I have finally completed my full set of Gamecraft buildings for my Afghanistan table. I had to do a lot of experimenting with techniques and materials before I found a solution I liked. I think the result looks good, but each building required a fair bit of messy work, so I'm glad I'm done. The stucco gel is not much fun to work with - it's really tacky, and the sand gets everywhere.
My process was as follows:
1. First coat of Liquitex Stucco textured acrylic gel - this doesn't have to be clean or even or nice, it's just there to provide a gritty surface for the following coat.
2. Clean out the corners, windows and doors of excess globs of paint.
3. Let it dry thoroughly.
4. Second coat of Liquitex, with a focus on applying enough to get all the corners a bit rounded. The walls themselves look better if the gel is applied a bit unevenly.
5. With a very wet brush, I smoothed out the walls and roofs. I don't try to get them perfectly flat, just smoothing down the parts that stick up, so it looks like a mud wall.
6. Clean out the corners and apertures again.
7. Let it dry thoroughly again.
8. Paint - I used cheap craft acrylics, watered down and with a bit of Pledge floor polish added. The stucco gel I used is white, and I only did one coat of paint, so the buildings came out very light.
9. Wash - I used a thin black / brown wash over the whole building, which I then blotted with crumpled up paper towel, which gave a slightly mottled look to the walls, while leaving the corners and recesses fairly dark.
With several different stages to do, I had a bit of an assembly line going with 3-5 buildings at each stage of the process.
The mosque was a special case, because it came with a dome. The dome was a coarse foam half-sphere, so I gave it several coats of plaster, smoothed with a wet finger, to give it an even enough surface for painting.
In-progress photos:
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2NVAfhKSKCGgeZcLSwdkECKghpq0HbsY9LmgiYmaPE6A7gISCcQWo5Hf3h67Gi6MgaizDdCVR5XFQbsYwyige76kopoqDUNVKzWRWuaRwpSbajjcoK7eGH_i8AXa5sh8iKndCAHWrZDBI/s400/_DSC0343.jpg) |
First coat applied. |
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXLFEBsqv6Kq34y6yjdooPguX4JBQxqRyRvoAEOOS1D5pGYslq91Wd5N6w7-eZozF-zSrYX4hNCSZSW-jv1S1nWJymZlvRBGOEHMkbRuEZgiGtDsjrj9b2jC0nqYu9jUS6weBhUroXfBkO/s400/_DSC0344.jpg) |
First coat applied. |
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4lj5CFvuUBc7wwmffI78UYjCKVteavZxTU9uOcXcfMaqhyK8PCitY3PLGeRuUnT12ium3wsZFbHr62CSnp8YBGUl96HW-A8_LM6_coshVBYxIpRS6VrvKVTV43FmdjKznnS83roANM21u/s400/_DSC0346.jpg) |
Second coat applied. |
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZnp06vxx4ITk9lXbdcv7h99FEaQC_TYwEwB4qjQ5Fwq_nGJweZ-l09lvQ38ng9J6yGtGlguKuygpfQlTtv4lNLeObUK3N3WRoHF3-S3MM3H1dF-jXo8XykgI5bQneu5EOVkZshxSb5-iJ/s400/_DSC0347.jpg) |
Second coat after smoothing. |
For photos of the completed, painted buildings, see my
next post!