New Year, New Toys

Something different for the first update of 2016. These are Old Glory Grants, assembled years ago and base painted with Light Stone from a rattle can (Army Painter made for Battlefront, I think). Then they sat, neglected and lonely, until late last year, at which point I decided to do something that wasn't dark grey, dark yellow or dark green.

Grants wore a variety of paint schemes in their short time with the British army. This one is based off an example in the Imperial War Museum. I suspect the colours are fanciful, but they are pretty. olive Drab by Testors, everything else by Humbrol (or, as a friend calls it, "God's own paint range").

Alas, most historical paint projects involve browns and greens. This would include the two platoons of British infantry (Battlefront, Guards, 1944) that have also been waiting patiently for uniforms. Humbrol paints all the way, glazed with diluted Minwax Dark Walnut for shading and protection all in one.

And now it's back to the worktop, where twenty T-72s are waiting. More dark green. :)

Mix-n-Match

An eclectic assortment of models has graced my workbench over the last few months. Most are now done and here are a few of the results.

Starting where I left off last time, with Reaper fantasy figures, here's Rogers the Bull:

Making use of a Reaper miniature, I now have a twisted-ghosts-scary-thingy model for my Angmar Lord of the Rings forces. GW's model has been unavailable for some time, cost a lot and didn't look as good as this one:

Then we have an orphaned StuG F/8. This is the third model from an Old Glory package. It wandered away from the other two and sat in undercoat for a couple of years, but now it's happy in grey:

Sticking with vehicles, a Battlefront Somua S.35 has now joined the three Old Glory models. It is a fraction taller and has a little more detail sculpted on, but the two brands blend well together. Paints are assorted old-formula Humbrol enamels, which brush beautifully.

Every German force likes 88s in the background. Back in the old days, Battlefront's boxed set for 88s came with two guns deployed on scenic bases and two complete models  to be assembled in the towing position, to go behind the supplied halftracks. Scrounge suitable crew figures from, say, Old Glory packs and, voila, one has four 88s for the price of two.

The most time has gone to a box of Planetary Empires tiles from GW. This was a set that GW released to complement their 40K game. One can clip them together in various ways, add factories, shield generators and so on and fight campaigns over the landscape. Alien worlds can have alien colours!

Dodging Dragons and Grabbing Loot

Fantasy miniatures painted over the summer.

Most of these are from Reaper's vast range, some in metal and some in Bones soft plastic. The treasure chest may be from an early 1980s box by TSR or another of the figures manufacturers from that bygone era. Edit (15 Aug) Turns out the treasure chest is from Grenadier Models, early 1980s. I thought it looked to solid for a TSR miniature.

Reaper's Bones range is great for large figures and for adding groups of monsters to your horde at a decent price, but the soft plastic does lose some of the finer detail on individual heroic types.

Paints used come from Humbrol (enamel and acrylic), Tamiya, Vallejo and GW.

The Axe Knight

 Metal figure, enamel paint for the armour, hence the strong shine. This mustachioed hero will undoubtedly be found in the thick of the fray shouting such helpful rallying cries as "Come on me, what ho!". I do wonder why a knight whose heraldic device is crossed swords is playing with an axe, though.

Paladin of Clementine

This one's a plastic figure, hence the softer facial detail. She was painted to be the first paladin from the church of Clementine in a D&D game. Colours were specified as black and yellow with a rose device (shield) and entwined thorn vines (tabbard). Alas, the poor lady died in battle before her figure was ready.

Dragoborn Warrior

Another plastic. The beautiful gloss shine on the armour was created with a thin coat of Liquitex general purpose high gloss artist's varnish. I found these acrylic varnishes in the local arts and crafts store and have fallen in lurv with them.

Dwarf Hunter and Dogs

Metal figures, all. Eddy only has two dogs in the D&D game, but he's adopted a third just for these portraits.

Half Dragon/Dragonborn

Another metal figure. No particular character in mind, but this would be a dragonborn who is approaching herodom, given that he towers over normal figures.

Barbarian Warrior

Metal. The lines caused by mismatched mold parts are not so obvious to the eye, especially at a couple of feet distance with 48-year-old Mark 1s. Reaper call her "barbarian warrior" or some such. I prefer to think of her as "Not-Red-Sonja".

Peacock Warrior

 This one is plastic, so the detail is soft around the head. An Elf with expensive armour and a big peacock on his shield. He may look a bit of a ponce, but he's probably quite good with that sword, what with being several hundred years old.


Scalpel

A henchman of dubious background. Small, not very bright, loyal, stealthy and expert at putting his dagger into unsuspecting kidneys. Sadly, after an unfortunate but briefly exciting encounter with an ancient blue dragon, he has devoted the rest of his life to holy contemplation. Another of the Bones figures.

And lastly, what would a good fantasy RPG session be without loot?

I had to add a washer to stop the chest tipping over. That might be a rug under the chest, or it might be arcane wardings.

Summer Fun

So, what with all the usual summertime fun, painting has been a bit, well, random. I've taken to grabbing odds and ends and partially-done pieces and finishing them, just for fun. On top of that, I've rediscovered the joys of painting fantasy figures in completely-made-up-no-historical-uniforms colours.

So, here we go...

First up, we have a 1/100th scale Matilda II from Zvezda. These little plastic Zvezda kits pop together in a few minutes and don't really need glue, although I use said stuff because the solvent smells good and the join lines don't start to gap apart over time.

The Tilda with the commander is a Battlefront offering. Both models were painted with Xtracolour's trio of Caunter scheme paints, albeit with a gap of several years. As you can see, the BF model has more detail sculpted on and comes with the option of having a commander sticking his head and shoulders out of an open hatch. The Zvezda model is otherwise a decent mix-n-match prospect.

And then we have three French Somua S.35 tanks from Old Glory. These were supposed to have been Char B1bis tanks but the package was mislabelled and I think the Somuas are neat tanks, so I kept them. Pretty much all the paint on these comes from my collection of (mostly ancient) Humbrol enamels. They're painted following a drawing gleaned from teh interwebz for the 18th dragoons of the 1st DLM.

French tanks look pretty in these schemes. I may end up branching out into a May 1940 French tank list for Flames. One day.

Changing scales and manufacturers, next up is a small band of uruk-hai from GW's Lord of the Rings range. These came in a bag full of assorted orcs purchased from someone who was selling off excess minis (horrible thought, eh?). Paints are Humbrol, Tamiya and Xtracolour's "Dark Flesh". The models looked very dark and drab when painted, which is entirely appropriate for them, as they're part of the sable-clad army that issued from the Morgul Vale, but did make them too dull, so I decided to give them a "minwax treatment". The pikeorcs got a dip in a water-based stain and the crossboworcs in a dark walnut solvent-based stain. Group A ended up lighter and redder, group B turned very dark, but have more depth. I'm still not sure which I prefer.

Coming up next - dodge the dragon and grab the loot!