Just for fun

[Lluis of Minairons]

Well, not just for the fun of customizing and painting it, but with some evil idea behind too...
The fact is that I had in mind to prepare some sort of small campaign set in South China Sea waters, but I lacked eastern ship models; so I started seeking in the Net, until found the 3D models of a guy who had designed several outrigged boats of Indonesian and Polynesian style...



The original models were a bit crude, not accurate enough either; but I decided to give them a try and see what I could do with them, with the galley in these pictures as a first result. It is intended to represent a Chinese large galley from Ming or Qing periods (i.e Renaissance to Modern).



As a matter of fact, it would be better for anyone willing to build a Chinese fleet to use some Mediterranean galley models (like those made by Skytrex or Imperial-modellbau, for example), because historically the Chinese Empire got obtained their own galleys (Wugong Chuan) by reverse engineering Portuguese ones, after having suffered a heavy beating at the hands of these (https://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2015/04/wu-gong-chuan.html).

However, it was a matter to try and see what I could do with one such basic model, so I am happy with the result anyway.



More exotic samples soon:)

Lluís

[Colonel Kilgore]

I'd say that worked pretty well!

Lovely work, Lluis.

Simon

[Leslie BT]

Nice different boat, beautifully finished Lluis

[Lluis of Minairons]

And today here you have some of the main culprits of the 'traffic jam' my workbench suffered lately - a 'traffic jam' already commented in a previous post.

These are a collection of five Malay or Polynesian outriggers whose 3D designs I happened to find on Thingiverse. Despite they seemed not too rigorously accurate, I thought it would be fun to give them a try. If anyone curious about, here you have the link toward these: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4546307



Once 3D printed by a friend in their actual scale, I realized they were even more basic than expected (so I'd recommend for eventual trials to downsize them a bit, perhaps up to 75% of the pretended size; they will look certainly cooler if smaller). Anyway, I was unwilling to force my friend to reprint them, so I decided to push forward those models as they were.



I performed a few modifications on them, such as replacing their original masts and sails by some scratch made rigging, using polystyrene rods and cardboard, as well as their outrigging floats, that I wished to be more slender. Here you have the results on the smallest boats - that can reasonable pass as Malay paraw or Filipino garay outriggers.



Honestly I didn't exprime myself beyond that point, given the scarcity of fine detail there (no trace of bulwarks, excessive height from waterline to main deck, etc); so I tried to mask eventual deficiencies by paint job - by painting black all lower hulls to fool the eye, or visually simulating those missing bulwarks by paint too.



About the galley-like vessels, all overwiews I read stated that either Filipino lanong as Malay karakoa were outriggers too - but that guy's models lacked them, so I improvised some outrigging floats for them too (using... er... plastic cable tie pieces!!!).



These models are still compatible with PP ships range, because they are 5 and 6.5 cm long respectively; although I'd recommend to downsize them a bit for a better look, as said.



Well, not any pieces of art there, but they still look pretty decent on tabletop!

Lluís

[Colonel Kilgore]

That's a great job, Lluis - thank you for sharing your trials and tribulations with those 3D prints too!

Simon