Right, picking up from where I was, these have been some rather hectic days with me setting up a new office, choosing furniture and all that. And it's not to become easier for now on, these will be the last peaceful days As I said before I had a few models belonging to the TOEs that needed painting, so I stuck them on a wood strip with blu-tack (this was white anyway), and gave them a coat of Games Workshop Skull White spray. Must be the only good thing that ever came out of GW After well dry overnight, I thinned some Vallejo Acrylic paint of the appropriate German Dark Yellow (I have some quibbles with Vallejo's colour selection but...) with window washing which has lower surface tension than water, so it's 'wetter'. This made the thinned paint flow nicely to the darker corners leaving convex surfaces with a nice natural highlight. After a few good hours to dry up and let the acrylics cure, I went over to the green and brown camo colours, again thining a bit as the paint was too thick as it came out of the tube. On a couple of models the paint was thinned a lot, if necessary applying second coats of the same colour. This happened for instance to the Maus which looks rather ghastly, but it ended up rather well after shading and highlighting (or one might say these helped disguise my lousy work ), but anyway the actual Maus looked like it was painted by a drunk Hitlerjunge after meeting Hitler at the Bayreuth festival. View attachment 28998
This is rough going, I'm being plagued by a quirky internet connection and sometimes as it just happened I'm in the middle of a post and then again it crashes Visiting a few railway modelling stores I managed to buy a variety of flock that would make Wotnochad Phil proud of me These are only a few of those I bought to last me a lifetime or two! The secret is in mixing several into a tub. They will come in several textures, and to make the mix a bit more homogenous I graded them through a tea strainer I bought for the purpose. This is a batch of 6 Panthers from the previous posts, stuck to their bases. Some of these will have some bald patches, but the flocking will cover these. Sticking will be provided by white wood glue, just make sure yours dries up transparent. Apply the glue in more or less connected spots while William watches approvingly, then lay the batch on the bottom of a tub with your present batch, and let the flock flow over everyting. Alternatively you could sprinkle your flock over the bases laid on a sheet of paper through the sieve. Don't press on the flock, and don't worry if you have everything shrouded under green dust, you can blow or brush the excess later after it's completely dry. Mind the SWMBO, though :p More later, as the beauty of this is that it is an incremental process, that is, you can add more stuff later if you feel like it. For instance, you can add more flocking on top of this one making it thicker, you can add bits of hedging, tree trunks, stones, etc. The Bonsai Diorama Les was talking about a few days ago As a matter of fact as my Regiment HQ base will be somewhat larger, 4x4cm, to contain one Panther, one K-wagen and a radio truck, I may give it a different treatment. We'll see later.
Good effort, looks like you're getting the hang of it and I wish we had sunlight like that to pick out the details for us !
Life's a beach, and work hasn't allowed me much time to carry on with this, but I haven't forsaken hope yet! The TOE for my Pansa Divisia is located in Google Docs here, it shows how much I still have to do, which is a lot! If the link I gave isn't working please say so by PM, it's the first time I work with this
All right, so I've more or less finished the Division's Pz Regiment, time to take the plunge and tackle the Infantry. I rummaged around and found one box of semi-painted Heroics & Ros Germans. H&R figures have been rather out of fashion lately, people are going for Adler and GHQ figures which are indeed superior, and the GHQ as usual are superlative, but as I have these right now that's what I'm going to do. Maybe later when I do the Volksturm I may go for GHQ Another fact is that GHQ are several times more expensive. So this is the ragbag I've got. I'm sure I have others somewhere, together with some from Main Force Miniatures, but you know how it is, when you're looking for something you'll never find it when you want it First of all I'm going to sort this out and give them a bath. Ideally I need 4 battalions x 9 bases worth of figures for the two Abteilungen which at 4-5 per base would be about 150 figures. I haven't even counted these ones. Most of these figures were painted at least partially some 10 years ago using the basic technique of same green overall, nothing else. Of course I'll have to do better this time! Either I get new figures or use the painted ones. Removing paint from 6mm figures is something I'll never do again, I tried several methods and it never works! So over the extant coat of whatever will go a layer of Humbrol matt white, shot with an airbrush. So enough waffle, I have to start, will do one Abt. at a time.
For all this once again I am going to follow the directives laid by Mr. Ritterkrieg and his infantry painting guide . He's using GHQ figures which are bigger and beefier than H&R, which is not to say they're not excellent, because that's what they are! Here is one photo from his guide, and I call your attention that the figs are 6-7mm tall to eye level at most. 6-7mm I said! He must be slightly mad, because he actually paints camouflage schemes on his figures in this scale! LMG Gunners: with their smocks done. The MGs and ammo belts still need highlighting and the boots need gaiters but you can get an idea of the variety of clothing. Blurred edge, plane tree, tiger and autumn oak leaf. The only one missing is Pea dot but there are some others with that pattern - not shown. I have deliberately mixed the uniforms on some figures. Sculpts are modified only in that the winter hood is removed. I have used the Winter, Afrika and standard infantry poses. He does not explain how he did this, at least at this stage. Perhaps there is something in the GHQ forum, I'll have to check later, at least for curiosity's sake. I have a friend who is very much short-sighted. As a consequence he paints very close to his eyes and sees the figures incredibly magnified. He can paint 6mm figures with the same level of detail as you and me can paint 20-25mm figures! Concerning the post above, I'm going to repaint old figures but this is an extreme measure, this is something that if I had new figures on hand I would not do.
Either I get new figures or use the painted ones. Removing paint from 6mm figures is something I'll never do again, I tried several methods and it never works! If it enamel paint....here's a fullproof method...steep them in oven cleaner!!! And after a few days wash under a cold tap with a toothbrush for the nooks and crannies. I recently recycled a lot of my 25mm Minifigs "Mythical Earth" figures and sold them on to a friend. They came up shiny bright!!!
I tried that, plus paint stripper, brake fluid, onion soup, virgin mare's milk, everything! I even had them listen to my former mother-in-law singing for five hours on a row! It's all bloody hopeless! One thing is 25mm figures, 6mil is something else, no matter how much you manage to strip there will always remain traces that on a small figure will be disproportionate. But thanks all the same. How much did you say you were offering for the old witch? ------------ My best story regarding this was once I was asked to strip and repaint a few 1:1250 scale white metal ships for a friend. In the paint stripper tub they went. Next day I fished them out but... no turrets! They were plastic, they melted in the stripper! Was he furious! :p
So, the Infantry. As I'd said before, I had found a stock of old, unfinished figures and went ahead with them. As these figures were being painted some 10 using the boooooring old style, I decided to use them as they were but giving them a coat of matt white first. As usual with wargame figures I stick them to wooden strips some 20cm long using only a light dab of white glue so you can pry them off easily later. This gives me a good grip and allow for my technique of repeating the same brush stroke 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-etc times, then repeat for the next different stroke. You are not painting individual figures, you're painting say 20 torsos, thens 20 right arms, then 20 helmets, etc. In case your figures are rather varied, you can at least group them on the strip. So after this white primer is quite dry I went over then with the basic feldgrau, somewhat thinned to allow the white to shine a bit through the green layer.
After this was dry (am I repetitive or what!), I gave them a thinned out (synthetic paint thinner) coat with MiG Dark Wash (see here, I find this works very well with acrylics and the pigment is extremely fine), although I'm sure acryllic black with some brown would work as well, thinned with Windex. Same technique as for the tanks: let dry a bit then lightly remove excess with a flat stiff brush moistened in thinner (would this work with acrylic?), and after all dry and cured, it took a light drybrush coat to bring relief out in this case using Luftwaffe RLM 02! Next details. Gas mask cannisters, boots, other equiment, wooden weapon parts with some brown, entrenching tools handles in a light wood (yes, you can see them!) then weapon barrels and the MGs using a mixture of black with dark grey. I don't like pure black as too harsh. Finally faces and hands. I used a Vallejo dark flesh, and I was careful not to splodge it around too much. Faces are a problem, just a little quick dab to avoid spreading paint over chest and shoulders which is the commonest error. In this case better too little then too much. Hands are easier, you only need a little dab over the gun. After these were finished time to paint the helmets, carefully not to go over the face, but of course overpainting any excess face over the helmet At the end I painted the individual figures base stubs they come with with the colour I intend to use as base undercolour, in this case a dark umber, and finally a final coat of very diluted wash, and they're ready for basing.
These H&R figures come in strips of about 10 per strip, and you have the choice of cutting them up as individual figures or you can leave them all together. I like to spread them apart to have wider brush space Remember you are not painting individual figures, you're paintiga armies and you have to use mass techniques. Of course you can come around later and give your command figures a little more detail if you want. A thing I forgot was that Panzerscrecke, heavy MG tripods and the mortar barrel and legs were painted German Dark Yellow before the final dark wash. Also before basing I still want to give gun barrels a lighr drybrush with Gun Metal, and machine gun ammo belts will have a suggestion of Brass. Those wooden strips are in this case a 2m length of 10x5mm strips I bought in a DIY shop for €2, which I sawed into 20cm lengths so I have a nice supply now. A good idea is always to have various strips in several stages of finish so if one group is drying or curing you can work in another group. If you have any questions shoot
Still regarding helmet colours, remeber the Germans used to apply camouflage paint and simple mud on their helmets, so no need to be dogmatic here
Haha, I was just told in the rules forum that the TOE I want for my Pz Grens is: 1x HQ 9x Inf 3x MG 1x Mortar 81mm 1x Mortar 120mm 1x 20mm Flak Which means I'm some bits short! I'm forging ahead with what I have and will have the stragglers catch up later
Haha, I was just told in the rules forum that the TOE I want for my Pz Grens is: 1x HQ 9x Inf 3x MG 1x Mortar 81mm 1x Mortar 120mm 1x 20mm Flak Which means I'm some bits short! I'm forging ahead with what I have and will have the stragglers catch up later Pas de problem, must be an understrength unit?
Of course you're right, but I like to have my units up to full TOE and when I'm writing the game scenario that's when I whittle them down Look at this picture and tell me this painting method for all the extra work is worth it or not! It may take a bit more effort, but once it's done, it's done! Look especially at the ammo carrier at the back and compare with the one below it on the strip in the old style.
