Second Rough Build of the Iron Mother

Hi all,

I’m back again with another update. Last week, I spent most of my free time building the second version of the Iron Mother, which you can see below:

There she is! I know there are lots of white rims around the edges of the card, and there’s plenty of shine on the model, which the camera has somehow managed to pick up, but this is only a test model. On the actual finished model, I plan on doing a proper job by colouring the rims and using photo matt card to print her out.

Here’s a nice close-up of her lovely face, she’s quite the looker eh. Her face is just too small, and for some reason one of her ears is the wrong way round. Her crown could also be made a little bigger, and I’m thinking of adding more layers to hide the unprinted side.

I made the model pieces quite flexible and adaptable so that the Iron Mother can be put into different poses, which works pretty well. However, I will need to make the joins dark green to help hide the gaps between the different pieces.

The black lines between the metal and wood represent bitumen, which our ancestors used for waterproofing. The Orcs have used it on their Iron Mother’s cart for the same reason.

‘Crumpling’ is a new technique I’ve found, which I’m sure other, better model makers use all the time, but I’ve only just discovered for myself. You can see it used on the ends of the tree logs that the Orcs use to push their Iron Mother around, and I think it works pretty well.

Here’s a shot where I’ve also used crumpled up card on the bucket containing the blue substance. This is where the Iron Mother keeps her Tears—the solid magic she eats to give herself the ability to cast spells.

It’s not a great shot of them, but you can also see her Bobs, her children who live in the cart’s tanks until they get too big and she throws them out. Anyway, I plan on improving this by raising the water level in her tank by at least 5mm. As you can see, this should allow you to see into her cart more easily and show off all the extra detail inside.

Looking at the Bobs now, I think they also need a darker outer line so that they can be more easily differentiated from the rest of the model.

In this shot, you can see the Iron Mother’s feeding pole and the set of shelves where she keeps all her precious things, such as magic items, books, scrolls and jewellery—all, no doubt, ill-gotten gains.

Here’s the back of the model. Ultimately, Orcs are scavengers, and here we can see that the Iron Mother has used two massive doors, perhaps taken from a city she sacked, as the back of her seat.

The annoying white rim that goes all the way around the model’s tank is something I’m hoping to fix by simply folding the card instead of scoring it. Fingers crossed, eh?

Lastly, here’s the front of the model, where you can see her giant iron mask, which protects her against arrows and even ballistic missiles from bolt throwers.

This is still just the base model. There are plenty of modifications, upgrades and customisable parts yet to be made so that model makers can really make their Iron Mother their own.

There are also quite a few fixes still to do. For instance, her face is too small, and the water level in her tank needs to be raised by at least 5mm, as you can see.

Overall, though, I’m happy with the model’s second build. There’s still plenty to be getting on with, so that’s it from me for now.

PnP Fantasy

Second Rough Build of the Iron Mother

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