Back after a break

Buying, and painting, and more painting!

     It's been a while but the fall of 2017 was pretty busy when it came to gaming related hobbies.  I picked up some new tools and started scooping up Matchbox cars for Gaslands.  Instead of reading it all I'll just start with pics and descriptions.

I had to get some items from GameCraftMinis.  This is one of his mdf compound kits I got (the roofs for the rooms aren't pictured) along with a couple more tank transporter boxes and the templates he makes for the spacecraft interior rooms.  Those are scaled down 2d pieces that will help you determine what you can match and how, along with how big it will be (you multiply your length by a set number depending on size, 20mm or 28mm).  After building the compound I covered edges with wood putty, put small rectangles in the corners (see upper left room) and then gave it a coat of non-skid paint, paint with sand in it.  Instead of having the roofs built into the kit I closed up their assembly holes and trimmed off the locater tabs.  It just needs a drybrush and some light weathering and it'll be ready for doors.

 

Soviet defendeers, Mig-21s and SU-24s

    For Little Wars 2018 I'm going to run an Invasion of Monster Island game using ufos, 1/285 Soviet aircraft, an alien mothership (to be built) and of course giant monsters.  The ufos come from ebay and were  one of eight styles in a package of  144.  I think they are for a boardgame.  I painted them up and put magnets in the bottom so the CorSec flightstands will work for all my air units.

1/1200 Japanese planes

  Aircraft in Naval Thunder  can be abstracted with d6s but I like modelling so I had to add some planes.  These are 1/1200 Japanese planes with which to harry any allied ships.  They are mounted on 18x18mm basswood bases using a thin brass rod.  Yes, I put propellers on them!  I do this for my 1/285 planes and I have the small punches to make them so why not?  At tabletop distance it doesn't add anything but I like it.  I have Betty's, Zeros, Vals, Kates, and a ton of seaplanes (including 15 individually mounted Jakes for my  IJJN).  In the future I may get some allied planes just to paint up.  In the background are 1/2400 French battleships waiting for their planes and labels to be done.

Jakes in progress.

     After poking around and reading some painting forums I figured I had to upgrade my paint shaking.  I have a Robart and it works fine but they can break (I'm on my 3rd).  I picked up this one from Amazon and it does a great job.  It has a setting so that it's off until you push down a paint bottle to mix and shuts off automatically.  Not super cheap but if you amortize it over the years of painting to do, it's a good investment.  

     We've been having painting challenges each month to motivate ourselves and this was the output from one of them, Panzerschiffe sinking merchant ships and some scratchbuilt barricades.  No labels needed on the merchants since they're more for dramatic effect than actual game objectives.  

The heat of summer

 Summertime in the city

This summer is seeing hot and humid weather come and go so my normal terrain building binge is smaller this year, I normally use spray cans for terrain and spray outside. But in the heat I managed to hit the Iron Maiden concert at Tinley Park, with Ghost opening.  An awesome show!
We had another painting challenge and even though my output this month is less, I predict a big pile of completed items next month.  Here's what was accomplished this month:
 I completed 6 1/600 non-combatants from PT Dockyard.  They were based up like my other ships and I just used boring names like "750tn coaster" instead of coming up with actual names, more generic that way?   I also tried out some soldering on the masts.  I've had bad luck with pieces breaking off my minis, after they were painted and done, and it's a drag.  So instead of using the supplied rod I took thin brass and knocked together some sturdier ones.  My soldering skills are very rough but hopefully with more practice it'll get better.

The rest of the new stuff.  We have 7 French 1/2400 GHQ destroyers (labels are on them now) for Naval Thunder; battleships are next for the French.  I also finished some 6mm sci-fi tanks from Adler/Darkest Star that I've had in bags for about 7 years.  There are 3 pieces of 6mm modern UK microarmor that were done.  These were bought in 1986 at GenCon and I've painted them 3 times already.  This is their final strip and repaint and will show up in some what-if Cold War games.  The garbage cans are resin from Scenic Express and will be used for scatter terrain, nothing fancy but useful.

 I finally got decals on my Timmee 1/48 AC130.  I found an old set of Microscale gunship decals among my modelling stuff and threw them on.  They aren't "historically accurate" for this particular bird but the bird is a plastic army plane with imaginary guns.  I think it dresses it up nicely.

I put the "Ghost Rider" nose art on it.  The big seam line is pretty pronounced on this toy and since the plastic is flexible it doesn't go away easily.  I could have gone all out on it but it's a game piece and if I put in that amount of time it'd never see time in a game.  

In progress...

  Here's what's in the pipeline so far.  My wife challenged me to build buildings for my imagi-nation modern Africa so work begins.  These are 2 foamcore buildings I started.  They'll get time in my 28mm games and will be generic enough to possibly fit into colonial games as well.  They need some paint and extras (doors, awnings, etc) but a few more of these and I'll have a nice base for commandos to raid.

While working on the buildings I thought I'd knock together some brick buildings for it, but realized I needed a few more.  Casting time!  And since I was messing around with my Hirst arts molds why not order his new brick sets and some sci-fi ones?  I don't like scribing brickwork but also don't want to always have to buy brick buildings.  These fit that middle ground nicely.  Shipping from Hirst was fast, I know there's more to order.

An MDF ruin that was sitting on my shelf for years came out of storage and was constructed.  Some rubble was glued on and I'll add a bit more of detail.  

The last 2 sections of my Hudson & Allen castle awaiting some dry brushing.  They were washed along with some homemade scatter terrain and an O scale RR building.  

The corral for 28mm western games.  It's mdf fencing from Gamecraft minis.  

More stripped down micro armor primed and ready for paint.  The 6mm pile is slowly going down.

A closer shot of one of the African buildings.  The roof is towel glued to a cardboard frame and is removable.