Avalon 2017

From the 21st to the 25th we did our annual week in Avalon, at the Windrift with the cousins, as usual, and it was a lot of fun.

Girls on Moreys Pier in Wildwood

There is something to be said for family traditions, and this has become a vacation one for us over the last 5 or 6 years.

Moreys Pier

We do beach. Pool. More beach. More pool. Wildwood boardwalk.

The compulsory mini golf evening

Mini golf. Eat too much.

Julia taking it slow

Sleep in.

Unfortunate pic framing on Moby Dick

Enjoy the ocean. Enjoy the pool. Again. Enjoy being with family.

There should be another post just like this next August, although that one will probably need to be planned around Band Camp, since Grace will be a freshman in the high school marching band by then, and that will take up the latter part of the month. Where does the time go?

Standing Stones

In a D&D game, there are a few types of must-have terrain to keep in your back pocket for use as your players and their characters bumble and stumble around the world (if you are into that sort of thing...). Standing stones, obelisks, and forgotten monument stones rank high on that list.

When the mood strikes me to make something in the way of fantasy terrain, and I can't figure out something specific to do, it is an easy choice to carve up a few standing stones, monuments or forgotten altars (blood-stained perhaps...).

Standing stone and forgotten altar miscellany

These take virtually no time at all, and consist of a little bit of knife-carved foam coated with a darker gray undercoat and a light gray sponging overtop. Throw in a little dark green or light green weathering for a change of pace. Easy Peasy.

Sewer Tiles

What's a good Dungeons and Dragons town or city without sewers underneath, inhabited by all sorts of evil and ill-intentioned creatures? With that in mind, I have spent a little time recently finishing a modular set of sewer tiles for our games.

The tiles are carved out of 1/2 inch extruded polystyrene insulation foam board (same as most of my D&D terrain). Each piece has a 1/2 inch base layer topped by another 1/2 inch "walkway" layer. The channels are either 5 foot (one square) or 10 foot (2 square) wide, with 5 or 10 foot wide walkways alongside. Where there is no walkway it assumes "solid rock" negative space.

Step 1, after foam assembly and a black base coat, is a sponging of Folk Art brand "medium gray".

Step 1 - medium gray sponging

Step 2 is a sponging of Folk Art "dove gray", a light gray applied more sparingly than the "medium gray". You want to highlight but not totally hide the darker gray, although I admittedly still go fairly heavy-handed on this step. Lighter colors "pop" better on the table during gameplay, and what might look more realistic up close from an artistic point of view often looks dark and dreary during games...

Step 2 - light gray sponging

Step 3 is a little bit of spot dry brushing of Folk Art "buckskin brown" (this is a nice rich medium brown color no longer stocked by the local Michaels stores - sad face...). This just aims to give a bit of a muddy feel, and to break up the potential monotony of gray.

Step 3 - a brown dry brush in spots

Step 4 is to retouch any "water" areas and edges with black, as you will unavoidably sponge some gray onto these areas.

Step 5 is to apply a brush-textured coat of gloss Mod Podge to the water areas to give them texture before painting. This is important, as you will be relying on the raised texture of this first Mod Podge coat to give something for steps 6 and 7 to catch on. The dry brushing in the next two steps will not be as effective if there is not some texture for them to pick up and accent.

Step 6 is to lightly dry brush some "buckskin brown" onto the water areas. This needs to be done streakily (is that even a word?) and sparingly - you are looking for hints of a sludgy nasty greenish-brown water, not an outright brown water.

Step 7 is to drag a heavy dry brush coat of Folk Art "citrus green", or a similarly putrid green, over the Mod Podge texture from step 5 (this is why step 5 is so important).

Step 8 is to re-coat the water areas with another coat (or two) of brush-textured gloss Mod Podge. You can see the way I did the brush-texturing of the Mod Podge (in step 5) by how the "citrus green" dry brush caught on that texture. The important thing in steps 6 and 7 is that I was looking for some hints of brown overlaid with a good bit of putrid yellowy-green, but didn't want the end result to totally overlay the black undercoat. I was hoping for a yucky greenish-brown over a still-dark base. I think this gives that effect. It might not be everyone's idea of a D&D under-the-town sewer, but it did achieve the exact result I was looking for...

Steps 4-8: brown water, putrid green, and gloss Mod Podge

By the end of this mini project I've added enough new pieces to the ones I had made several months ago to fill a medium sized Sterilite storage container with a good variety of 5 and 10 foot sewers with 5 and 10 foot walkways, including enough junction pieces to give me good flexibility to create all sorts of layouts. [In other words, probably much more than I will ever need...]

As with the badlands terrain pieces documented a few days ago, I'm not sure how much use I will have of these pieces, but they were fun to make, and the entire project probably took less than $20 in materials and 3-4 hours of time. And most importantly, it was fun...

Glen Campbell

Music legend Glen Campbell passed away August 8 at the age of 81. I can honestly say that as a younger person, I had no interest at all (or frankly, knowledge of...) his music. Rhinestone Cowboy would be enough to send me out of the room...

Glen Campbell, earlier

But then sometimes you grow up, and your mind opens up a bit, and your musical horizons expand. My knowledge of his music is admittedly still very limited, but I can recognize that he certainly had a substantial handful of timeless classics, songs that I can now appreciate for what they are.

Glen Campbell, later

My favorite Glen Campbell song is Wichita Lineman, a song written by Jimmy Webb in 1968 (the background to which is here...a good story in and of itself)

Wichita Lineman on PBS, a wonderful version of a classic song. Lovely. Great understated guitar work, with a beautiful simple solo and a bunch of seemingly effortless fills.

...And an amazing solo version with terrific guitar work (and a very interesting arrangement) - song starts at about 8:50 after an interview.

Guitar Man with Jerry Reed.

By the Time I Get to Phoenix, and Galveston. The guitar solo on Galveston (~5:30 on) would make many modern day "shredders" blush. (Who knew?)

Lastly, Ghost Riders in the Sky with Roy Clark. Roy Clark could be a whole other post...

Rivenrock Wastes Completed

Shown below are the intermediate steps and final product of the project to complete "badlands" hill terrain for either historical miniatures or Dungeons and Dragons games. [Another very recent post showed the beginnings]

After a dark brown latex house paint base coat (Behr "Swiss Brown"), each piece gets a stipple and dry brush of Craftsmart "Orange Spice". This rusty reddish brown color is intended to show only as subtle hints in crevasses, and isn't done very heavily.

Brown base, rusty red and finished piece

Next, each piece gets a healthy sponge coat of Folk Art "Camel", my go-to light tan color for terrain. A little dry brushing gets to the spots the sponge can't easily reach. I don't want an overwhelming amount of the dark brown base showing through.

Base coated, rusty red and "camel" sponge

Finally, a lighter sponge coat of a very light creamy tan (Folk Art's "Taffy") is used to highlight the edges and brighten the flat surfaces. The pieces looked a little dingy before this step but popped nicely after.

"Camel" sponge (left) without final highlight (at right)

The final project, shown below, consists of a large two-piece hill which can be used together or separate, a bunch of larger pieces, and a good assortment of smaller pieces in both 2" foam and 3/4" foam. The 2" pieces (which are most of them) give good height and mass, and the smaller pieces allow for climbing access for figures, or just smaller scatter.

Final pieces with "Taffy" light highlight

This project filled a very large plastic storage box. I'm not sure how often I will have a use for them, but the materials were cheap and the whole project only took a few hours scattered over the course of a week or so. Very easy, and now I have options other than gray rock...

River Update

As noted previously (April 23), the family has embarked on a major project - knocking down the old River house and building a new one in its place.

Progress has been slow, but the amount of permits and studies and approvals and inspections to build a place on the waterfront is astounding in its....umm...thoroughness.

New house taking shape

We had the chance to go down today on a rainy day to meet with the builder and check out where things stood.

Great room to be - living and dining from the kitchen

Other than rainy and dreary and wet, it was nice to see a fully framed house with most of a roof. This was the first chance to walk through the bones of the new house.

There is a lot of work left to be done (obviously), but it was nice to see it this far along. In other words, not a hole in the ground.

I will admit that I still feel a bit of sadness every time I think of the old house being gone, but that will pass in time... And I have no doubt the new house will be amazing.