From the Challenge: Bolt Action 28mm Flak 18/36 AT Gun Crew

My Bandai/Fuman 1/48 88mm Flak 18/36 plastic kit was one of those models that sat on my shelf for literally years. I'd opened the box, looked at all the tiny parts on the sprues, and closed it back up again. It was only due to the encouragement of fellow Conscript Frederick (who'd built and painted his own identical model) that I took up the challenge of this one. If you're interested you can check it out on the Fawcett blog here.

However, even though the gun was finished, to use it on the table you need a crew! Warlord Games came through (after a fashion) with an excellent 6-man crew set for the Flak 18. I say "after a fashion" because of the standard Warlord shipping faff... basically, although I'd ordered the models on 18 December, they didn't get into the post until well after New Year's... "we moved facilities, COVID-19 has disrupted the supply chain, there was another lockdown, etc...", but somehow they'd managed in the meantime to find the time to put together, promote on social media, and post out a bunch of their "mystery boxes" (unsaleable junk boxes?), which was annoying... but I didn't bother ordering one of those as I already have a laser pointer I bought at the Dollar Store, ta very much :-)

Anyway, the crew eventually arrived and paint was slathered upon them. I think they look quite good crewing the gun. The models came with separate heads so I used the ones that made the crew most flexible in terms of period.

Here are the lads lined up. I have to say the heads fit really well and the poses are quite good. All in all a great purchase for seven quid.

So that's the 88mm Flak ready for action, now we just need to find a game...

Stay safe all!

From the Challenge: 28mm Space Explorers in EVA Suits from ???

 <<ORIGINALLY POSTED TO THE ANALOGUE HOBBIES PAINTING CHALLENGE BLOG>>

I'm trying in this Challenge to work my way through some already-primed figures that have been hanging around awhile. These models have probably been in a Plano case for five (?) years. I think I bought them to use with the old Kenner Alien boardgame if I ever chanced to pick up a copy. 

But for the life of me, I can't remember where these models came from. They're clearly old sculpts, probably from the '80s, but were new castings available commercially. The anatomy and detail are somewhat ropey but they have a certain period charm.

The massive helmets are super-cool right?

I just did some hand-numbering on the front plates to distinguish one from the other.

Here's one with a handgun of some kind... I likely should have replaced this with something from the bits box as it's not that well done.

Number 4 also carries a gun, also not looking that good.

I figured I'd fill the blank space on the shoulders with a decal from the trusty GW sheet.

Now for some perspective... this was my vision for these four.

Or maybe something like this! In any case, it's never gonna end well for these guys.

And if anybody knows where these dudes came from please hit me up in the comments! Thanks all and stay healthy!

EDIT: "Captain Gamma" on TMP reminds me that these models were originally sculpted by Tony Yates for Plastiform, and are currently sold by East Riding Miniatures. I should've remembered this myself as I bought my "Slick" Necromunda not-Delaque gang from ERM. Cheers Captain and I owe you a beer! 

 

From the Challenge: Count Orlok

<<ORIGINALLY POSTED TO THE ANALOGUE HOBBIES PAINTING CHALLENGE BLOG>>

Hi there Challengers, it's Dallas here... back again competing in the Challenge after many years away. When Mr. Curt kindly invited me to participate this year I was eager to take up the invitation. While my painting output has always been pretty reasonable, in years past there's been too much to do in the wintertime for me to devote due attention to the Challenge. However this winter, due to a variety of reasons (including but not limited to "no playing hockey during the pandemic"), I think my output will be up to the challenge of 500 points... hence I'm in!

My first entry is this great "not Count Orlok" model from Midlam Miniatures, a small boutique manufacturer located in Gateshead, England. Midlam sells all sorts of old-school fantasy figures, including the old Metal Magic range. This is the "Ancient Vampire Lord" sculpted by Josef Ochmann.

Any resemblance to a certain Count Orlok from F.W. Murnau's cinematic masterpiece "Nosferatu: Eine Symphonie des Grauens" (1922) is purely coincidental I'm sure... but it suits me fine since it makes the figure fit nicely into the "Hall of Traps" theme on level one of the dungeon.

Specifically, for those who don't recall the film, real estate agent Thomas Hutter is sent by his employer in Wisborg, Germany to Transylvania to close a transaction with Count Orlok, who's buying some property in the town. Hutter eventually arrives at Orlok's castle in the Carpathians and hi-jinks ensue... I figure as the Hall of Traps challenge can be fulfilled by painting a figure "lying in wait" Orlok should fit the bill nicely.

I make that 5 points for Orlok and 20 for the bonus, and sorry about the untidy stripes on his trousers!
 

Another Painting Challenge, another insane plan!

With Curt's annual painting challenge starting yesterday, it's high time I post an opening post and try to outline some of what I will try to get done this yet.

Normally I have a big spreadsheet done to help me keep on track (and to keep my OCD personality in order), and this year I started one, then got busy with work, laser cutting plans, and actual assembly of models for the challenge.

I do have some overall plans, just nothing laid out as well as I would like.  I put in for 1500 points again this year (about 300 28mm infantry models) but probably have about 2500 points assembled and primed.  I have been looking forward to the challenge all year and collecting and assembling models to get ready for it, and it just kept growing.  There is no way I am going to get it all done, but we will see how it goes.

Here are some of the various projects I have in the pipeline:

- Finish my SAGA vikings and Saxons from last year (I only got 1 squad of each painted last challenge).
- Paint up another Dropfleet Commander faction.
- Paint the TON of 30k Deathguard vehicles and Infantry I have been collecting (50+ infantry, 3 rhinos, a drop pod, a spartan, and a bunch of cool jet bikes)

- Paint an entirely new and mad 30k project, a complete robot based Mechanicum army!

- Paint enough ancient Greek units to put on a game of Hail Caesar!  Ok, that's probably a pipe dream in one challenge, but I do have over 100 assembled Greeks already.

- Paint something for at least 4 of the 6 theme weeks (I have something planned for each one, but not sure I will get to them all).
- Finally get my Tau titan done, this is year 3 that he is in the queue though, so who knows.
- Get some more Infinity figures done as needed for the league I am in.
- Paint my first 54mm scale figure.

So, as you can see, WAY to much on the plate.  Oh, and I just took a commission to build some terrain for Greg, since he would rather gargle glass and chase it down with acid than build terrain.  So that might show up in here too, no idea.

The pictures here are just a few of all the primed items I have littering the house and annoying the wife as she tries to clean up for Christmas!

Painting Challenge Theme Entry - "West"

Marder IFV and dismounts - 1/100 scale/15mm from Battlefront

For the fourth bonus theme round of Curt's Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge the theme was "West".  I thought "West Germans" would do nicely for this submission.  Unfortunately the hobby logistics didn't come together so well prior to the deadline so the submission didn't have a lot to it - a single Marder IFV in 1/100 scale, a plastic kit from Battlefront.

Full marks to the West Germans for coolest-looking IFV in the period...man those Marders look sleek

I had been working on my own group of Bundeswehr forces for Battlefront's "Team Yankee" game, but finished only infantry, as a variety of logistical hiccups (no bases for the vehicles, no material for the bases, blah blah) have cropped up to slow and prevent any real progress.  Plus, as you can see elsewhere in this blog, Dallas has already assembled an excellent assortment of West German figures (and we have played several games with them already).  So the impetus for me to crank my own West Germans out became pretty low...

I like to have the MILAN teams dismounted, but you can model them on the vehicle if you prefer

Nonetheless, I got this one vehicle done! A platoon needs three of them, and the whole company will probably call for six or seven of them in total.  Sounds like something I will try and get to in the spring.  Byron has been showing me how to use an airbrush, and I hope to put that to work on some West German vehicles. Stay tuned for more on that at a later date...

As always, some incredible talents have submitted Theme entries.  Check them out here.  A special mention of some continued awesome work by Byron, see here.  With theme entries, you can vote for your favourites...just saying...

***

If you want to try "Team Yankee" and you live in or near Winnipeg, be sure to come out to the "Legions Maxximus" gaming and hobby event on March 17th and 18th.  We will be putting on a "Team Yankee" demonstration game pitting the Bundeswehr and British allies against the rising Red Tides! "Team Yankee" is a fun, easy-to-play tabletop game set in the (thankfully fictional) cold-war-gone-hot of 1985. We really enjoy it, and we think you will too.  Burning tanks everywhere by the second turn! Hope to see you there!

The Madness begins again...

Well, it's getting close to that time of year once again...  No silly kids, not something so mundane as Christmas Holidays, I am talking about the far more important annual decent into madness that is the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge. 

This is the 6th year of the challenge run by Curt and my 3rd year entering it.  The last few years have been a lot of fun, although it almost always turns into a lot of work as well.  It is the time of year to actually paint some (and just a small "some") of the various hobby items I have accumulated over the past year in my ADD induced hobby obsession.  I always look forward to this event though as I tend to get as much painting done in the 3 month span of the challenge as I do the entire rest of the year!  So at least it gets me working!

As I do every year, I try to plan out what I want to get done, and then try and prep as much of it as I can before hand so I do not have to clean, base, or prime much during the challenge and instead can focus just on painting. 

This year I have a huge list of things to get done, and added some more to that for a side challenge with Curt regarding modern figures, although I am sure he will destroy me on that front as I only have a small portion of my challenge entries dedicated to modern.  Here is my basic plan so far, I am sure it will change:

My planning sheet, a doomed to fail attempt to keep me on track!

Also, other than figuring out the Theme Week entries and any last minute additions, I think I am almost ready as I have pretty much everything cleaned, assembled, based, and primed as of last night.  The one noticeable exception being the Tau Titan which I am still assembling, but the legs are in there for scale purposes.  He is going to be a big boy :-)

The masses sitting and waiting for the 20th

Once again I am trying to stick with mainly historical units, and not my typical non-challenge time painting sci-fi stuff.  This year I am trying to get through not one, but two Napoleonic 28mm units.  Who knows, at this rate maybe I will have enough for a game before I retire in 13 years. I also have some French WW1 sections to add to my WW1 forces, some WW1 tanks, and more.  Not added to the list or put together yet, but something I would like to potentially get done this year are some additional WW1 Germans (which I have already) to further flesh out WW1 games and some more 30k marines to expand my Death Guard force.  I seriously doubt I will get to them though. 

More 15mm WW2 Stuff

"Which way to Kursk?" - 15mm Mark IV panzer models from PSC

Work has been pretty busy lately, so not many posts in recent weeks, but I have still been painting.  I am continuing to focus on more 15mm WW2 stuff. Here are some pictures.  Up first are a couple of vehicles from Plastic Soldier Company.

In an earlier post I mentioned that I had acquired on box of their Mark IV panzer kits.  I assembled one as a Mark IV-H, but built the balance as Mark IV F2/Gs (my panzer knowledge is lacking here - it is not clear to me what the differences are between the F2 and G variants).  I painted these two models to match the Mark III panzers I have from Battlefront.

The long-barreled Mark IV Panzer is one of my favourite models

I hope these suckers will provide some heavier-duty fire support to the late model Mark IIIs during a Kursk game.  I still have two more models from the box - I built them similar to these, as F2/G variants, but I will probably paint them with either a straight grey colour scheme, or grey with yellow camouflage that I have seen on some of the panzer references before the tanks started getting the yellow paint coating right at the factory.

I think the Mark IV-Hs were starting to hit the front lines in 1943, but I would imagine that the less-"favoured" panzer divisions still had panzer battalions with a mix of late model Mark IIIs and then a company of these suckers

When I first ordered from PSC, they has sent an incorrect box by mistake - a box of German half-tracks, the 251Ds which I believe are a later-war variant of the ubiquitous Hanomags.  Being fabulous folks to deal with, PSC let me keep the mistaken box, and followed up quickly with the right material.  Here is a test model/paint of one of the PSC 251Ds (almost a year later).

Vanilla late-model Hanomag from PSC

I gave it a straight up (read - boring) yellow paint job.  You get five of these in a box, with all sorts of stowage options and crew models.  The stowage is great, but I am less crazy about the crew.  PSC 15mm infantry models have very soft details, and in my case the detail very seldom survives the base-coat of black spray paint.

A great alternative to the models from Battlefront - cheaper too!

I will probably wait on assembling the other four models that came with the box in the hopes of adding one of the conversion kits that PSC has released allowing you to make some of the various half track variants with 75mm guns, 81mm, flamethrowers etc.

Despite the crew model challenges, I have to say that once again I am impressed with the quality/price ratio of the PSC vehicle products.  If you need/want to build up 15mm WW2 vehicle forces, you should definitely consider PSC!

Horde o' Russians - mostly painted, but you can see the pending stuff off to the side

I have also been painting Russians, and to do Russians, you need, well, a lot of Russians. A lot.  In nearly any game system, you need a lot of them, particularly infantry.  I started with a Strelkovy Battalion box from Battlefront, which gives you a huge pile of infantry models. Officers, AT rifles, riflemen, SMG troops, and even a couple of snipers.  Here are some pictures.

There are some AT rifle stands in this picture (hard to make out) - those particular models are not BF's finest - because they are two-piece jobs, the infantrymen look like they have separated shoulders...

Apologies for the quality on these photos - my house is wonderful, but the lighting appears to be specifically designed to be pleasant for visiting but useless for photography.

Some command bases, with a sniper base in the front

As you can see, I did a chunk of the figures on single bases. As with my Golan Heights project (also in 15mm), as well as significant bunch of my 15mm sci-fi stuff, I thought it would be fun to have individually based 15mm infantry for some WW2 skirmish gaming. 

Individually based 15mm Russians - you get SO many of them in a box set, I figured I would divide between group bases and individual bases

My feelings on this are mixed - I quite enjoy the individually based 15mm models.  I like keeping the ranges the same as with the 28mm games (with Bolt Action, for example) and this provides a better sense of scale, dispersement, and the perception of a more "realistic" engagement  look and feel on the tabletop.  It is also more economical - after all, I already have lots of vehicles and terrain, and allows for a game on a smaller, more convenient space when called for.

Russian infantry with SMGs

On the other hand, group basing for 15mm took off for a reason! Namely that individually based 15mm infantry are quite fiddly for the players, and a bit of a pain in the @ss to use, I think! So I am "splitting the difference" - I have done about 30 Russians up individually, and the balance on the group bases.  The Germans will receive similar treatment - I am painting up  platoon of them on individual bases, and the balance will be based in groups.

Another advantage of the group-style basing is that it allows the 15mm models to be used for Spearhead.  We tried this once earlier this year with the group, and I am aiming to use Curt's next painting challenge as a spur to finish a pile of 15mm WW2 stuff, enough to play some of the scenarios from the book "Where The Iron Crosses Grow."

Notice: 2nd Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge

Hi Guys!

First, apologies for cross posting, but I wanted to get The Word out. I'm hosting another Painting Challenge over the winter. The big diference is that this time the submissions can be any historical figures/models, not just Napoleonics. If you're interested you can check it out here.

Up to the Challenge?

Best,

Curt

Dragoon(ing) along

Just a short update on my continued efforts to finish that initial roster of 25mm Napoleonics I started last July. Curt and I are doing really big units in the "grand manner" style. To help keep us motivated, Curt has launched his own spring thaw challenge. I had finished off my first three infantry units, some command, some skirmishers and (eww) artillery. Now I'm stuck into the hard part (for me) - cavalry!

Our cavalry units are 24-figures strong. I am close to half-way on my first cavalry project, a unit of Austrian Dragoons. The figures are from Foundry. Here are a couple of pictures of the progress so far.



I'm starting to get into a bit of a groove with the cavalry, but I can't quite bang these out like I can with the infantrymen. Practice helps, however, and each night I complete another one or two troopers is a good one! The picture below is a testament to my lack of project focus - you can see a bunch of 40k stuff in various stages of completion in the background.



Helpfully for me the Austrian Dragoon uniform has a lot of similarities to the uniforms of the Austrian regular infantry - white coats, coloured facings, yellow and black puff (I'm sure it's not called a "puff", but whatever*) on a black helmet, etc. I can't wait to get these guys all finished and based, and at the current rate, that will likely be end of March. Every nervous Austrian commander needs cavalry to cover their flanks of their column (or just ride with them to check out a potential new summer palace), so it will be good to get some cav together for the scions of the sausage.

*PS - fellow Conscript Curt has informed the "puff" is actually called a "comb" - I'll remember that for the future!

Napoleonic Spring-Thaw Painting Challenge

First, my apologies for cross-posting but I wanted to make sure 'the word' got out.

In the interest of promoting a healthy lead-and-plastic arms race (and the mere hope of the end of Winter) I am hosting a 'Napoleonic Spring-Thaw Painting Challenge' to fuel the engines of productivity. The Challenge will be conducted along similar lines of the well-fought Fawcett Avenue Conscripts Fall Painting Challenge. 

Painting Challenge Rules:

'The Napoleonic Spring-Thaw Painting Challenge' will extend from February 2nd to midnight May 1st.

Participants are to be members of, known to or vouched by The Fawcett Avenue Conscripts (Home or Westside Chapter). Any others who may be interested in participating are to contact me via this post or on my blog.

All model submissions are required to relate to the Revolutionary/Napoleonic period (1789-1815).

Scoring:
1 point per 25/28mm foot or unmounted horse figure
2 points per 25/28mm mounted figure
2 points per 25/28mm artillery piece or limber

(Other scales/models points value to be determined by The Judge)

Figures can have been previously primed to the start date (Feb 2nd) but no colour can have been applied prior to that date. In order to be scored the figures have to be based and the groundwork completed. The honour system will be followed in relation to the completion and entry of figures to the Challenge. Woe goes upon the head of anyone who besmirches themselves in the painting of toy soldiers!

On top of general bragging rights, smack talk, etc. modest prizes will be awarded for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. (Prizes will be gift vouchers (or their equivalent) from an online hobby store.)

In order to be scored, photos of completed figures/units are required to be submitted to me (The Judge) for posting on the Analogue Hobbies blog. Updated scoring for The Challenge will also be tracked on the blog.

The Judge (me) will participate in the competition but will not 'place' as a scoring competitor (i.e. no prizes for me).

So, there it is. I hope you take up my thrown brush (with 'white feather' attached) and join me in getting a bunch of stuff done for 'The Beautiful Game'!

"Banshee" style Autarch

Here's my sole entry for the painting challenge (sigh - the Colonial Marines aren't even done). It's that Eldar Autarch conversion I was working on, based upon a Games Workshop Howling Banshee Exarch. From the fluff, the figure is armed with weapons and wargear associated with both the Howling Banshee and Fire Dragon shrines.



Black primed, then sprayed white highlights; I like the stark contrast between light and dark. Under-painting in various acrylics and GW glazes. Final blending and details added with tube oil paints. It's kind of like painting the figure twice, but I find it allows very subtle colour transitions. NMM for metals; I agree with KevinH, often metallic paints do not scale down well because of the courseness of the pigment.



Details done using 000 Winsor & Newton Series 7 brushes. I find that a good point serves just as well as a 10/0 brush, and allows better paint flow.

Figure is removable from its vignette display base for gaming.



It is the new HQ for my tournament army. Very inexpensive points-wise, compared to other Eldar HQ's. The melta gun and power sword provide capability against both tanks and infantry. Her Banshee Mask is a cheap "strike first" button for close combat. She'll ride with one of the Dire Avenger squads inside a skimmer tank.