HMS Terpsichor Refit

[Jack Tar]

Hey Everyone,
Go easy on me, I have not painted a mini in at least a decade if not more. After purchasing SOG the HMS Terpsichor has screamed paint me with the boring colors that came on it. Here is my first crack at it, let me know what you think. I don't know how historically accurate it is for this class of ship, but I have always liked the look of Royal Navy ships with yellow gun decks, so here it is. At some point I'd like to rig it (no idea where to start with this) and get some of the photoetch ratlines I have seen on some of the posts here. But that will be for another time. If I ever get around to that I'll post updated images.
If anyone has any suggestions on how I can improve it (other than rigging it and ratlines) or any feedback at all I'd love to hear it.

Thanks!

[7eat51]

She looks great, Marc.

Tell us how you removed your masts. Nice wash on the sails.

As for rigging, see this post toward the very end; Vol posted Rory's guide on his blog: http://sailsofglory.org/showthread.p...ng-and-rigging

Stop by the Welcome Aboard forum and give yourself a proper introduction (though such a posting as this is an awesome one); folks will be glad to meet you: http://sailsofglory.org/forumdisplay...Welcome-Aboard

[The Royal Hajj]

Marc, she does look really good mate! Black yards and washed sails alone add so much to these little ships, the additional paint work you did just makes it stand out even more as a ship-shape ship.

For another (and very easy way) to rig the ship, you can see my thread on the paint brush bristle method.

[Jack Tar]

Thanks Eric!

Well the mast removal was kind of an accident (at first). Through careless handling I snapped or work hardened the foremast on accident. At that point the die had been cast and I used some precision snips to clip the other two off. Then I used some fine grit sand paper (220, and a quick brush with 320) to level everything out again. I used a dremel and a very fine bit, I'd guess it was in the range of .5 mm - .75 mm (you can see the size of the hole on the tongue depressor in the second image) to put a centered hole in each side of the snipped masts. I then used a very fine brass rod to join the masts back onto the main body. Once the brass rods were in the mast it was also nice to put them onto the tongue depressor for paining/drying/etc. I'd guess the brass rod was somewhere in the range of the drill bit in diameter, it was a nice snug fit. I'd have to go back and measure the material with some calipers to be 100% certain. But again, when you are talking about a tolerance of .25 mm it is negligible in my opinion.

As for the wash I am sure I am about to make some of you avid model maker/painters cringe when I talk about what I did. So as stated above it has been a minimum of 10 year since I painted a mini so needless to say some of my old knowledge/skills/techniques are rusty or gone. I attempted wetting the sails and letting capillary action do the work the first few times and I wasn't getting a result I was happy with. Even after everything dried and I went back in to try and clean up some visible edges from the paint water solution it really just looked like trash. So I had a bottle of very diluted simple green nearby that I used to get the wash off and start over. Well one of the times I didn't get all the cleaner off and what do you know....the wash went where I wanted it and dried with a nice look also. I have absolutely no idea how this will hold up or if it will degrade over time, but so far there has been no change. I am sure if I start having more time to redo some other mini's I'll actually look into some tried and true methods of washing, but I was kind of impatient in getting this refit done. I know future floor polish is one method, but I didn't feel like running to the store. I figured worst case scenario I started with a small ship and it would be relatively inexpensive to replace if I royally botched it, so there you have it.

I was actually throwing a post on the Welcome Aboard forum when you posted your reply.

[Jack Tar]

Thanks Keith!
I have actually looked at that post a while back. I really like the idea of the paint brush bristles they have a nice thin line and don't look crazy out of scale like a thread or sorts. I'll have to do more research on my end since I really don't like when things look way out of scale, heavy ratlines on a small ship.....just no good (personal preference of course....everyone is different).

[7eat51]

Thanks, Marc. Great story how some of this came about.

If you do some rigging, please continue showing your work. It's both educational and inspiring.

[Jack Tar]

Thanks! I am not painting or model making wizard by any means. But I have some coworkers that are, so I can tap their shoulder when I need some tips...or if anyone has some questions I could possibly mention them. If I ever get any new/great/fascinating knowledge I'll throw it on here and spread the wealth.

[Jack Tar]

On a side note....

Has anyone discovered a great way to solidly seat the mini's in the ship base? I am totally not OCD but really don't like when the ship is all wobbly and not squared up on the base.

So far all I have done is wrap a little bit of the sticky side of a post-it around the mini post. It has not worked as well as I'd like and I'd prefer to not glue the mini into the base. Thanks for any tips!

[Nightmoss]

Marc, your ship looks great and the repaint looks very nice. If this is the HMS Terpsichore it's painted differently than the stock one I received in the Starter Set? Was it blue like this out of the box? Just a curiosity on my part but see here for the the original:

http://www.aresgames.eu/games/sails-...ry-starter-set

As for rigging you've already received some excellent feedback on how to proceed next. Cheers!

[Nightmoss]

On a side note....

Has anyone discovered a great way to solidly seat the mini's in the ship base? I am totally not OCD but really don't like when the ship is all wobbly and not squared up on the base.

So far all I have done is wrap a little bit of the sticky side of a post-it around the mini post. It has not worked as well as I'd like and I'd prefer to not glue the mini into the base. Thanks for any tips!

I use magnets and you can read through this thread if you're feeling so inclined. Others buy enough ships so they can permanently glue the ships to their bases? There may even be other tips here if you use the 'search' box to track them down? Enjoy!

http://sailsofglory.org/showthread.p...hlight=magnets

[Jack Tar]

Magnets! Fantastic idea, I don't know why I didn't think of it. I will implement that sometime in the near future.

The ship I received in the starter set is exactly the same as the link you put on your post. In the very first picture I had already done a little work on the mizenmast and sails, but the hull was untouched. The blue color you are referring to is the light I was using bouncing off the hull, it was a in actuality dark blackish/brown color.

[Nightmoss]

Magnets! Fantastic idea, I don't know why I didn't think of it. I will implement that sometime in the near future.

The ship I received in the starter set is exactly the same as the link you put on your post. In the very first picture I had already done a little work on the mizenmast and sails, but the hull was untouched. The blue color you are referring to is the light I was using bouncing off the hull, it was a in actuality dark blackish/brown color.

Thanks for answering my question. I've learned through much trial and error that lighting can make a huge difference in how these ships appear on screen.

[Jack Tar]

very true.

[Ducky]

Nice work Marc ! Let us see more ;)