Lovely 'AB' Napoleonics & Chicken stuffing 'Tyrannids' !

 A more traditional 'photo' post this one starting with the first of the new 18mm 'AB' Peninsular Napoleonic commission for Mark. There will be a round 850 figures in all spread over the rest of this year and we are starting with some British Infantry and cavalry followed by some French cavalry and infantry. I wanted to capture a few close ups of the bare castings, they really are superb sculpts and are a joy to ring to life with some paint.  Marks request is for gloss varnish and flat green bases, no flock or static grass, I just use Vallejo earth texture to build up around the bases before painting them Flat Green.

Also still working though the Space Hulk figures for David (in exchange for Battle Cry) and here are a couple of shots of the first two 'Tyrannids' painted to match the Genestealers basic colour scheme. These guys are SCARY! I do like the contrast that the 'bone' parts bring I'm just needing to add a bit more in the photos, there will be six of these. David requested the weapons be 'Organic' and it took a couple of attempts before this which I'm rather pleased with as is David, it's certainly Organic looking and I said to David it looks like they are stuffing chickens! Plan is to have all 64 figures completed for the end of June and we are about half way through.

I have also added a dozen small damaged gun markers to my Battle Cry set up, placing one each time a battery is hit and removing on the third hit. These are made from Kallistra 12mm guns suitable 'blown up' on small rounded bases. In a Eureka moment I discover that my figure trays would actually fit into the large game box if I cut them down a little and the result is as you see, everything neat and tidy in the box, excellent!

A cost effective way into the hobby.

I'll be the first to admit that I really don't know where this project will end up but in the meantime I'm having fun painting the figures and doing the basic conversion work required to make things work. I had long thought that the plastic Epic ACW strips offered an inexpensive way into the hobby where large armies are required and this is a slightly different approach to building big brigades for Fire & Fury (original) with lots of colourful flags and mounted Brigadiers which have the unit information on the bases for easy identity.

2nd Nassau Regt. 3D prints and the first 'Genestealers' !!

I'm enjoying seeing my YouTube channel slowly growing and have just hit 902 subscribers which is not bad going for me mumbling gruffly into a phone camera! I find it a great way to feature what I paint as it turns over. Here is the latest, 3 battalions of the 2nd Nassau at Waterloo for Stephen, 3D prints which are a perfect match for the Warlord Epic range and fill in some of the gaps. It's funny to think back maybe a decade or so when printing ones own armies would have been something of a wargamers dream! These are really nice prints, some of the best I have seen and pretty robust too. 

For David Crook I am just starting on the old GW Genestealers and what an interesting paint job they are going to be! I must say I love 'em having never painted anything like them before. We have now established the basic colours so I will work through the batch of 24 before finally going back for final detailing, especially the heads and faces etc in order to keep the finish consistent across all 24 of them, useful when working in batches of just 4 figures at a time.

The colour scheme for reference so far is:

• A base coat/primer of white ( this is a major departure for me but wanted to use thinned paints on the main body.
• Vallejo Gunmetal Blue with about 20% Vallejo medium thinner added for improved flow. This is a lovely blue with a slight metallic sheen and when used thinned it is akin to using one of fashionable 'Contrast' paints. I looked at the contrast range but could not find a colour like this one.
• A thin wash of Vallejo Blue Ink Wash then tones everything down slightly and adds shade where it runs into the gaps of the body.
• Vallejo Violet is then used 'neat' for the head and hands etc and to paint in the body parts that you can see inside the outer body which is then thinned with Ivory to achieve the highlights to the skull etc. 
• Claws painted with Ivory plus a touch of Buff and then Sepia washed around the cuticles. 
• Tongue painted Cavalry Brown, teeth Ivory with sepia wash.
• Base treated with Vallejo Earth texture, edges matt back, texture will be inked and highlighted though entire batch at the end.

And finally. having just finished another 2 regiments of Streltsy (plastic 1/72nd by Strelets I think?) for good Old John I am about to begin the 18mm AB Peninsular Napoleonic commission for Mark, the first instalment will be spread over 2 weeks painting and I'm thoroughly looking forward to seeing what I can do with those brilliant little castings.

40k Terminator Marines.

 I must say I have found painting these sci fi figures for David Crook really fun! I have been working closely with David for colour schemes etc but I think they turned out well. Very pleasing to get a short reply to these photos this morning 'Bloody Fantastic'. 

Next, onwards to Genestealers.

Bull Run Re Run!

I decided to play the 1st Bull Run scenario again as I wanted to try out some different tactics. This time I played on the printed rubber backed mat and used the Command and Colors terrain tiles as they better matched the brighter mat. A 6 to 4 Reb win this time and another very enjoyable hour and a half was spent. Included a couple of small rule points that I missed first time and picked up from the excellent video linked below which is a concise explanation of the rules of the game, for example artillery firing from a hill adds one hex to the range. Next up will be Pea Ridge.

A Mad World!

Sick of politics, back to my best therapy, painting model soldiers. Since I made this 5 days ago the World has changed!

I'll send in these guys! Terminator Marines, early GW as I understand it. being painted for David Crook and my first time with anything sci fi related, really enjoying the challenge.

Finally something soothing for the old Noggin in these turbulent times.

Latest video, another game of Battle Cry & Terminator Marines!

It occurred to me fairly recently that the 15 years of photos now lost in the posts of the past could be used to make a number of period specific videos for my YouTube channel. Having started with a couple from Old Johns commission work I have this time moved on to the French and Indian War collection that I put together around 10 years ago or so. 

Battle Cry.

I played another game of Battle Cry on Friday morning, this time the 1st Bull Run scenario and once again I really enjoyed myself. It ended in a 6 to 3 Union victory with the Confederate centre deployed on the hill completely devastated by concentrated Union fire, I'm sure that playing the Forced march card as the first card really allowed the Union centre to get quickly into firing line and put the Rebs on the back foot from the start. Battle Cry is not as nuanced as Commands & Colors Napoleonics, for example when the unit that Stonewall Jackson was attached to on the hill was eliminated there was no roll to see if he became a casualty, a lone General needs to be attacked by a fresh unit, so he slipped away on the next Reb turn!

Having been forced to retreat from the hill by Union fire Jackson led his unit back up again where it was destroyed by withering Union fire.

 

The Rebs occupied the hill along it's length but the firefight went very much in the Unions favour! 

Finally, David and I had a long chat on the phone last weekend where we discussed the painting of his figures. These are my first ever Sci Fi figures so I needed a lot of guidance but here are the completed first two and I am now using these as the basis of the rest of the Terminator 'Salamander' squad.