Sometimes Insomnia is a Good Thing

Sometimes not being able to sleep can work in your favour. Before going to bed last night, I decided to put in an hour painting some Land Ironclad bases I'd mounted previously in my usual green base colour. The ironclads were from "Objects May Appear" available via Shapeways, mounted on Brigade Models UK's 40x40mm bases. After getting all the bases coated once, I decided to putter around with painting the actual ironclads, since they aren't overly detailed, just nice simple shapes.

Once I got started I couldn't stop, at least in terms of doing some colour trials, so I now have my first land ironclad units almost ready to go:These are indigenous ironclads from the Ottoman Empire. Pretty crude compared to other nations', but effective (and cool looking). I painted the armour in a "metallic black sequin" colour, which may just really be a glossy black. Hopefully it holds up after varnishing.

The second (anti-aeronef) turret is an add-on from the pack of accessories availabe from Pat and Walt's Starship Emporium on Shapeways.

Another view. There are 2 more ironclads in the unit, awaiting paint.

As it turns out, the Imperial Chinese Army has bought "export models" of the same ironclad from the Ottomans. The export version has cheaper armour, and as the Chinese could only afford three, they'll all be slight unique in appearance, basically in the colour of the little roofs. One is completely done, other than finishing the base's green - which is where the whole process started to begin with!




The French Republic also has some ironclads from OMA, in particular this self-propelled artillery piece. I have four in total, two will be done with this wood chassis paint job, the others will be spiced up in nationalistic colours.

To defend their borders and coasts, the French also have their Victorian version of the Maginot Line and Atlantic Wall - killer gingerbread houses!This is still in a test phase, as I try out colours on it, but I like the gunmetal grey for the turrets and stacks, an antique copper for the smokestacks, and a metallic white for the "marble" balacony.

Since these windows are really about 3 stories high, I'll paint in some panes to break up their size a bit. Plus having an armoured building with massive windows is silly enough as it is! I still need to figure out the stats for this beast in land Ironclads.

Still in VSF, last fall I used some spare insulating clay to build up a couple of terrain pieces, including this volanco. I'm finally starting to paint it, got the basic rock done and the first coat of lava. The cork patches will be painted as the trunks of trees, then green scrubbing pad glued on top.
Back to my town and village for eastern India, I've puttered around a bit more on them - almost done!


My North American 18-19th century fort has also gotten a bit further ahead, I'm just on the touch-up stage now.

Ditto for my North American windmill piece:
And then switching to 3mm, I've painted up one of SPC's stone churches as a brick church for my 3mm ACW Terrible Sharp Sword project. Still a work-in-progress:
And I've been messing around with SPC's original 3mm ruins set, these are four identical pieces, two being done up in white, two in grey concrete, mainly intended for Vietnam. If you look closely, you'll see the ruin with the story that was painted/wallpapered blue has a picture frame hanging crookedly on the wall - now I need to figure out what picture I can paint inside that frame!
As always, all the pics can be seen in a larger size by clicking on them.