3D-printing dungeon decor... pt. V

I've got a big dungeon related update to show you...

One of the best miniatures I have printed so far is this Dwarf merchant...

This model will be an excellent NPC but could just as easy be used as player. It has a lot of character and it printed flawlessly. I think he will be very fun to paint!

I have started painting the suits of armour...

While the paintjob is quite simple, these manage to look pretty good. I still have a lot more of these to paint, but so far I am very happy with how they turned out...

I have also painted a round cabinet from VaeVictis. This model is from their Patreon and is part of their Magic Workshop set. The design comes in a couple of variants, one with empty shelves, one filled with books and potions and the option to print those as one piece or two separate parts (top and bottom).

I had printed the empty version previously and painted it last week. Due to the detail of this piece the painting was fast, easy and yielded a pretty nice result. This weekend I printed a couple more pieces. I made them a little bit larger, by accident, but as it turned out, the larger scale works very well...

Apart from printing these ready-made pieces I have tried to digitally kit-bash some unique combinations. These digital conversions were inspired by this piece from Zealot Miniatures. I purchased this table a year or two ago during the last expansion of dungeon clutter but I haven't painted it yet.

The source of inspiration from Zealot Miniatures...

The first attempt at creating something like this was relatively simple. Below you can see the original design I came up with, using a round table and castle, both of which I found on Thingiverse.

The first design... 

This printed very well but lacked some detail and style so I continued tinkering with this idea. Eventually I came up with the following designs...

The first model is the castle of the hand...

The second model is this super fancy fantasy castle... The smaller spires did print fine, but got knocked off during the clean-up. I have recovered most of the spires and will repair them.

While the first two models are fictional designs, the third is a modelled after an actual, real castle: Neuschwanstein castle... It can be found in Bavaria, Germany and was built for/by order of king Ludwig II in the late 19th century. This castle formed a source of inspiration for Disney's Cinderella castle...

The base for these conversions comes from VaeVictis. I split the bottom half of the model (the base is from the round cabinets) and removed a layer of drawers to lower the top surface. This allowed me to make the castles as large as possible to preserve as much detail as I could.

The castles in these prints are all created by very talented designers and are all incredibly detailed. However, I had to scale down the designs considerably and some of the detail was lost because of that.

The castle of the hand
Fancy fantasy castle
Neuschwanstein castle

The idea behind these designs is that an NPC could have a model of a castle in his study. Maybe it's just for show, it could be a toy or maybe it could even be magical, who knows... Such an item could be very interesting when it comes to RPG's...

Here you can see the first, failed print of the fancy fantasy castle... Due to the delicate nature of the design some of the finer details were lost or failed to print entirely. After curing the model even split open due to uncured resin being left inside...

3D-printing dungeon decor... pt. IV

While digging through Thingiverse, something I started doing on a daily basis now I have my Elegoo MARS, I found a set of medieval suits of armour. According to the creator, these are from Fable III, which would explain why I felt I had seen them before.

Immediately I thought of filling the halls of my dungeon with these pieces...

The first print turned out too small (my own doing as I scaled the model to 35mm), in this smaller scale the sword proved too thin to be printed properly. To fix this I imported the file in Tinkercad and put in another sword I thickened considerably.

Compared to the first print I further enlarged the next batch by 15%, bringing the suits of armour more in line with the rest of my dungeon furniture.

The suit of armour in the middle is one from the first batch, both the models
 on the outside are from the last print. 

When compared to a miniature the suits of armour look a bit oversized, but next to the other pieces of furniture they look just right.

The suit of armour comes in two variants, one with a sword and one without... 

I printed 24 suits of armour in two prints of 12 each...

I based the suits of armour on small, round MDF bases. The small bases allow easy placement all throughout the dungeon.

Below are a couple of examples of how I want to use these.

The small, recessed arches are a perfect fit for these armours, but because they have such a small footprint they can be placed just about anywhere. I hope these new pieces will add to the medieval atmosphere I am trying to create for my dungeon.

I will be painting these soon...

3D-printing tanks... Pt. IX: T18 Boarhound

I love printing unusual and less-used vehicles, and while Thingiverse is a true treasure-trove not everything I am looking for is available there...

One of the vehicles I have been looking for, is the T18 Boarhound armoured car...

I really love the design of this vehicle... 

I wanted to add this armoured car to my platoon of Staghounds or have it serve as a command vehicle in a British armoured car company... It's initial version was armed in the same way as the Staghound Mk. I and is't a nice miniature to add some variety.

As with the Staghound, this is a very large armoured car...

With a Sherman and a Staghound for scale...

Not only is it almost as big as a Sherman, it weighs just about the same too... This is one impressive armoured car!

I found the Boarhound on Shapeways and contacted the designer (Kampfflieger) to ask him if the stl-file was available for download. He quickly responded and directed me to his Patreon: Panzer Printer... Apart from the Boarhound there are a lot more cool designs, mostly of rare vehicles. The designs themselves are pretty good and there's a wide selection of models to choose from.

I had to re-scale the design from 1:72 to 1:100 and I have adapted the model to accommodate a set of small magnets. As an added bonus, the design itself is already hollow and open at the bottom; resulting in a rather economically effective print, despite it's size...

However, that proved to be something of a hindrance, too... The walls of the hull are so thin, the vehicle started warping, even after I had cured it. I think it's because the design was originally intended to be printed by Shapeways, and they use a different technique...

It might be hard to see, but the thin sides are flaring outwards...

Above you can see the first two printed hulls. At first I thought the warping was caused by the supports I left inside the hull (I didn't bother removing them as you wouldn't be able to see them anyway), but the second print suffered from the same problem, despite having all of the internal supports removed. I took extra care while cleaning the model, but it started warping even before I got the chance to fully cure it...

Screenshot made while in Tinkercad...

To counter the warping I thickened the walls of the rear half on the hull and I inserted blocks to connect the axles and strengthen the overall construction.

The model on the right features the strengthened frame...

Here you can see the adaptation I made to accommodate a small magnet.
I also added a few pieces of stowage...

The stowage is from Thingiverse. The pieces are designed by TigerAce1945 and can be found HERE... Seeing how easy it was to add some detail to the (already awesome) model, I regret not trying it any sooner...

While cutting up the file and re-scaling the model I forgot I had already re-scaled the turret... Hence, the first turret came out much too small, being scaled down twice instead of just once... For the second print I replaced the file and printed it in the right scale...

The difference in size is obvious...

The warping and the re-scaling error are all part of the learning experience... In the end the Boarhound turned out great and I will be printing a couple more!
I really, really, really like this model; it's a clean design and nicely detailed. You can expect to find many more of Panzer Printer's designs here in the future!