Bricks?????

Hudson & Allen make some, bu they're some kind a soft material. you could get some walls from the model railroad department of your hobby store, or cast them from plaster from one of the molds there.

other companies make individual bricks for dios. Custom dioramics, Verlinden, 135 Construction Battalion. This place has got some great stuff:
http://www.hometown-hobbies.com/home_page

this place is really good too:
http://www.discountmodels.com/

some of the other members should be by soon also, and they'll help u out some more. but in the interim, hope I assisted a little.

-Matt

Thanks gringe88, this is definately the place for info, and give it a couple of days I'm sure there will be a BUCKET of stuff for me to look for.

You can also make bricks out of clay, they wont be as even or symmetrical though. They make a rock colored clay, but I would paint it.

A way more expensive way would be to use plastruct sheets. They make texture styrene sheets with rocks and bricks, etc.

And one last way, I dont think its the same as your idea, to build a main frame i guess thats the word, maybe out of styrofoam or cardboard. then cover small parts with plaster. Then you can carve in bricks and stones.

Good Luck!

Hirst Arts makes molds for casting your own blocks. I haven't tried them, but I've seen the finished product. Really nice stuff.

www.hirstarts.com

HTH,
Dan

Hey thats an awesome site. Some buddies and I are getting a D&D game going, more adult oriented in nature and I wanted to build the sets.

A castle? Definitely an interesting idea.
I am going to be constructing a large dio fairly soon, and one of the structures calls for a lot of bricks, so I'm in the same boat you are, and I'm not quite certain which way to procede. I think that getting a realistic result by using individual bricks is going to be fairly difficult. What I am leaning towards right now is actually pouring large sections of plaster, then carving the brick texture and outline into them. It'll be a few months before I actually get around to this, so if you start yours, whichever technique you chose to go with, I'd be very interested in how it turns out.

Have a look in the kids section of a big department store. In London I bought a childs building set to make model cottages or even mosaics. You get a set of rubber moulds with different shapes,a couple of bags of plaster and mixing pots etc. Just add a color to the plaster mix and away you go. A whole city streets worth of rubble and bricks for your diorama.

good call tweey1I have been pondering this for a few weeks . Im going to try to make a mold using some brick wall 1:35 I have and then cast it using resin. ohhhh. more fun

Sean,

Alot will depend on what type of medieval castle you are building. All medieval castles are not the same. Some use existing stone, others use quareyd stone. Stonemasonry can be large rectangular blocks others can look like fieldstone stacked interspaced with larger blocks like Samur in france. Middle eastern architectural styles were dictated by geography and material availibility. Krak de Chevalier in Syria is very different from the Edwardian (Edward Primus) D shaped towers in Wales al la Caernaveron (sp?) . Cadbury fort was all made from timber. With very low stone foundations. Norman towers differ from saxon or celtic hill forts differ from crenalated mansions or keeps differ from the very modern looking Brugundian or late 15thc. french castles that have a stucco or plaster over them and are white washed. Like you can find in the Tres Rich Hours of the Duke D'Berry

Some have thick mortar others have almost no mortar. Again, geographical differences are as varied as building styles dictated by technology changes in time.

A high density foam like those used in archetectural sculpture or surfboard work pretty well. A wall compound that you can carve or scribe would work fairly well or you can "build" a castle wall from wood or foam blocks cut to size and shape and any texturing can be done with acrylic medium, paint etc.

Thanks for the Hirst Arts link, interesting stuff. Something I have been looking for.
Unfortunately I then followed another link...
and then another...
and then another...
ad infinitum.
And stayed up waaaaaaaaaaaay past my bedtime!
Oh well, at least I ended up learning how to make a 4 in 1 mail hauberk which is another thing I want to do.

Thanks for the sites guys, very useful

renarts, big thanks for your info, I don't think she had even thought of that part of the equation.
She had a read of your post, then took over the puter to start surfing for more info.

Had too cook my own dinner!!!!

Sorry tweety, I owe you a dinner. Glad the info helped. (sorry if it threw a monkey wrench into the works)

Claymore,

This is a pic of some of the chain I've made. The one on the right is butted mail that is part of a hauberk I made. The section on the left is riveted chain for a camail to fit on my helmet. It will replace the old butted mail camail when I finish cleaning up the bronze vervelles I cast to mount it to the lower rim of the helmet.
Both are 4 on 1 rings.



Think of the stuff on the left as DML indy tracks and the stuff on the right as section tracks.....

When you get ready to start your hauberk let me know and I might be able to help you get started.

Mike

hi tweety why don't u use for making your bricks : BRIXMIX from SES creative it is brickpowder you mix with water and pour in in a mold and it hardens in open air ( no oven needed) the sell starter packs for making buildings and castels with the molds,wood,gleu etc. hope this will help you out