Building a 28mm chimney

A minimum effort project for a lazy evening.

Winter approaches and the shadow of the holiday season looms over us. This year we wanted to run an extra festive Frostgrave scenario during the Christmas period. But instead of working on the scenario, I chose to build some tabletop terrain, a chimney.
The model I had in mind should be able to be used as a standalone element in the ruins of frosty Felstad, aswell as a chimney for my dungeon tile set.

1. Tools and material used:

  • Metal ruler for measuring and cutting
  • Pencil for adding details
  • Cutter and exacto-knife for… err… cutting
  • Clump of aluminum foil to add structure to the stonework
  • Styrofoam obviously πŸ™‚

2. Base structure

In a first step, I cut the different parts to size, using several bits of leftover Styrofoam. I eyeballed most of the measures, because I had no clear dimensions in mind. I paid attention to cute a large piece for the base and sufficiently large piece for the top, that would create a small overlap.
The hole in the chimney was cut with that fancy new exacto-knife blade I bought recently.

I added some details the usual way, after I cut all the pieces to size. The brickwork was added by stenciling it with a sharp pencil. The stone structure was applied by using a clump of aluminum foil.
Instead of my usual go-to glue, I tried some all purpose glue that I bought at the local penny store. It worked surprisingly well. Proof, that you don’t need to buy expensive materials πŸ˜‰

3. additional detail

Before I applied the colour, I added some more details. I cut some leftover pieces of balsa to size and glued them into the chimney. I tried to make them look like heap of firewood, but I am not too satisfied with the result.
Some areas of the chimney looked to bare to me. Therefore I used the pencil and added some more details into the structure.

4. Paintjob

In order for the terrain piece to blend with my other tabletop terrain, I painted the chimney in the usual fashion.

chimney undercoat
Modge pogde as foundation
dark greybase coat

As per usual, the entire structure gets a sturdy coat of modge podge mixed with black paint (remember the free shadows πŸ˜‰ )
At this point I added some fine stones next to the firewood and hoped it would look like ashes.
Next I applied a base coat of dark grey. Make sure not to cover the inner parts too thoroughly and ruin your shadow/sooth effect.

When coloring brickwork, some crafter I follow colored a few bricks in different shades of brown. Thisis supposed to add some nuances to the brickwork. I never really dared to try that, because I feared it would ruin my paint job. Then again, one needs to remember the words of the immortal Cole Porter : Experiment πŸ™‚ So, I coloured some bricks brown and sienna.
Since I had already some brown colour prepared, I used it to paint the firewood. I made sure not to cover pieces of wood entirely, but only the upper parts. That way, so I hoped, it would seem as if they were burned from beneath.
I applied an over-brush with grey and (yet again) paid attention not to colour too much of the inner areas. Finally, I dry brushed the outer brickwork with a mix of dark grey and white. During both steps, I paid extra attention not to brush vertically or horizontally, but in a diagonal motion. I wanted to avoid getting too much paint into the recess of the brickwork.

terrain build chimney final product
Helga and Olaf are evidently very happy with their new interior heating.

VOILA… job done.
With the exception of the time the glue needed to dry, the entire project took me the better part of an evening.

2 comments

  1. This looks awesome! Well done.
    Here some additional input: A pothook for a chicken broth (or witchβ€˜s poison) would have completed your project.

    1. Hey, thank you for your kind comment.
      I had not thought of a pothook.
      During my next working session, I will add one and definitively include it in future builds ( I need 5 more chimneys ;_; ). I will edit the post accordingly and include the final result.

      Thank you for your input and helping me improve πŸ™‚
      D.

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