"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition" - Rudyard Kipling
Season 10, Episode 7
One of the genuine pleasures of taking part in Forgotten Heroes has been reconnecting with old friends, discovering new projects and being reminded exactly why this particularly cosy corner of the blogosphere is so special. To Jez and Roger, whose continued enthusiasm keeps this splendid enterprise alive year after year, I owe a considerable debt of thanks. Without their efforts I rather suspect Captain Caveman would still be little more than an optimistic peanut sitting on a supermarket shelf.
Yet there remained one final task. Captain Caveman himself had yet to make his formal appearance and no self-respecting prehistoric superhero can simply be left standing alone upon a gaming table; he requires a home and naturally that home sits atop the roof of a van. The Teen Angels, as readers of a certain age will doubtless remember, travelled in a somewhat distinctive vehicle which served much the same purpose as the Mystery Machine, Mystery Incorporated's trusty van. This presented an obvious opportunity, namely the construction of Cavey's rooftop cave. What could possibly go wrong?
Quite a lot, as it happens. After a little searching I discovered a suitable STL file on the Crooked Dice website which appeared promising enough. At £6 it seemed worth the risk and after all, what is Forgotten Heroes if not an opportunity to make questionable purchasing decisions? Or is that just me? Unfortunately the model appeared rather more suited to resin printing than my own somewhat agricultural FDM printer and the initial attempts were, to be charitable, deeply disappointing.
At this point I once again sought the wisdom of the estimable Simon Moore, who very kindly pointed out the entirely obvious solution, "turn it upside down." One occasionally encounters moments in life when another person says something so self-evident that one immediately wonders why one had not thought of it oneself. This was one such occasion and of course, the next print proved vastly more successful.
Knowing that the roof would ultimately disappear beneath Cavey's cave, I was not overly concerned by minor imperfections and so attention turned towards constructing the rocky summit itself. A sheet of plasticard provided the foundation and a quantity of leftover epoxy sculpt was spread across the surface and encouraged into something vaguely resembling the cave seen in the original cartoons. Rocks were added, texture appeared and optimism returned.
The cave itself proved an absolute joy to paint and for a brief and entirely unfamiliar period everything proceeded exactly as planned. This naturally made me suspicious. There remained, however, one final detail. No cave upon the roof of a van can reasonably be accessed by conventional means and so a ladder was required. Two coffee stirrers, split and sanded, provided the uprights whilst small plastic bones were lashed into place with wire and secured with superglue. It is, I freely admit, completely ridiculous, which is probably why it has become my favourite detail.
As I write this final dispatch the model is still not entirely as completed as far as I would have liked. There remain details to finish, logos to paint and the cave to permanently fix to the wagon. Yet perhaps there is something rather fitting about that. Forgotten Heroes has never really been about finishing. It has been about beginning. About rediscovering forgotten characters, rediscovering old enthusiasms and, in my particular case, rediscovering the pleasure of writing and sharing my experiences with this most wholesome of hobbies with friends.
Captain CAAAAAAAAAVEMAAAAAAAN!
Season 10, Episode 6
Whilst rummaging through the bits box in search of components for Captain Caveman, I previously neglected to mention that I had made an unexpected discovery. Nestled within the yellowed remains of another long forgotten Kinder Egg shell lurked a tiny, plastic elephant. Now most sensible hobbyists would have smiled fondly, returned it to the box and carried on with the task at hand; I am evidently not most sensible hobbyists. At the time, the discovery was noted and reluctantly set aside. Captain Caveman still required vast quantities of hair and there seemed little point introducing further complications into a project already involving peanuts, cake decorating equipment and minor acts of sculptural vandalism. The elephant, however, remained. Waiting. Patiently. Like some diminutive, plastic, embryonic inception.
One of the favourite, recurring motifs of the original Captain Caveman cartoons was the inclusion of curious critters that Cavey would produce from the end of his club or indeed from the mass of hair covering his body. These often unwilling contributors would lend their unique skills to furthering the plot, and I would chortle at the cameos not truly appreciating at the time that everything could be made better with dinosaurs. Now as Flaming June is all but extinguished, I wondered if I could include such frivolity in my Forgotten Heroes project? Before I knew quite what was happening, one hundred and twenty ‘dainty’ dinosaurs were en route to Awdry Towers. I would love to report that this decision was the result of careful planning and considered reflection. It was not. It was, however, available with free postage and as I write this dispatch, the true scale of this acquisition remains unknown to the Saintly Mrs. Awdry.
My current strategy is based entirely upon concealment and the hope that brightly coloured dinosaurs might somehow, some day be mistaken for a sensible purchase. I selected five likely candidates to become Cavey’s familiars and stashed the other one hundred and fifteen!
Based and undercoated these were immense fun to paint. I took some initial inspiration from the cartoon itself but in the end plumbed the depths of my paint store to retrieve the most lurid and underused collars I possessed.
Meanwhile the memory of the small, plastic elephant cracked, "Life... finds a way." One of the stalwart gags of Hannah-Barbera prehistoric world is the use of small wooly mammoths pressed into surface of their world. For example a mammoth sink makes an appearance in the Flintstones episode, ‘Bedrock Rodeo Round Up’ and a full blown mammoth shower turns up in ‘The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones’. Could my little plastic elephant be used for such a purpose? In the butchered words of Professor Malcolm,
I became so preoccupied with whether or not I could, that I didn't stop to think if I should.
Success criteria would include a more cartoon like pose, longer tusks, more hair and the small matter of creating the illusion that the trunk was emitting water. I am starting to worry that this was no longer modelling, but more like experimental palaeontology!
The fur covered a multitude of sins and anatomic anomalies although there was a call to do some running repairs to sliced off toes, the elephant’s not mine you understand. The tusks were my next consideration and having removed its original appendages in the manner befitting a deranged, plastic poacher I attached superfine Milliput ones that had previous cured. A little bit of sanding and some green stuff applied to conceal the cracks and the build was almost complete - just the small matter of the cascading water feature.
Using a pin vice with a drill bit barely visible to my ageing eyes I had created a couple holes atop the trunk. And so dear reader on to the true folly of this plan, a return to the UV resin! What followed looked less like miniature modelling and more like an experiment conducted by a particularly eccentric Fellow of the Royal Society. With the UV torch suspended above the desk, strands of twisted wire were slowly coated with resin and cured layer by layer until something resembling a fountain began to emerge.
Season 10, Episode 5
Following the successful formula of the previous build, a second miniature was constructed and painted in suitably chilly shades of blue and placed within a makeshift mould constructed from scraps of plasticard and secured with a hot glue gun. Possessed of UV resin and a wholly unjustified degree of confidence, I began pouring the first layers.
The plan was simple, the execution, less so. The resin was carefully tinted and layered as intended until a steady stream of bubbles began emerging from beneath Cavey's arm. At first I was puzzled. Then enlightenment dawned. The peanut was hollow! The resin was entering the shell and the trapped air was escaping. I am not ashamed to admit that this revelation arrived several minutes later than it probably should have. Still, by this point, I was committed to the process and elected to persevere. A few bubbles could surely be explained away as imperfections within ancient glacial ice? Unfortunately, the resin had not yet finished teaching me valuable life lessons.
Despite knowing perfectly well that these procedures should not be rushed, I removed the shuttering too early and promptly released partially cured resin across the workbench with consequences that can best be described as educational. Following a brief period of reflection, several cups of Earl Grey and a stern conversation with myself regarding the virtues of patience, the resin was left alone to cure properly.
The resulting block required some considerable tidying up and at this point I encountered another of life’s great ponderables, how did all those impossibly talented social media resin wizards manage to restore crystal clarity after sanding? The answer, it transpired, was more resin. A final coating restored the transparency beautifully and although some bubbles remained visible, these were ultimately disguised with snow effects around the top and base where they now appear entirely intentional; sweet serendipity shines again.
More recently someone, sadly only known to me as Anonymous, left a comment on my last blog post, Crocodiles in the Jungle (How is this over a year ago?!) simply saying,
“Please come back Michael! You have been away for far too long.”
I do miss the interaction with other hobbyists that came with the inception of this most humble of weblogs and I am truly fortunate that some have sought me out across other platforms or quietly sent an email to check on my whereabouts. This is always a joyous moment and I need to do more to ‘pass it forward’ as it were to others that I have fallen out of touch with, but returning to this particular comment and I have to say that I was really rather touched by it and resolved myself to post something before the end of the year.
The world’s over indulgence with all things Halloween was the perfect incentive for this post. What better day to post a spooky spectacle and showcase another of my recent distractions, 3D Printing. This rather splendid mausoleum was a free sample from the incredibly talented Terrabloks, whose projects I have backed on more than one occasion and can gladly testify to the quality of their designs. For those who take an interest in the technical side of this process, it was printed on my Bambu Lab A1 with a layer height of 0.1 and an infill density of 5%. The final print has a working door and the roof can be lifted off to access the interior.
The details are superb and it was fabulous fun to paint, mostly dry brushed and washed. I based it on a ‘Warbases’ MDF terrain base and added a few other pieces for added atmosphere. The ghostly resident is a ‘Crooked Dice’ sculpt and I have had far too much fun setting up the photographs using Jon Hodgson’s backdrop books, available through ‘Handiwork Games’, to bring everything together.
So thank Anonymous for gently nudging me into making this post. Sadly, I am not sure it will herald a full return to this cosy corner of the blogosphere, but I am not quite ready to give up on '28mm Victorian Warfare' so there is every possibility that I might find myself lurking around all those splendid weblogs that I do so enjoy.
