Jumping Around History

 

As the title suggests, the second half of November saw two very distinct periods.

 

First up, I cleared anothe set of minis that have been lying around far too long. I think I got this German Heavy Mortar as a Christmas present sometime around 2014. It got assembled a year or so ago and then say on the WIP shelf for far too long. Pleased to say that when I got it down and set to work, it was a quick paint job and a nice distraction from wading through 144 French Napoleonics:

 

It's cetainly not a ground breaking paint job but it's completed, and in the amy. It even saw action the other day. In time honoured tradition of fielding newly painted minis, it did nothing and died quickly! The figures are all Warlord in metal. 

The other minis squeezed in at the end of November was the second battalion of French:

All very blue! It's fair to say that with Napoleonics you have to strike a balance between the paint job and the time it takes. You could spend ages on these with multiple layers of blues, some transition on all the white straps and other touches, but not sure how you'd ever get an army done. These guys are avergaing 45 minutes a man and I am half way through the four battalions. The figures are all Perry Miniatures metals.

I now have a busy desk with about 107 minis on it - a mixture of the remaining French, some more of Sigmar, some Napoleonic British and  a small smattering of 10mm. I have set a target of all of those done by the end of Janary - a tall order! I am also not sure how much will be done in December. It appears some kind of lock down may be coming which I have to say could easily hamper or hinder painting depending on what they do with schools. 

In any case, I shall have at least one more post this month for your reading pleasure, so don't forget to check back later. I hope all my readers have a good Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Rubicon Panther

 

Continuing the theme from the last post of "models I have had for far too long," the next complete mini is a Panther tank that I think I got way, way back in the black Friday sale of 2013! This particular tank is a Rubicon kit that I picked up along with one their

The model has a tyical stop/start history. It sat unloved for it's first six months, until one day when I had a building frenzy and constrcuted this along with a few other vehicles for Bolt Action. After that, it spent years on the shelf without any porgress until two years ago. Then, I was commissioned to paint three tiger tanks and whilst I had the airbrush out I did this and another one of my vehicles - laying down the base colour and camo. It then spent another two years on the shelf. 

However, as I try to reduce the lead mountain during 2021, my first goal is to clear the half built shelf - where this has sat during that time. It finally bullied it's way to the front of the queue, and this is the result:

I have taken a fairly basic approach. Once I had dusted it down, I added decals, weathered them in and then hit it with a thinned agrax wash. Afer that,I drybrushed it, chipped it and painted in a few details. 

Now at that point I would normally seal it with Klear floor varnish before adding oil paints for weathering and then pigments, finishing it all off with a matt varnish. However, because I want to get stuff done and I think it is at a pefectly good table top standard I decided to finish there. It has now been put in storage with my German Army in the hope that it may one day see the table top. 

Bingo wise, it is another box done so I am now at 70 points - I need to up my game a little on that front.

Boom, Boom, Boom! German 10.5 Howitzer.

In the ever going quest to one day beat my Bolt Action nemisis Steve, I have finally got around to adding some heavier firepower to my 28mm Germans.

I have gone for a leFH 18/40 10.5 cm Howitzer to hopefully blow a few infantry squads off the table.

Quite a fun model to paint this, combining a different range of techniques. I painted the crew exaclty as I would my infantry which was a simple enough job. However, the gun got a similiar treatment to the vehicles in the force, and I made use of oil washes to hopefully give it a beat up look. Some pigments to represent soot and a matt varnish sealed the deal.

One thing that I did do different to this was to mount the crew on the base in a way that they can't be removed. I normally prefer to have them detachable, but for speed they were simply glued on to the base. I did leave the gun loose for ease of tansport.

Plenty of other stuff for my Bolt action guys sat on the shelf, but it's 20mm next up!

Messing Around with a Light Box

I decided a while ago that I need to improve the photos I take for the blog. I tend to find that even with lots of lights on them they are dark, especially in the winter when there is very little natural light around.

I know that a lot of people use light boxes so after finding a cheapo one on Amazon for £7.99, I took the plunge. The light box itself is just an expanding wire framed box with white cloth over it. I didn't get the set that comes with lights because I decided in the short term that I would see if I could use my daylight lamps.

After setting it up, here are the results:

Here is a comparison shot of my recent Skaven both how I normally to do the photos (top) and the light box one (bottom):

I can't personally see a massive difference, perhaps I need some better lights? Also, ironing the back ground cloths that come with the light box wouldn't hurt. The main positive is that it doesnt matter how dark and miserable the weather is, the light will be constant.

Christmas 2015

Little bit late, due to family festivites, drinking and general merriment but here is my Christmas haul.

First up I have some Bolt Action reinforcements:

For the Germans we have some artillery (a 10.5cm gun no less), a Flakvierling and a heavy mortar whilst the Brits get a 25 pounder gun.

For my naps I got a box set of Perry Miniatures Brits. This should give me enough to field three batalions if I use the leftover Warlord guys and get some more command minis:

Next up was these:

That should give me a good start to get a Dacian army going for Hail Caeser. Going to need a lot more though.

The big one:

Been wanting this for a while, ever since I had a couple of games a while ago. Was great fun and might even be a game I can get the wife involved in!

Now this little gift seems insignificant:

It's a chargable daylight lamp. It should allow me to set up a collapsible paint station down stairs. These means I can paint more often as well as keeping the wife company. Win! 

The only down side to all these gifts is I now have an unapinted mini pile bigger than ever before - going to be busy.

Panzer IV Complete

Realised the other day that I don't think I have posted a single painted model in November, figured I had best sort that out. I intended to do so earlier this week but the arrival of my newborn son somewhat distracted me!

Managed to finish off the Panzer IV that has been staring at me for about 8 weeks or so. It's the plastic kit from Warlord, not bad to put together. I painted it in the same style as my Hanomags, which was basically to hit it with my airbrush then weather it. I was happy with the final result, it should look just the part supporting my grenadiers across the battlefield.

So lets keep this simple, have some pictures:

I messed up a litte with the Schurtzen - I didn't put much effort into the back of it as I thought it would mostly be covered, but some of it shows. Oh well. I'm also still not sure if I have mastered the use of pigments - the different coloured mud was more by accident than design. What do you all think?

Plenty more to come over the next couple of weeks hopefully, got several things to update when time allows.

Birthday Swag

Been a little while since I last posted. I've been busy working and had a few days away with the family visiting Legoland and Warwick Castle, which was a nice break away. The main reason we went away was for my brithday, and of course, there were gifts involved. Luckily for me, many of them were hobby related due to having furnished the parents with a Warlord gift list and the wife with an Amazon one. 

Here is what I got towards my various projects:

My Bolt Action British force got another chunk of infantry along with a medium mortar and MMG. This is good news as it means that force is well on its way to being a decent army - I already have a Sherman Firefly waiting to be painted so this will build it up nicely. 

Mr Germans recieved this little diamond:

A Pak40 75mm gun. I like this because it will give me the option to field a good anti tank gun without having to take a tank - something worth experimenting with. 

Final hobby present was this:

I alrady have the core rules and the Overlord book so getting this was a bonus. I think my move into 20mm WW2 will be a new year thing as got a bit much on at the moment and funds only stretch so far. 

Other presents included some various gift cards, cash, a radio control car (which is great fun chasing the four year old daughter around) and I treated myself to a 1600 piece Lego Tie-Fighter, which is taking some work. So overall, a good birthday was had. 

Hobby wise the first four Taliban will be done soon and other things are moving along so there should be a quite a few updates this month. As always, please give my facebook page A Cardboard Fortress a like.

A Few More Germans

A quick little blog post to tide things over, I have competed another half a dozen Germans:

This lot are split down the middle, three are a Warlord Games late war plastic Germans (now discontinued I think) and the other three are Artizan miniatures. The later three are metal and a joy to paint, really nice chunky details. Here they are in their own:

These three guys will allow to field three 10 man squads, or act us swap outs for my panzerfaust toting guys, if they ever actually get to fire them!

Pleased with them, seem to have cleared quite a bit of the Bolt Action back log of late.

As always, visit my face book page and give us a like: The Cardboard Fortress

Puma and Panzer IV Progress

As any World War 2 war gamer will tell you, you need tanks. Infantry are the back bone of any force, but tanks are where it's at. 

So without that in mind, I have made progress on a bit of armour support for my Bolt Action German force. This required breaking out the airbrush. To say I found this worrying would be an understatement. Having used it once, I had stripped it down and cleaned it down before putting it back together. But would it work was the question? The answer was a resounding yes! For me, this is a great boon as it means I can use it more regularly because I was concerned that I had use it once and then broke it. 

Anyway, on to the pics. I went with the same scheme as the half tracks, here is the Panzer IV:

And here is the Puma:

They've also had the first stage of weathering in these pics, using a sponge I first applied hull red followed by metallics in the most worn areas. 

Still a long way to go with these, but hoping to get stuck into them soon. 

As always, more updates at The Cardboard Fortress

Heaven Is A Half Track Part 3

It has taken far longer than I had originally planned but finally, the three half tracks that I started on a few months ago are done! I could say it was because I tried out new techniques, but the truth is that I was a bit afraid I would wreck them, so kept them at the back of the queue. 

But in any case, on with the pictures.

This was the first one done, you have already seen it in Part 2:

And the next one, with a bit of stowage added from a pack bought off of eBay:

And the third and final one:

And here are the three of them all together:

I think they look quite good together. They have been a great learning curve for some techniques, and if I were to do them again there are some things I would do differently. That all being said, I can now mechanize a whole platoon of infantry - just a shame transports aren't much good in Bolt Action!

Stay tuned for more updates to come, including more armour!

As always, please feel free to drop by my Facebook page, The Cardboard Fortress

More Grenadiers!!

Not a massive leap forward, but another unit of 6 late war grenadiers have made it off the desk and into the display cabinet:

The front view

The rear view

Not overly happy with these, I think I rushed them abit. On the plus side, unlike the earlier unit I feel they have some more character with the bare head and soft cap mixed in there. Again they are kitted out with assault rifles and will act in concert with my other unit as my spearhead. I have my first game of Bolt Action next week for quite a while so will give them a try out then.

Overall, this takes me not too far short of 50 infantry. I have also nearly finished the other two halftracks and I am going through a building phase with various things and seriously considering a few other projects, so I am hoping for quite a few updates for you all over the next couple of weeks. I might even get an army shot or two done next week when the little one starts at school and it's safe to take them out and display them.

As always, please drop by my facebook page, The Cardboard Fortress and give me a like for more regular and random updates.

Heaven is a Halftrack, Part 2

I have to first explain my nearly month long absence - real life can be a pain sometimes. Work, children and holidays have all got in the way. I also always notice that isn't it worst when all you have to do is those few little bits? I can often find all the time in the world to get a model to the 90% stage, but sometimes getting that base done or that final highlight on eludes me. And I don't like posting half done stuff.

However, I have finally finished one of my three half tracks - my first Bolt Action armour. Here are some general shots:

Above you see the finished article. I am quite please with how this has come out overall, especially since it is the first real time I have airbrushed a tank.

Front and back shots. I did neglect the inside a little bit. I meant to heavily weather the inside foot area to represent all the ware and tear but forgot until quite late in the game and decided not to risk making a mistake. Finally, a close up of the weathering:

Essentially the techniques I have used after the base layers was sponge chipping, some oil washes then streaked before adding mud around the tracks and wheels. I then splattered some fresh mud up the side of the tank.

It's all been a good learning experience, and I feel ready to tackle the next one and maybe vary the weathering a little bit.

In the pipeline is another blog post within a week and some more grenadiers. Progress is being made!

As always, more regular updates on my facebook page, A Cardboard Fortress. Feel free to give me a like.