Someone posted to my Ork Battlewagon blog here (linky) on CMON asking if I was going to tell my secret to making the battle damage shown in the photos. Not really a "secret" but I looked around the articles section and didn't find one so I've decided to make it my my first article. How To Do Battle Damage.

I'll show how I do three most common types of damage: Cut Metal, Bullet Damage and Explosive Damage. Each uses slightly different tools and a way of thinking about how the damage got there. This tutorial will not show you how to paint this damage, only how to inflict it on the plastic itself. These technique should work as well on metals as well.

CUTTING/CONSTRUCTION DAMAGE.

This is most commonly seen on the edges of metal plates that have been hacked or torched off other metal things and bolted/welded/riveted on ork vehicles in a poor assemblage of armor plating, like this...

The physical technique for this is pretty easy, it's really an exaggerated form of adzing, or scraping. The trick is to really choke up on the Xacto and use your thumb to control the blade (like in the first photo). This is the probably the most important part to NOT cutting off your thumb. Please also note that in some (most) photos you'll only see one hand. Technical difficulty with my other camera meant that I didn't have the timer option when I shot these. Always hold the piece you are working on with BOTH hands. Controlling the piece and the knife you are using are paramount to saving yourself from injury. Now that the "I'm not responsible for clumsy cutters" disclaimer is over, 'ere We Go!

Place the edge of the knife at a steep angle against the edge you want to chew up. Press your thumb against the opposite edge, drawing with your your knuckles, bringing the knife down into the plastic. Once the blade is down in the plastic a little bit, give your wrist a little flick and pull the knife up out of the plastic at a different angle, almost straight up from the piece. This should give you somewhat of a satisfactory "click" as you pull out a little bit.

As with most things in this hobby, pics can only show about half of what's intended so I made a little video to show you what I'm trying to describe. If you have the sound on you'll hear the "clicking" sound I mentioned.


Video 1 320x240 - :58 3.8MB

TRY THIS IF VIDEO DOESN"T WORK - MPG VERSION

Now that you've seen the technique, here's what's going on in my mind as I'm pulling the blade against the edges. I start with a few long and shallow cuts, then change the angle to around 45 degrees make a more cuts, change the angle again to nearly parallel to the edge and make many small cuts, dragging many small knicks out of the edge.


These are roughly the angles.

Now here's the tricky part. This is paraphrasing from what I remember reading somewhere online, "be random, but not too random". Something like that. Go ahead and vary the angle, length of cut and depth of cut. There's no fast and hard rule about what happens when. You can start using the little cuts first, or the long ones. The shallow angles don't have to be long, they can be short too. Be sure to randomize the cuts though - by that I mean don't do an edge that's all long cuts or all medium angles or all deep cuts. Switch it up a bit. Below is and example of an edge that exhibits all three traits.

See how it looks cool and banged up? There's at least three layers of different angled cuts going on in a very random pattern, or "non-pattern" if you will, that makes this look like it's been hacked at and banged up pretty good. You can vary the concept under how the piece of metal got this way, kinda like it's story. A recently hack-sawed off piece would consist of many small, steep angle cuts made at various angles to the edge like the photo below. This would leave a fresher, flat area closer to the edge for paint and such. The paint hasn't had the time to flake off near the edges.

An older piece that's been around longer should have more dings, larger dents and basically more destruction to the edges, much like the piece in the original example at the top. This one's probably been attached, banged off, then bolted on again to another vehicle quite a few times in it's life. Much like these plates making up the top deck on my battlewagon.

Notice the differing thicknesses of plate that make up the decking. Thinner pieces usually only need one or two angles to achieve the battered look. it's also harder to include more angles as there just isn't the physical thickness to cut into.

Next: Bullet Holes