Little Bird Temple in Your Soul

From the grass beneath my toes to the distant islands of tangled marsh weeds, the drone of summer bugs rang around me. But even amid that noise, the music of the temple easily cut through. Like the tight pluck of fiddle strings, the sweeping thrum of a bass line, or the staccato jab of piano keys, dozens of distinct birdcalls came together in harmony.

Along the sandy shoreline came the sound of a harmonica. It took me a moment to realize it was an instrument and not birdsong. The temple's Bard was resting in the shallow water, adding his own song to the temple's music. Beside him, his Blue jay perched atop the Bard's extravagant mask, braying along.

All afternoon, variations on this set played on. I woke when the sky had begun to bruise purple.

- Butchko Halme, The Lakeside Almanac

Taivast (Tie-Vast) temples are aviaries where local and migrating birds come and go, roosting in the upper rafters and dovecotes or nesting on the straw floor among the many statues. The exterior is a fine example of Dwarvish artistry (though the woodwork certainly needs some cleaning). Regardless of whether the artist is from the Pig Islands, Copper Harbor, or even Tomb, Dwarves use bright, loud colors in most of their designs. Idols of local birds such as terns, sand cranes, marsh wrens, yellow-headed blackbirds, and more decorate the exterior. In contrast to the strict geometric patterns of the Lakemen, Dwarvish art is filled with depictions of animals, heroes, small gods, ancestors, and often grandiose portraits of the artists themselves.

Taivism, the majority faith of Dwarves in the Living Lakes, fulfills both practical and spiritual needs. All birds, even a chicken waddling along the ground, possess innate power. The concentration of these birds keeps most small gods and other fearsome critters away from towns and villages. They provide eggs for meals, loose feathers for alchanic machines, and flight for funeral rites. Bards, the masters of song and story, spend years studying birdsong at such temples and in the wilds. Playfully called “white hats” or “shit heads” because of the bird waste that stains their clothes, Bards are a critical part of day-to-day survival. Their songs heal ailing townsfolk, repair structures such as roadways, and carry the tall tales that all Dwarves strive to become the subject of.

Taivasts might revere birds as spiritual beings, but there is no central deity worshipped by practitioners. Instead, Taivism focuses on the self. Through pillars of fiery independence, forward momentum, and bold expression, Taivasts seek to be the best they can be. Unfortunately, this has led many non-Taivasts to view Dwarves as selfish, glory-seeking blowhards.

While a “Bard” is specifically tied to the practice of Taivism, bird power is widespread throughout the Living Lakes. Lakemen cultures often view birds and their power as just another force of nature to be mastered, though some argue this is a loophole used to avoid the wrath of their jealous twinned god, Ukonilma. The mass migration of Herran to the Living Lakes has led to scores of Taivast converts, but many of their spiritual leaders maintain their own queer forms of bird power. Even the horrid Gnomes twist the power of birds, burning the sacred animals alive or feeding them to cats in base ceremonies and dark rituals.

Taivast temples are comforts found in nearly every corner of the Living Lakes. They are a place to rest if the inns are full, a place to find creative inspiration, and a place of protection during the long months of winter migration.

Behind the Scenes

Howdy! This was my biggest project to date :o

I painted the backdrop, created the terrain, built and painted the temple, sculpted and painted the birds, sculpted and painted the minis, and took the photos 🙀

I’m very new at building terrain, especially actual buildings, so it was a real learning opportunity…mostly that I don’t like building houses lol. Having to measure and play architect on even a small scale was sort of a pain in the ass, but I’m happy with the results regardless!

The Temple

Rather than actual religious temples, I based this design off of Bird Park in Door County, WI. The homestead of folk artists Albert and Louise Zahn, the lakeside home was covered in whittled icons of birds, angels, and other Christian imagery. The Great Lakes are the north star for my design choices, so this connection felt like a no-brainer.

As my first terrain building, it also helped that the design was rather simple (even though I still struggled with it). I used XPS foam to create a rectangle, topped it off with a firm piece of poster board, then covered the entire structure in mini-popsicle sticks for the wood siding and door/windows. You can see that I actually used the incorrect size on one side.

The steeple is present on the Bird Park structure, but it also evokes a religious feeling right away. Plus, it acts as a chute for birds to enter and exit the building. It’s crowned with a dovecote based on this birdhouse I found at the Green Bay Botanical Garden. 

Once again, this was a huge pain in the ass to build. I eventually used an old ibuprofen bottle jabbed with BBQ skewers. The shingles are cut from old cereal boxes.

For the colors, I wanted to go bold with primary colors. Not only is this lore accurate for my Dwarves, it’s also my own preferred color palette. I chose blue to resemble the sky and yellow to resemble the grasses that dot the marshland.

Lastly, I painted a stained glass piece to take up the rear of the temple. I went with the sandhill crane, a vital part of Wisconsin’s marshland ecosystem. Plus, they have striking colors!

To get the effect I wanted, I painted a slice of cardboard with a mix of Mod Podge and white paint. Next, I drew the stained glass outline and traced over it with black paint. Then, to get the glass effect, I mixed a copious amount of silver acrylic paint in with the cooler colors, and gold paint with the warmer ones. This gives it a reflective sheen that's good enough for glass! Finally, I just traced over the outline again with black paint to make sure it stood out.

The Birds

These were the real key that unlocked the whole project. A few years back, I visited the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, WI, which focuses on folk artists from Wisconsin and the larger United States. This is where I first saw Albert and Louise Zahn’s beautifully simple birds. Just a plain shape with some distinctive paint, and boom: you’ve got a bird.

For my bird idols, I wanted to maintain a uniform shape, despite the different species. I used Sculpey oven-bake clay, then painted each bird to match species found in Horicon Marsh—a 33,000-acre wetland found in southeast Wisconsin.

They are:

• Buff-breasted Sandpiper
• Double-crested Cormorant
• Forster’s Tern
• Killdeer
• Mallard
• Marsh Wren
• Northern Harrier
• Prairie Chicken
• Red-winged Blackbird
• Sandhill Crane
• Swamp Sparrow
• Trumpeter Swan
• Yellow-headed Blackbird

The Backdrop

To set the scene (and because I don’t have a nice photo box), I decided to paint a backdrop of a marshland. I had done something similar with my vampires (seen here on Zar's blog), just on a smaller scale. This is a really fun way to brush up on your painting chops! Just pick a reference photo and unlock your inner Bob Ross.

For the mound, I cut out a chunk of XPS foam and chipped away at it’s edges to give it a hilly appearance. I covered it in a mix of dirt from my mom’s garden, Mod Podge, and black paint. I then covered it in a generous blanket of flock. For the taller weeds, I untied strands of rope I had lying around from an old bachelor party costume (we went as monks to Medieval Times). I bunched up the strands of fiber, hot glued them to the board, and hit them with a spray adhesive to keep them straight. I then dry-brushed them with greens and tans. I have a real aversion to watching tutorials (stupid, I know), so this was a lot of improvisation and problem-solving—which leads to an equally fun and frustrating end result.

The Miniatures

As always, my commitment to ape-like Dwarves has made life difficult. This time, I ordered metal miniatures from Badger Games to sculpt over. As I wrote previously, the ape and monkey STLs available online are just way too overdesigned. They all look like Sun Wukong wearing Warcraft-sized pauldrons.

Similar to my previous designs, I emphasized the nose and mustache to give them that immediate Dwarf look. For clothing, I'm always tempted to give them some Midwestern attire, like overalls or fishing gear, but I had to consider a few larger factors: they're arboreal and very hairy. Their clothing would need to prioritize mobility and style rather than warmth or practicality.

I went with loincloths and vests for the Dwarves, loose attire that could be decorated to their hearts' content. The models are also VERY tiny, so those items were easier for a novice like me to sculpt.

For the Bard, I made an impulse decision to give him a mask, made from green stuff and adorned with a winged bit from a metal Polish Hussar kit. If Dwarves love folklore, statement pieces, and peacocking, a mask makes sense. However, I'm wary of straying too close to Indigenous American imagery.

Fantasy has a long track record of taking a real-world culture and declaring, "This is how my Orcs act." On the other hand, it's equally heinous to strip a setting so inspired by the Midwest of anything that isn't Eurocentric. At this point, my process is to read and research primary sources from the region while avoiding direct analogues to real-world cultures in my setting.

Lastly, I was excited to finally sculpt a Herran, the Humans in my setting! 

Even before I knew much else about the setting, I knew I didn't want humans to be the dominant species. I originally envisioned them as warring, Viking-like tribes, but the Forsaken Gods setting recently used that exact idea.

With the drawing board blank, I decided to get weird with it. I've wanted to shoehorn giant crayfish into the setting for a while, and I've always loved the chitin armor from Morrowind, so I decided to work backward from there. What sort of environment would crayfish live in? How would humans adapt to that environment? What would their material culture become? What kind of environment would drive people to migrate away?

I settled on mudflats, a sort of flooded delta wasteland. Like Fremen in stillsuits, the Herran move beneath the muck on deadly assassination raids for scarce resources. Clad in organic armor, they feel alien within my woodland world. This also allowed me to smuggle in another one of my current obsessions: the bulbous armor designs of Kobayashi Makoto, Kazuhisa Kondo, and Kow Yokoyama. You can learn all about them at https://www.zimmerit.moe/.

I sculpted the round armor plates from a mix of green stuff and Tamiya epoxy putty. With a biological look in mind, I made sure to avoid hard edges in favor of rounded, organic shapes. The results are far from perfect, but I'm excited to keep trying my hand at this type of armor.

Along with the initial Viking concept, I wanted the Herran to be the ones who introduced firearms into the setting. However, once their homeland became a resource-scarce river delta, large-scale arms manufacturing was out of the question. That distinction has instead been given to the second most populous race of my setting: the Lakemen. I'll write about them later when I use them for my Under the Dice Fest Mordheim warband >:)

That's all! Thank you all for reading <3 This one was a doozy!

xoxo Gray