Finished Tanks & Ruined Factory

Well, by "finished" of course I mean they need a coat of Dullcote to really finish them off, and the tanks need a coat of Future Floor Polish over their decals to seal them, but "artistically", these are all done!  Yay me!

First up is the 6mm ruined factory from Gamecraft Miniatures, with a roof added on by me, as well as doors and ruined walls made from Gamecraft's ruined floors.  This is the front, complete with Nazi eagle.  The front pillars etc. were painted as being fancier than the basic walls, and show up a big grubbier looking in real life, the white reflected the flashbulb well in this pic:

Here's an interior shot, the office area is where the turquoise walls are, the rest was factory:

Another view of the interior, showing the one problem area I had, what to do with the reverse side of that fancy entranceway.  It was either try to paint by hand the windows and door, or...

Build a pile of rubble to put in front of the blank wall to cover up that it doesn't match the exterior.  This is what I came up with, a wooden base with some cork bits, tin foil paper, a pin or two, and the sprue from a set of Shapeways aircraft I'd recently prepped.  I also used some cardstock as roof/upper floor pieces.

A close-up of it.  I'd built it so one side, that would go up against the wall, was supposed to be tall and cover up the blankness, but as you'll see in the next pic, somehow I misjudged the height and it's still short.  Not sure what I'll do, either make another or keep adding to this.  I do like the bits.

The rubble in place - as you can see, the wall isn't really covered at all.

The temperature and humidity around here finally broke this week, after 3 weeks of high temps and humidity that meant I didn't really want to do any critical painting or decalling.  But with this window of opportunity, I finally decalled up some tanks that have taken way too long to finish. 

This is the whole collection, although the American halftracks and armored cars still need final detailing before they get their decals (I also have to figure out where the decals go on them!).

British Comets to the centre and left, one of those American halftracks on the right:

ISU-152 up close:

More ISU-152s!

On the left a couple of T-34/85s, I did a pack of 5 (all of these are GHQ), 3 in one platoon, 2 in the other.  The T-34/85 up front is obviously a hero of the Soviet Union with all those kills on the barrel!  Decals here are a mix of GHQ and I-94.

The other platoon (2 tank platoon) of T-34/85s.

My fleet of JS-3s!  These heavy tanks were in platoons of 2, so my five-pack gave me 2 platoons and a HQ tank.  The red numbering and star didn't show up as well as I'd hoped, but within historical reality.

Another view of the JS-3s.

 As always, clicking on the photos brings up bigger views of them, although these small scales aren't necessarily prettier the closer you get!

3 & 6mm Paintjobs in Progress

Hehehe, I said "paintjobs".  Here are some of the things currently on painting table #2 now that the big German factory is finished (pictures to come).  First up are some 3mm wood churches for Terrible Sharp Sword ACW gaming, the miniatures are from Bay Area Dockyards:

 Most of the painting is don, now I'm in the touch-up cycle, correcting all my mistakes from the first pass!  The pieces are ok, these ones didn't need any fixing, I have a lot of other Bay Area Dockyards that need sanding after I patched some pitting in the resin.  Not tragic problems, but two extra steps in the process.

Next up is a 6mm bridge from what used to be Simply Six - I think Picoarmor carries the range in the US (at least he carries the 3mm stuff from Simply Six).  This is actually DONE!  Yes, believe it folks!  It just needs sealing:

It's a really nice piece, none of the Simply Six stuff ever needed fixing, just a wash and straight to painting.

These 6mm ruins are also from Simply Six:

These are still a work in progress, I usually dabble with them when I paint left over from one of the other pieces, I add a bit to the rubble piles, and now just need to focus on finishing them with some grays and browns.

Finally, here's the Stalingrad Grain Elevators in 6mm from JR Miniatures:

The bulk of the painting is done, just have to do the gravel on the roof, drybrush the green and blue roofing, and do the metal tanks and pipes (and latticework on the one side). 

Reapermas Arrives at Twothreesixmm

Last night I came home to find a large, large box left on my front porch by UPS - my Reaper Bones Kickstarter package had arrived!  Reapermas at last!  I had pledged at the Vampire Level (all that that ended up entailing is in the picture below - click to see the whole thing) and picked up some extras:

• Cthulhu (a huge, huge figure!)
• Undead (Bone) Giant
• Clockwork Dragon
• Mythos Monsters
• Deep Dwellers
• Extras of the IMEF Marines and Nova Corps
• Carrying case for figures

When I originally pledged, my plan was to use some of the Lovecraftian figures for pulp gaming, the non-fantasy Zombie Hunters and Chronoscope for pulp, VSF, and/or modern spy gaming, and the sci-fi figures for topping up Star Wars.  The clockwork dragon is for VSF as some mad Prussian science project.  Some of the fantasy I'd paint myself to top up my collection of plastic collectible pre-paints and 1980s-era metal for Warhammer Fantasy-universe and Conan/Kull skirmishing, with some also being set aside for my young nephew as his first painting projects.

However, since then, despite my best efforts, I started three new projects this winter - and without really planning it this way, Reapermas actually supports two of those projects better than it does anything I outlined above (other than getting my nephew started at painting).

One project gathering steam has been Mythic India, and a ton of the figures above will work for it - the familiars, a couple of the necromancers, the skeletons and mummies, swamp things, owlbear, griffon, and the female storm giant (imagine her painted blue as the avatar of an Indian goddess...).  Even the spiky dark heroes and elves can work in the setting with the right paint job and mindset.

The other project is gaming with miniatures in the world of the Feng Shui RPG - for those not familiar with it, it basically encapsulates the best of 1980s and 1990s Hong Kong movies in one grand setting.  So Chinese eunuch sorcerers with Shaolin monks with gun fu mobsters with strange science fiction.  I'm not sure of what rules to use yet - Osprey and Ganesha Games have announced a Hong Kong set based on the Song system that will be my first stop - but I've started collecting minis for it.

Reapermas helps with some gun-toting heroes, including a perfect figure for Furious George, second in command of the Jammers faction (yes, I know Furious was a chimp and that's a gorilla, but I'll work with it).  The IMEF and Nova can work as Buro soldiers/police, perhaps the Wheel too.  Some creatures will do as demons for the 69 AD timeline too, although I have some other figures (in metal) from Reaper that will be better (and work as cyborg-demons, aka abominations).

My third new project is the Monster Hunter International setting in 15mm, so theorectically out of scale for this, BUT that giant head monster (can't remember its D&D name), the green and fire haunts, the vermin, the swamp things, and the specials I got - undead giant, Cthulhu, Mythos monsters, deep dwellers, ALL will work for 15mm too!

It's like I'm a genius but don't even know it.  Of course, it's probably 50 years of painting to get this all done, but I'm looking forward to it.

There's been good threads on how to work with the "Bones" material circulating around, so I now have to read up on that, certainly some of the figures need a bit of re-shaping after their travels.