Painting 28mm American Civil War infantry Part 1.

Two posts in a weekend, I must be on a roll! Having undercoated eight of the Renegade ACW's I could not resist getting some paint on them, and as usual when I start something new I like to record the method and shades used in order to retain consistency along the way.

To begin with I had already decided to go for a 'quick' paint job on these, using a controlled dry brush to get down the basic colours before adding highlights followed by an ink wash to add a little depth and to bring the shades together. For these Rebs I wanted to stick with a limited palette rather than a mish-mash of browns, greys and creams etc. I went for my trusty' London Grey' as a base dry brush, and 'Flat Earth' for the 'Butternut'. I use all Vallejo shades apart from the brown I use for Reb belts,  boots, cartridge boxes etc, for which I stick with Citadel 'Mournfang Brown' as I simply can't find anything to match it in the entire Vallejo range. I order all of my paint supplies from 'S&M Stuff' online so I pick up a couple of bottles of the Mournfang when I top up my Vallejo's.

OK, so to get started the figures were hand undercoated using Vallejo matt black rather than primer, reason being is that it gives a completely flat, shine free basecoat for the drybrushing. Once dry the drybrushing begins with London Grey and Flat Earth, some as you see are fully grey others a mix of Grey and Flat Earth, just the two basic shades to set the overall tones. Next batch I'll introduce a few light blue 'Liberated' Yankee trousers maybe for a touch more contrast but that will be it. I chose both the main shades not just for the colour, but also the fact that both come up quite thick which is perfect for drybrushing. Both also take the highlight shade well. I use an old small brush, allowing just a small amount of dryish paint, what I want to avoid is too much paint going on and obscuring the black around the details, a quick light brush over is required. I hit the belts too as its far easier to paint over these than paint a round them later, but being careful to leave the edges showing the black undercoat wherever possible as shown below.

I then paint the flesh shade colour - Light Brown - followed by the Citadel Mounfang Brown on some belts, the boots, cartridge boxes and percussion cap pouch. I leave the canteen strap and breadbag for a little variation later. I then highlight the flesh with Sunny Skin Tone. At this stage the basic shades are established ready for highlighting, this took me only around 30 minutes to get them as shown below, it really is that fast! You can see the base shades are quite patchy but highlights will improve that later.

I don't go in for eyes, this is my standard method of painting faces using just the two tones. So next it's the main uniform highlights and for this I use Sea Grey over the London Grey and for the Butternut I use the Flat Earth with about 25% Ivory mixed in. A quick job picking out the light areas but again leaving the base coat to provide shade and we arrive at this stage.

Next I painted in the brasswork - Vallejo Brass of course - and at this stage I had been painting for exactly one hour and it was time to pop downstairs to catch Football Focus whilst tidying up! A couple of hours later I felt I just had to get in a little more painting on them, so I added the Brass barrel bands and trigger guards to the as yet unpainted muskets. At this stage they were ready for an ink wash to the main uniform areas. I used Sepia for the butternut areas and Black for the grey areas, I tend to thin down the inks slightly with water and work carefully with a small brush to control where the ink goes, I only really want it to run into the folds and creases, I don't want to get any on the flesh areas. The blanket roll was painted with Burnt Red highlighted with a touch of Scarlet while wet so it blends.

This second session was shorter, around half an hour, but the figures already look close to finishing. Part 2 will see me completing the muskets, bread bags, canteen straps and any other detail. They will then be set aside while I undercoat the next 8 figures with the 4 figure command base being left to last. I can accurately say that the time will be around 2 hours from start to finish for 8 figures, pretty good going. The Yankees should be a tad faster.

Renegade 28mm ACW's and 4Ground 15mm church.

The Renegade ACW's that I ordered a couple of weeks back arrived yesterday so I thought I would record my first impressions of the figures here. But first, it is of course the much anticipated launch weekend of Flames of War Version 4, and with my set due to arrive hopefully today or Monday from Caliver books, I thought I's start with a few pics of the 4Ground damaged church that I completed during the week.

The kit was a joy to build and every piece went together perfectly, the instruction sheet being clear and concise with all parts numbered for easy identification. It was put together over several days/sessions, allowing drying time between. Some of the parts such as the windows are very fine but push out of the MDF sheets with ease, I suffered no breakages, and the 3D effect once finished is very convincing. The interior window detail for example consists of an upper sill a lower sill and two side pieces for each window, plus the 'stained glass' effect piece itself, a little fiddly but where the fit was too tight I gently filed the parts to slide in. As with all 4Ground buildings the main structure is double thickness, a 2mm outer and a 2mm inner which produces a scale thickness and allows for the addition of brickwork on the damaged wall sections. I do agree with James of the 'Mad Tin Hatter' blog that the hole in the tower does look rather too large, I think the entire thing would have come crashing down in reality, but overall it's a nice looking piece. It will require some rubble sections to be created where complete walls are missing, but I have an idea for that (cheers Steve). I like that you can see the interior detail after all the fiddly work!

Like all 4Ground kits it's not cheap at £33.00, but it does make for an impressive centre piece on the table and level of design work and detail makes it worth the money in my opinion. I would recommend the use of plastic pegs and elastic bands when building as MDF can have a tendency to warp slightly when wet with PVA, although it drys nice and flat.

I also painted the Sherman 'Dozer' a Battlefront resin and metal kit, a useful addition to my US 2nd Armoured list. I need to order some Allied Stars to finish it.

Renegade 28mm American Civil War figures - first impressions.
My initial order of figures from this range arrived yesterday, having waited a good couple of weeks for it. No real problem on the wait as I have plenty to keep me busy, but it does seem a long time these days. The castings arrived in an outer jiffy bag with the figures bagged up loose in two Morrisons freezer bags inside, I would have expected some kind of box or padding but the figures were undamaged.

The castings are of a high quality with crisp detail, I always tend to look first at the facial detail which is very good and varied. This order consisted of Confederates marching at order arms, a pack of skirmishers and a command pack, although all were bundled in together, no separate packaging, which is OK I guess. The castings are robust with nice solid bayonets, I would have liked a little more variation in the poses, position of legs and arms etc but they will build into nice compact units. The command figures have lots of character including some great beards, there was a fair bit of flash between some arms and heads, but it cleaned away easily.

The uniform and kit is well defined and accurate, the subject of Confederate shell jacket production is a whole field of study by itself, there being many variants, but these look convincing. Trousers are all rolled up at the bottom, may have been nice to see a few tucked into socks. Muskets are well modelled as are straps and brass work on the cartridge boxes etc.

Overall I'm very happy with them, I plan to base these up for Johnny Reb II and the pose will allow for a tight shoulder to shoulder formation. I will start with a 20 figure mid war Reb regiment, these are not the ragged soldiers of the latter period, uniform is in good supply and is in good nick. The unit will consist of 17 privates, an officer, standard bearer and a drummer. Flags will be ordered from GMB designs in due course. Skirmishers will be 10 figure units, 2 per base. All Johnny Reb II units consist of 5 bases and each figure represents 20 men, so a 20 figure regiment represents around 400 men. This may well become my very own Nostalgia project!

First picture showing a selection of castings from the Confederate range.

More Germans, 4Ground buildings & the Airfix fountain!

Sunday morning again already, and I'm just back from an extremely wet dog walk, pouring with rain and howling wind but the hounds still need to be walked!

This week has been busy on the domestic front with new carpets and all of the furniture shifting that goes with it, as well as running a wheelchair bound friend to the GP and then to the local hospital for blood tests and an X Ray. Of course nothing goes as planned, the X Ray machine at Folkestone was out of order so we drove onto Dover passing the Battle of Britain Memorial on top of the Cliffs before dropping down into Dover Town Centre, a rather grimy place these days but full of magnificent Victorian architecture that tells of it's more prosperous past. We arrived at the hospital only to be told that the X Ray department had just closed for a lunch hour ...... what! in this day and age? .... so rather than sit about for an hour we gave up and drove back. We will try again during the coming week.

I  still managed a bit of hobby time and completed the German infantry platoon of 35 figures (I like 5 figures per base for my rifle/mg teams). These were painted after gluing down on the bases and priming as usual and turned out not too bad, my aim being to capture the tones of the 'Splinter' or Splittermuster camouflage on the figures wearing the Zeltbahn Poncho. The figures are by Peter Pig and I especially like the MG42 being fired over the shoulder of the ammo carrier, as often seen in news reel footage.

I also painted the Battlefront German HQ Objective marker, a nice little model to which I may add a flag, probably not accurate but I like flags!

The 4Ground order arrived and I'm keen to get building, the church looks good as does the cafe Grondree. The description on the 4Ground site for this model is quite interesting as it was the first French house to be Liberated on D Day. I also ordered some telegraph poles to run along the hedgerows.

Georges and Thérèsa Gondrée settled in a small Café next to Bénouville bridge after meeting at Cannes.  Georges, was an ex-banker with Lloyds and due to this was fluent in English, Thérèsa was from Alsace and could speak fluent German.  At the time of the invasion the Gondrées had three children and as their dissatisfaction grew toward the German invaders they started to support the resistance in Caen with information about the German Garrison.

  In the run up to D-Day, the Gondrées provided a huge amount of information to the British through Thérèsa being able to understand German conversations as she never let the German’s know she could speak their language.  This information became vital in Major Howard’s planning for his Coup De Main attack by his D-Company of the Ox and Bucks light infantry.  The information was critical and promptly provided, for example they enabled Major Howard to know the exact location of the explosive triggers in a bunker near the bridge that would blow up the bridge.

On the morning of the 6th of June 1944 the Gondrées were rudely awakened by the sound of gunfire and explosions, Georges made his way to the window where he was shot at by a British soldier mistaking him as a German Soldier.  He then took his family down to the cellar to await the outcome.  Later that day he and Thérèsa had been trying to discern the nationality of the soldiers and had decided that they were not German.  Not long afterward there was a knock at the door and Georges met two British Paratroopers, who he showed around so they would be sure there were no German soldiers inside.  Georges and Thérèsa were overcome with joy at the liberation and provided champagne to passing soldiers for the rest of the day.

Café Gondrée has the distinction of being the first French house liberated on D-Day.

And finally for now a big thanks to 'Norm' for adding the link to the Airfix resin fountain model, it has had a quick paint job and fits nicely into the centre of my Town Square. You see it below in all it's magnificence with two 'big cats' moving menacingly around it, they are of course Panzer VI Königstiger ( King Tiger) models by Forged in Battle.