WIP: Normandy Farmhouse and Barn

I finished up the Normandy Farmhouse and Barn. I think they turned out pretty good. Here they are on my table! That's right MY table. In MY basement.

I had some trouble with the roof of the house. As you can see, it doesn't sit perfectly. I left the roofs off the structures so the little mens can get in. Neither building has a second floor. I am thinking of correcting that with a little bit of plasticard and balsa wood.

WIP: Normandy Farm House and Barn.

I picked up the Normandy Farm House and Barn from Najewitz Modellbau. 

I am so excited. I have also cleaned out a space in the basement and set up a 6' x 4' table!

Above is a shot of the house. You can see a little Green Stuff on both the bottom corners. This was my first attempt at green stuff. I have used green putty before. Green stuff was great.

The corners had broken off. Not sure when. But I shaped a small brick together and stuck it in the bottom corner. Worked like a charm. I need to sand this a little but it worked out great.

Here is the barn. The windows and doors were not perfect fits. A little more green stuff and I had the cracks sealed up.

This is the roof of the barn. This needed a large amount of green stuff to fill in the gaps. I probably should have used putty here but it was good practice. I am also going to flip this over and lay in a coating of putty on the reverse side of the roof join. Just to strengthen it up. I want to leave the roofs separate so we can lift them off if any of our metal mans need to duck in for some cover.

The roof of the house had some join problems too. I haven't puttied it yet. But I will. Hope to have these done by the new year.

WIP: Sd.kfz 251/1 Ausf C Hanomag (Complete)

Jeff at Pair-A-Dice started carrying Bolt Action figures! W00t! I went down and picked up this halftrack.

I really tried to muddy this thing up. Front view is just about all mud. 

Green camo only. No red on this one. Just for some variety.

The machine gun mount in the back already broke off. I intend to just lay the MG in the open bed so we know it is there. I also need to paint the MG gunner.

This is 28mm. I just think it is too small. It holds up against the figures just fine. I probably should have taken a picture next to a mini. Sorry.

WIP: Jadgpanther! (Complete)

Around this time of year, it gets a little crazy around the Legion. Our daughter is involved in a million different activities. I spend a LOT of time sitting in our car, waiting to pick her up. She is almost 13. I keep trying to get her to drive herself. :) Anyway, I have been remiss in posting. I HAVE been slowly but surely working on various projects.

I have always loved the Jadgpanter. This is a 1:48 scale model from Bandai/Tamiya. This is all hand painted. No airbrush. I am really pleased with how it came out. I have been working on my weathering skills with pigment.  Click for larger pictures.

 Front view.

 Other side view.

 I can't wait to use this in a battle. Although, I have not been having good luck with tanks lately. I like the 1:48 scale for vehicles. 28mm feels too small as you will see in the next couple of posts.

Sherman Finished!

 I put some muddy weathering and the dull coat on the Sherman this morning. I am really very happy with how it came out overall. Prime, basecoat, wash, highlight, weather. Those are the steps. I wish I had a bigger decal to lay over the engine vents in the back. But I don't and I am not going to worry about it. I cannot wait to get this thing on the field.

In the picture on the right, I see a tiny problem. There is a vent on the turret that is showing the primer I used. I finished up a can of Army Painter Desert Yellow and you can see it. I will not make that mistake again. I always have primed black. I will start doing that again.

Last note. After I put the decals on, I applied a wash to dirty them up. I left some spotty areas. Those, I think, were quickly fixed by the mud spray effect.

Let me know your thoughts!

Sherman WIP +1

I just finished putting a wash on the Sherman.

Next step is a highlight with a mix of Violet Brown and Desert Yellow on the hull and turret. OOO....I can see some spots on the wheels and tracks that I need to touch up. Son of a biscuit! The wash is drying as I type. I think it looks good. I am going to wash the tracks in a more muddy color - sepia.

I really like the sandbags and other small bits of stowage I have.

WIP: 1:48 scale Sherman

It took me awhile to put together, but I put the treads on over the weekend and primed this 1/48 scale Sherman Tank from Hobby Boss.

The stowage is from a kit by Verlinden. If you look inside the hull in the top picture, you can see the washers I added to make the model a little heavier. I like the size of the 1/48 models for 28mm games. The lightness of the plastic just worries me a little. So I like to weight them down.

I am still on disability from having a blood clot so I will start applying the base coat today. I am waiting on some Army Painter Strong Tone ink to be delivered for the wash.

The Verlinden kit was great. I have a ton of parts left over. The sandbags were easy to manipulate. I love the spare tank tread. I should have taken a rear view...the back has a couple of gas cans and a bucket. But the best part from the kit may have been the antenna. Because the kit asks you to heat up some plastic. Pfft - no way.

WIP: Baueda Ruined Building and Sandbag Emplacement

 The sandbag emplacement is coming along. I've done most of the base colors. I still need to do some ammo boxes. But the wood and oil barrels are done. Next is drybrush highlighting and then hitting the sandbags.

The ruined building finally got assembled. I had to use some putty. It is not exactly square but I am not too worried about it. After reading The Guns at Last Light: The War in Western Europe, 1944-1945, I am not too worried but everything was completely blown to hell anyway. A little putty will look authentic. I primed in Vallejo Desert Yellow (almost out!) and then started painting everything in Iraqui Sand. Going to use that as my mortar color. Will drybrush a brick color over the top, hopefully letting the joints show through. There will be some gray on some of the decorative pieces like over the windows and the ledges.

WIP: Baueda Sandbag Emplacement

Claudio, over at Baueda, put together a Kickstarter campaign for a sandbag emplacement. It came in the mail Monday. Claudio, as always, included a bunch of extras.

If you click on the picture, you can see the first two steps. I primed in the desert yellow color on the left. It was either that or black. I went with the color closest to sandbag. I should have done the barrels black but I am clearly not thinking things all the way through.

On the right, I used a vallejo wash on the whole thing. These should be pretty easy to paint up. Prime, wash, main, highlight, done. Will only have to use a few colors. One step at a time. :)

WIP Part 3: Baueda 1:48 Ruined Building

I am making a mess of this. I should probably leave it alone. You can see the styrene pieces I cut to the right. I didn't like the way they were working out. I decided I would just glue the walls together and then putty it to the base.

It looks great here but 10 seconds after I took this picture the back wall fell off. Grrr. I think I am going to stick with my plan anyway and putty it to the base. I am going to need some putty on that wall.

I trimmed too much off the bottom of the two long walls. The one that fell off, I can see that I de-stabilized the wall. It is starting to bend. Pfftt. It is my own fault. Doing something I should not be doing.

WIP: Part II Baueda 1:48 Ruined Building

Well, I took a pass at the flash on all 3 sides and the floor of the building. I need to go back and hit the two on the left - the ones with doorways. I got a little aggressive on the right-most section.

The two on the left have molding left. I don't know if I will trim it all. I might use the drum sander and then build up the window piece with some putty. I am worried that if I cut away the molding under the doors that I will lose stability on those pieces and they will flex.

Camps Completed

I have been working on a lot of pieces at the same time lately.

 I made this DBA camp from some bamboo skewers that I chopped up! I'm pretty proud of myself. The log in the middle is from Baueda. Here is a rear view:

I am really happy with the way this turned out. I used some textured paint to work out the road/path section. Rocks and static grass and boom. I will probably use this for my Later Carthaginians.

These are some Roman tents - also from Baueda. I have a whole fort I need to put together. I have been working my way up to it. I like the way these came out too.

Completed Bolt Action Box Set Buildings

The damaged buildings in this post come from a Bolt Action box set that Santa brought me. I didn't get a chance to do a WIP post because they went together and painted so quickly!This is a rear view of the house. I am pretty proud of myself. I got some plascard "flooring" from Dan's Crafts and Things. I think it came out rather well for a first time n00b. :) Next time, I will be a bit more brave and carve out some damage in the middle of the floor.

 Here is a front view of the house. Normally, I would paint the rocks black and dry brush them grey but I left the stone as-is. I thought it matched the stone of the house pretty well.






I did get more brave with the flooring in this one. Now that I look at it, next time I am just going to snap it off to get a more realistic break. Still...I think this came out rather well.

WIP: 28mm Modern MRAP

I can't remember where I bought this mini. But I thought I would update from a Humvee since the MRAP is currently the replacement in Afghanistan for the Humvee. The model is not the greatest. I am not sure if it was a bad mold or what. But I am not that good of a modeller to correct the imperfections.

I am, once again, using Sgt. Scream's method/color scheme. The shot on the left shows a primed, sepia washed and then dry brushed with the Vallejo's DESERT YELLOW (70977) with two parts Vallejo's BEIGE (70917) mix that Chris recommends.

Over on the right, you see the MRAP primed with The Armypainters' primer called DESERT YELLOW and washed with Vallejo's Sepia Wash. I am not brave enough for Chris' oil based wash. The sepia seems to do the trick.

The place that I got this from put the gunner in for free for me. As I look at these pictures, I may have to carve him out of there. He looks too futuristic to me.

WIP: 15mm Essex Spartans for DBA

I've been doing a bad job of tracking the work on my Spartan army.

I am in the home stretch. I've tried to keep the colors both simple and historically accurate. Armor is mostly bronze with some leather mixed in. Tunics are either white or red. Shields are mostly bronze again with a mix of all black.

I need to touch up the arms, legs and faces. I also need to tip the spears. Then apply lambda decals and base 'em up. It has taken me a long time to do these. I also worked on some Warlord buildings during this time. I need to put pictures up of those too.

WIP: US Modern Vehicles Final

Thanks to Chris over at Small Scale Operations for the reminder that I never posted the final pictures of the US Modern vehicles I was working on!

I used Chris' paint scheme on these. I think it worked out very well. Keep in mind, these are the first things I have painted in 20 years. So be gentle with me. :)

Click the pictures to see them on a bigger scale. No decals on the humvees. I couldn't find enough surface area to use. And I am too shaky to free hand a chevron.

You can go here to see these minis in action. I was rushing to get these ready for the AK47 game in the battle report.

WIP: Modern US Vehicles IV

I applied the first dry brush highlight. I say first because I am already thinking about a final highlight of a lighter color just to pick off the edges.

I used a 1:1 mix of Vallejo Iraqi Sand (819) and Pale Sand (837).

And I am still following (mostly) Sgt. Scream/Chris's scheme. I like it. I am not sure the pictures are doing it justice. But these models look like they belong in the desert or even Afghanistan to me. Tomorrow, I will try to hit the black. Tracks and tires. And the weaponry.

I am planning on playing some Bolt Action tomorrow! Can't wait.

WIP: Modern US Vehicles III

The second layer is a 2:1 mix of Vallejo Beige (917) and Vallejo Desert Yellow (977).

I used a heavy dry brush technique. I can already see the difference between the completed tank and these models. The heavy handed dry brush lets more of the wash show.

Again, just the first coat. I need to paint the stowage and the treads/tires. And highlight.

Next step is the first true highlight layer. 

WIP: Modern US Vehicles II

Here are some pictures of the next stage of painting these vehicles. I used the Sepia Wash from Vallejo.   Sgt. Scream recommends using an oil based paint. But I am just not ready for oil based paint. Washes are a new concept to me. Here are a couple of the tanks.

Here is a closeup of one of the turrets. I originally watered down the wash but quickly realized that I could (and should) go full strength. 

Lastly, a close up of the body of a tank.

I will confess that I was a little skeptical of how this was going to turn out. So, I finished a tank. And I am pretty happy with it. But I won't show it just yet. You will have to wait for it.

Next up: putting on the first layer of the main color.

WIP: Modern US Vehicles

I primed the QRF US modern vehicles yesterday. It took me awhile to put them all together. This is the first time in maybe 20 years that I have put together and attempted to paint any kind of miniature. It was slow going. The last time was probably some Orcs and Goblins for Warhammer.

You should be able to click to expand. The vehicles are all QRF:

M1 Abrams
M2 Bradley IFVs
Humvees

They are primed with Army Painter Desert Yellow. I am going to try to follow this painting guide from Small Scale Operations. I have just ordered some Vallejo paint. I am not going to use the oil wash. I will use just a regular wash. I'm nervous, we didn't wash 20 years ago. :)