Mentioned in Dispatches: Terrain Building: Roads

Roads must be one of the simpler terrain projects, I'm not quite sure why I haven't made any before. I suppose they are not very exciting, but when mixed in with other scenery they help make sense of a battle field, linking disparate elements.

I decided on 2" as suitable width, not so much a main road, but single track path that could be winding through anywhere in Middle-Earth, or the Old World, or indeed 1930's New England (that's another virtue of roads, one of the most versatile items of scenery you will ever build).

I used mounting card, cheap, easy to cut and surprisingly sturdy. I got a big (A2?) sheet from WHSmiths for a few quid (other brands are available).

Straight sections are easy, I pencilled in two lines 2" apart, with some room either side. Then I used pen to mark the end of each road section, 6" apart, as can be seen above.

I then used the pen to mark on the long edges, wiggly lines which for reasons best known to myself at the time I didn't photograph.

Next up: the bend sections. I drew more pencil lines on the card, this time 1 27/32" apart.

Now the end lines, again in pen. These are drawn at 22.5 degrees and should measure 2" (it's almost as if i planned it...)

Then the long edges, again wiggly, this time I did take a photo. The bends are labelled 'B' (the straight sections were 'A')

I drew several other different sections, along the same basic lines.

'C' is a three way fork, basically a straight section with two spurs coming off.

'D' has a 22.5 degree end and a 45 degree end.

'E' is like 'C' but with only one spur.

'F' is the Devil's favourite, a cross roads.

'G' is a T-Junction.

I appear to have two 'E's, oh well, this one is 45 degrees at each end.

The final board looked a little like this (above). If I was clever I could have put the sections closer together, there is no reason why sections of the same type could not have been touching and thus saved cardboard, but well... I'm obviously not clever.

After all the sections were cut out I used polyfiller to but texture down either side, to form the road banks.

Then I textured the sections with sand, courser on the edges, finer down the middle.

They were painted, dark brown for the road, green for the banks.

I dry brushed the road section (not the green) with a mixture of brown and yellow paint...

...then again with added white.

I glued some grass clumps and flowers onto a few of the sections. The clumps were bought, the flowers were stripped off some cherry blossom trees bought but then turned out to be two small for purpose.