escape Games in Sacramento. I'm still trying to make my own terrain, but there are some nice options in there and bargains can be found if you're willing to look.

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    1. Thank you! I'm glad you like it. I do a bit of each; some kits, some kitbashing, some scratch builds. Yes, there are bargains if you look. Takes time, of course, but what doesn't? And there's absolutely no shame in using a kit to save some time for a different project later.

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  3. Thanks for the walkthrough. I like the stucco detailing. Very nice

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    1. The stucco detailing is one of the nicer features. The wrought iron railings are nice too. It's a simple model, but it really isn't too bad, save for the fit. And maybe that's just having sat in the sun too long. Glad you liked it!

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  4. (Sniff) These pictures of the old B and B in Blanding almost made me cry.

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    1. It's the dust. It will do that. Gets in your eyes, makes 'em tear up. And then you find yourself thinking of that time in the dust mines out past Hanksville with the yucca boys and nothing to do but scribble poetry on the hab cube walls while you wait for the solar wind to pick up. Does it every time.

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  5. My dear sir! Excellent. Streets like a tedious argument. Insidious intent. Yellow fog. Overwhelming questions.

    But the one night cheap hotels? The sawdust restaurants? The oyster shells?

    There will be time, one presumes?

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    1. There will be time. After the mermaids sing. The yellow fog, thankfully, has curled it's last and gone to sleep, but the streets still make their tedious argument and there are still cheap hotels. And I left a pile of oyster shells myself just the other day.

      Thank you, sir! Yes. My tedious street needed a one night cheap hotel.

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