Can I play with magnets?

Hey guys, long time since my last post (as usual), but thought I'd post a little tutorial on how I magnetised my Customeeple silhouette markers.  It makes them a lot easier to transport as they go flat for storage.

First up, I'm very impressed with the Customeeple acrylic templates, they are good quality for the cost, and being able to get my main Infinity faction's (Bakunin) logo on there really sets it apart from some of the other templates available.  The silhouettes are no different, you get 3 templates in total, an S1/2, S4/7 and S3/5/6, plus a 25, 40 and 55mm base.  One thing that I was a little disappointing was that the acrylic is just a rectangle, so you have to glue it directly (and flush and centered) to the base.  I think they could be improved by adding a tab so that you can slot them in to the bases without requiring glue, but overall I was thoroughly impressed.  Anyway, on to the tutorial!

A (finished) silhouette template.

To magnetise your templates, you will need a bunch of 5mm diameter magnets, plus some 2mm diameter magnets.  First, you will need to find the center and diameter of the base:

Marking the diameter

The easiest way to do this is to draw 2 parallel lines anywhere on the base, then draw a 3rd line between the center point of those two lines.  The center of that 3rd line is the center of the base, and a line drawn from that point to the edges is the diameter.

Next, drill two holes 2mm in diameter at the edges of the base, both on the diameter line (being careful not to cut into the sides of the base.

Drilling holes on the diameter

Once you have drilled two holes, and cleaned them up, attach two of the 2mm diameter magnets to the bottom of the acrylic piece, being careful to ensure that when the acrylic is placed on top of the base, the magnets fit snugly into the holes and the acrylic piece sits flush with the base.

Magnets attached

Finally, attach 2 of the 5mm diameter magnets underneath the base, covering the hole you drilled earlier, being VERY CAREFUL  to ensure the polarities of these magnets matches up to those you attached to the acrylic piece, you may need to carve some of the plastic out of the underside, depending on where you drilled your holes.

 The 5mm magnets in place

And that's it! when you fit the magnets on the acrylic piece, they should sit flush in the hole and the magnets should hold it upright and in place.  They are pretty sturdy, though your mileage may vary depending on the magnets you use (I used neodymium ones)and I've yet to have one topple over of it's own volition.  Then once your done playing, just take the acrylic piece off the base and pop them back in your bag, flat as a pancake!

It's just a little inverted, it's still good!

So there you have it, magnetised silhouette templates.  It was really simple to do and in my opinion makes them much easier to transport.  Hopefully you may find this tutorial useful when you come to make your own.  Thanks for reading and check back soon(ish) for more nerdly goings on in the world of Leigen_Zero!

Nothing says I love you, like a Humboldt Squid

Hey everybody, thanks for checking back on Clawing at the Walls!

So last week's post is a day late in the posting, no excuses, I'm just crap at keeping to schedules, but what the hey..

So, there have been some hobby updates, in the 2 hours-ish I had for hobby time last week, I did manage to put brush to pewter and made a start on my Sin-Eater Observant:

Early Stages

I'm just blocking in the colours at the moment, but I feel that if I document any progress, regardless of how small, it just might keep me going on this whole blog thing.  I guess it's the whole momentum thing, a tiny snowball can quickly become an avalanche providing it rolls for long enough.  The Sin-Eater Observants are one of my favourite units in Infinity.  In the fluff they are the guards of the Observance, men who have undergone painful and sadistic ritual torture just for the sin of being born male, fitted with neural implants that jack up their reaction speeds to inhuman levels.  They are reactive-turn beasts and are armed with some of the heaviest weaponry in the Bakunin Jurisdictional Command and the models are just bad-ass looking.

Usually the 'core' of any of my Infinity lists will include a Sin Eater with Mk12, which for me is the right balance between punch and price, so I wanted to prioritize painting him up as he's nearly always seeing table time.  Colours so far are GW Codex Grey on the trousers and some other areas, GW Mechanicus Standard Grey on the left shoulder, GW Ulthuan Grey on the rest of the longcoat, P3 Frostbite on the armour plates and GW Goblin Green on the ribbing.  Eventually both the armour and the longcoat will both be white, but I want to experiment using different basecoats to achieve a different white for each area (note, I'm a traditionalist in some regards, when I paint white I start with an off-white basecoat and work up using many many layers of very thin white, oh and I'm also a bit of a masochist).  His base is self-built using plasticard and some flexible resin power-cable from Zinge Industries, the yellow will eventually be hazard-striped.  I haven't quite decided what to do with the Mk12 itself yet, but despite all the naysayers I will probably use some metallic paint on it.

In other hobby news, I made a start on my HoTT Skaven army, but came unstuck when I tried to remove all the extra metal that gets stuck to the bottoms of miniatures of this scale, it's a byproduct of the casting process, but it's lumpy, uneven and adds a good 1mm of height to these already 'large for 10mm' miniatures, I tried sandpaper but it wasn't sturdy enough so I think I'm going to have to invest in a heavy duty file to get rid of the excess metal.

Outside of the hobby world, I came across this bad boy in a mother-and-baby store:

The Alleged Squid

Yep, that's right, it's a gigantic plushie (the tentacles are about 18" long plus a good 12" of body) of a Humboldt Squid.  I knew then and there I had to buy this for my son, because in my mind, nothing can express the overwhelming love I have for my little dude like a cuddly toy cephalopod apex predator!  needless to say, at 3 months old, a giant red floppy thing with eyes the size of golf balls completely flabbergasts him, but I'm planning ahead to when he's a toddler, and he can truly appreciate it and insists on dragging it everywhere by the tentacles.

Anyway, I appear to have finished my beer (Asahi super dry, for anyone that's interested) and I have work in the morning, so I'm going to sign off now.  Thanks for reading and tune in next week for another installment in the nerdy world of Leigen_Zero!