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ASTEROIDS
Creating planets and moons
for Battlefleet Gothic has to be one of the easiest pieces of terrain to make from
scratch. Planets can be made from table tennis balls, foam balls or even the Grandparents
priceless antique Christmas Baubles (Ok, not really the last one perhaps). The
planets on the right were actually made from small polystyrene spheres which are available
in a large number of craft and hobby stores, plus they cost pennies to buy so are great
value for money.
Before you start painting them you will have to
seal them as the spray undercoat will melt the polystyrene and leave you with a rather
sticky puddle. You can use a watered down PVA glue for this as it dries to leave a nice
clear sealed surface which you can then spray straight onto.
Once you have undercoated the globes (textured
paint is also a good undercoat if you want some texture to your planets), you can then
paint straight onto them. The trick here is not to worry about being too neat. Starting
with the base colour simply brush it on with coarse strokes until the entire globe is
covered. Although you can paint lighter colours onto this with a brush a good technique I
found was to use a sponge to 'dab' patches of colour on. The sponge square used in the
blister packing is perfect for this. Try not to get even patches of colour on with the
sponge, merely dab away at it to create areas of light and dark. The planets can then be
finished with more defined details like clouds or darker areas of continents. Again these
are sponged on, this time using the edges to create more definition.
If you are feeling more creative try making planets
with striation lines (look at pictures of Jupiter to see what I mean). These can be made
by watering your paint down so it is almost translucent and holding the planet by its
stemmed base, slowly rotate the globe whilst holding the brush in the same place. This way
concentric circles can be made which join back up and create a multi-coloured layered
effect.
Rings can also be made up using a circle of clear
plastic which can be painted and stuck over the globe. At a later date I will demonstrate
how to make a heavily scarred 'exterminatus' world, but I think that is enough
terraforming for one day.
Happy colonisation
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