Paint Queuemas Day 6: US Army in MOPP Gear

"On the sixth day of Paint Queuemas..."

Today's entry is another group of Eureka Miniatures - some 28mm US Army in MOPP Gear. This is a great range of figures with a lot of variety beyond even those I have here. If I had one criticism, it's that the mold lines are kind of tricky to see and remove because they often run along seams, pockets, etc.

This is another bunch of miniatures I've done using zenithal priming and glazing. The fatigues are done by painting one coat of Dark Green ink, then a coat of GW Camoshade, and then I applied blotches Vallejo Medium Brown and Medium Olive, then did a final wash of Camoshade to tone the transitions down and blend it all together. Yes, I know this isn't true US Army woodland camo as it lacks black but I decided against including it since it didn't look nice and took away from the shading. All the webbing is Reaper Worn Olive, washed with a coat of GW Camoshade.

Doing the flesh was surprisingly easy, as I opted to simply paint the brows and cheeks with Vallejo Flat Flesh, and then washing it with a heavy application of Fleshshade and Sepia. Once I filled the lenses with Testors Canopy Glue after sealing, it gives the effect of deeply sunk eyes inside a hood. Gunmetal was done with basecoat of Dark Grey and a coat of Black ink.

As I wanted to go with a post apocalyptic "Twilight 2000" vibe, I kept the bases very sparse of vegetation, opting solely for rocky soil using a variety of craft paint. I did not include much dirtying of their fatigues, as I wanted to give the impression that they'd just been deployed or airdropped somewhere.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's post!

Paint Queuemas Day 4: "The Beast", Soviet Tankers

 

"On the fourth day of Paint Queuemas...."

And now for something completely different. It's been years since I've painted a unit of true 28mm miniatures, so I decided to add to my burgeoning Cold War collection with this Soviet tank crew from Eureka Miniatures that are definitely NOT based on a certain action movie from 1988 😉.

To speed up painting, these are zenithal highlight primed and then painted using glazing. For the khaki uniforms, I applied one coat of thinned Vallejo German Camo Beige, and then two diluted coats of GW Earthshade. The helmets, gloves, and boots are thinned Vallejo Leather Brown, covered with two diluted coats of Secret Weapon Soft Body Black. Because there's so much brown, I wanted something to offset that, so I chose to paint the gasmasks in Vallejo Golden Olive, which was then given one coat of Dark Green ink wash and then two coats of GW Camo shade.

The gunmetal is Dark Grey craft paint, with two coats of Soft Body Black over that and the bakelite AK parts are Vallejo Orange Brown, washed with GW Sepia. Lenses are Vallejo Light Turquoise with a Blue ink wash and buckles are AK Gunmetal.

I painted the bases uses multiple light coats of earth toned craft paint. To get the dusty boot effect, I dampened the figures boot with a clean brush and let the craft paints "bleed" unto it via capillary action. Then, when I did the final highlight, I did a light dry brush over the soles and front of each boot. A very easy and convincing effect!

Finally, I sealed them all and added some Testors Canopy Glue to the mask lenses. Cool little squad, now I just need to pick up the Rubicon Models T-55 tank for their ride!

Soviet Motorized Infantry in Afghanistan

I recently finished up more miniatures that had been sitting half complete in the paint queue for months now, this time some of Eureka Miniatures' Soviet Motorized Infantry. I had started in on the flesh and blocking in colors when these were delivered and set them aside, only to collect dust. I'm glad I picked them up again to finish because, like most of Eureka's works, the detail is super crisp and a joy to paint.

The most iconic part of the Soviet uniform in Afghanistan was the KZS jumpsuit, which was simply a light camouflage overall worn over the soldier's BDU. To go along with my Soviets in NBC suits (see below), I wanted the squad to have a bold colored KZS of olive green and desert sand. I used Vallejo Medium Olive and progressively highlighted it with Vallejo Light Olive, then I washed it with diluted GW Earthshade, then highlighted the high points of folds with a 50/50 mix of Light Olive and white, then did one more washed of diluted GW Earthshade. The "splotches" are done by blocking out each one with Reaper Faded Khaki and then painting the inside of each with Reaper Amber Gold, leaving a tiny rim of Khaki visible. This helps to blend camouflage patterns into the garment. I finished with yet another wash of GW Earthshade, but only in the recesses of folds to help blend in the splotches.

Flak vests, bags, and chest rigs are all Vallejo Russian Uniform, highlighted with white to help them appear faded from constant use, all once again washed with GW Earthshade (I'm really starting to love this wash...). Flesh here is my normal process - a base of Vallejo Medium Flesh, progressively highlighted with Vallejo Flat Flesh, and finally Basic Skintone, then washed with GW Fleshshade. Gunmetal is done in Vallejo Dark Grey, highlighted with a 50/50 mix of Dark Grey and Vallejo Grey Blue, and washed with P3 Armour Wash. As I shoot more in my personal life, I'm getting a better sense of what truly weathered, "blued" gunmetal looks like and I think this recipe is fairly close to reality. The wood furniture is Vallejo Brown Leather with some Brick Red mixed in and the iconic bakelite magazines are Vallejo Red Leather; both are washed with GW Fleshshade.

The bases are Territorial Biege, highlighted in Khaki, drybrushed in Vallejo Desert Sand, then washed with diluted layers of Secret Weapon Sewer Water. The bricks are simply washed in diluted Brick Red and a mix of arid-style grass is applied.

Special Weapons Section

Rifle Section

Additionally, I repainted some of my old Soviets in NBC gear from a few years ago to more closely match this squad. Repaints included some work on shading and washing the suits and masks in order to make them look dirtier, some minor repaints of the weapons (particularly the RPGs), and repainted the bases.

And here's a glamour shot of both squads together. Now all they need is a stateless, stealth operative to track down or a giant mecha to defend...

Tutorial: Information/Propaganda Kiosks

A unique and visually-appealing piece of scatter terrain is an information or propaganda kiosk. These were common in European cities in the late 19th and early 20th century, being covered in advertisements, news, and propaganda posters, and sometimes housed telephones or informative guides. They ran the gamut in terms of shape and size from squares, hexagons, or cylinders; from the size of a single person to large structures that were buildings in their own right. 

Kiosks are quick and easy to make, provide a nice piece of LOS-blocking hard cover, and can be customized for use in games as diverse as historicals, moderns, post-apocalypse, or grimdark 40K/Necromunda. In trying to get terrain finished for Adepticon, for this tutorial I'll be making four for the latter.

Materials

• Wood dowel/PVC piping (I'm using 1 3/4" wood dowel cut @ ~2" tall)
• Metal washers (2 per kiosk, slightly larger than the dowel/pipe. I'm using 2" washers)
• Plastic bases (2 per kiosk, one about the same size as the washers and another smaller diameter. I'm using 40mm rounded lip and small flying bases)
• Cereal cardboard, cut into strips
• Plasticard rod (for rivets. Not really necessary unless you want a gothic-industrial look)
• Bitz 
• Super glue
• X-acto knife
• Sandpaper
• Paint
• Advertising/Propaganda posters (sized appropriately for scale, do some internet searches and simply resize your printer output)

1. Cut the pipe or dowel to whatever size you want. I prefer somewhere between 1.5-2" tall to provide cover from elevated positions and for enough surface space to place lots of posters. You want to cut these pieces out at perfect 90 degree angles, so use a miter box or table saw. Rough up the metal washer with a piece of sandpaper for between adhesion and glue the dowel to the washer, looking at it from the top down to make sure it's centered correctly.

2. Repeat the process with the other washer at the top of the dowel, being sure to rough up both sides of the washer, since you'll be gluing bases to the top of it. Again, do you best to center the dowel properly.

3. Glue the larger base to the top of the washer to build up the "roof".

4. Glue the smaller base to the top of the large base (small flying bases fit almost perfectly inside a 40mm base, with just a little sanding around the outside of the flying base)

5. Glue the cereal cardboard strips around the top and bottom of the dowel. To get a proper fit, glue one end of the strip down, pull the strip around so it covers the glued end, then use a sharp X-acto to make a cut just before the glued end, and then proceed to glue the rest down.

For decoration, I used the winged skulls from the Cities of Death kits for the roof and plasticard rod in slices for rivets. You can you whatever bitz you'd like. Obviously, I'm going for a design suitable for the grimdark universe of 40K but you can easily change the design up to fit any period. Most historical examples before WW2 incorporate faux gothic or, more commonly, Art Deco features.

6. Prime and paint. Once dry, seal with flat clear varnish and then cut and apply the posters. It's up to you how you apply the posters, though I use white glue. If you'd like a more weathered look, you can "age" the posters by washing them with diluted black tea.

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Tutorial: Quick and Easy Bronze Statues

It's Adepticon crunch time and that means repainting old terrain - one of which is this Deathwatch Marine I made years ago from an Inquisitor-scale Artemis and a plinth from an old Tamiya figure. I've done a lot of bronze statues over the years and people keep asking me about my methods so, along with the repaint comes a tutorial. I'll start out by saying that this statue is going to get the works, including heavy weathering. You can skip certain steps to make the statue look newer or less oxidized and I've denoted these steps by placing an asterisk before the number.

Materials needed:

• A statue (if this is your first time, I recommend a scrap mini. If it turns out great, you've got a statue. If it doesn't, you didn't waste a great mini!)
• A plinth (this is the stone or cement base the statue sits on. It can be anything from wood to plastic to old bitz. It should just look reasonably big enough to anchor your statue)
• Black primer
• 2 shades of Bronze paints (I use Tin Bitz for my dark base and Vallejo Bronze for my highlight)
• Verdigris paint (I mix my own using mid-tones of green, blue and white but there are ready mixed colors on the market)
• Vallejo Glaze Medium
• Secret Weapon Cool Grey Wash
• Off-White paint (for bird poop)
• Black or VERY Dark Brown paint (for engraving text)
• Colors for the plinth (I use Pewter Grey and Pure White)
• Brushes (one for detail painting, one for washing, one for drybrushing)
• Sponge

1. Prime your model black. Be sure to cover the model completely. All bronze statues have a black base color, so any bare metal or plastic will stick out if missed.

2. Heavily drybrush your dark Bronze color, covering all raised areas equally. It's OK to leave deep recesses a black color, for the reason I mentioned above.

3. Using your lighter Bronze color, lightly dryrush the higher areas and edges. It seems redundant but it will show through slightly, even with fairly heavy weathering.

4. Mix together your verdigris color and some of the glaze medium and cover the entire statue using the wash brush. You can vary the amount of weathering by varying the wetness of your brush - if the brush is fairly dry, weathering will be heavy; if it's wet, weathering will be lighter. Focus more weathering on the upper surfaces than lower, as rain causes more oxidation on upper surfaces.

5. Once the verdigris is thoroughly dry, wash the entire statue with SW Cool Grey Wash. 

6. While the wash dries, paint your plinth. Cover the entire plinth in your base color.

7. Using the sponge, stipple successively lighter shades unto the plinth. This is a quick and easy way to fool the viewer's eye into thinking its a stone effect. When finished, use a detail brush to highlight the edges with pure white.

*8. For a more heavy weathering effect, apply a second coat of verdigris glaze, applying it solely on upper surfaces. You can simulate drip stains by using the detail brush and applying the verdigris in vertical strokes, applying heavy pressure at the top of the "drip" and lightening the pressure towards the bottom "end".

*9. To simulate engraved text, apply horizontal squiggles of black paint for the text shadow. For the text highlight, apply horizontal squiggles of verdigris mixed with white immediately below the text shadow.

*10. To simulate bird (or other xenos avian) poop, dab off-white color in spots on the uppermost surfaces, applying drips in the same way as Step 8. You may add small lines of solid poop in some spots, but do so sparingly. Apply a glaze of off-white around each spot, especially in areas where spots are grouped together.

Syrian Insurgent Militia

These miniatures are a group of Insurgents/Rebel Militia from the current war in Syria. The miniatures themselves are from Empress in their Modern line and they are extremely well-detailed, to the point where it was slightly more difficult than normal to finish and paint them. The best part is, while each one is slightly unique, once painted they all meld together into a coherent group and I can't wait to get them on the table.

Unlike my normal posts, I won't go into extreme detail into how I painted every one of them, since each is painted slightly different. I did paint many of them in darker skin-tones. Light skin tones consist of VMC Orange-Brown base, VMC Medium Flesh midtone, VMC Flat Flesh highlight and GW Ogryn Flesh wash. Dark skin tones consist of Burnt Umber/Territorial Beige base, Territorial Beige midtone, and Beige highlight with GW Ogryn Flesh wash. All members also carry the same color tactical harnesses as well - Reaper Olive Drab base, Reaper Worn Olive midtone, and Reaper Worn Olive/White highlights. 

There is a mix of civilian clothing and camouflage styles as well. Camopedia was a huge help with the camouflage here - there is a mix of blue Security Force "woodland", Chocolate Chip desert, US desert tricolor, and Iranian woodland patterns.

The bases are done using premixed vinyl spackling, sand mix, and bitz box scraps. The dirty sand color is achieved using Territorial Beige base, Khaki midtone, and VMC Dark Sand highlight with a Secret Weapon Sewer Water Wash (love this color!). Rust effects are Chocolate Brown base, VMC Red Leather midtone, and Reaper Fiery Orange highlights.

Asphalt Roads from Linoleum Tiles

These asphalt roads made from Linoleum Tiles aren't actually my idea. I believe I saw this over on the Lead Adventure forums, it just isn't something you would think of. They have good flexibility and will conform to most gentle slopes, are durable, and look very realistic in 28mm.

The process is very straightforward. I bought several 1' square seal-stick linoleum tiles at Menard's for about $0.60 each. They were a plain glossy black, with a slight undulating texture, and a removable adhesive backing. I made my roads 4" wide - this will allow the road to be divided into two lanes of 2" each, wide enough to accommodate most 28mm civilian cars. First, I cut everything to size - seven 12" long straights, four 6" long straights, three four-way intersections, one three-way intersection, four curves, one roundabout, and two damaged sections (not pictured!). I didn't remove the backing. Then I gave them all a rough sanding to remove some of the glossy surface, but not enough to remove the undulating texture. After that, I sprayed them with a light spray of clear flay varnish and drybrushed them with some dark greys (as well as painting the edges to blend in better). Lastly, I marked the dividing lines with a white paint marker.

Quick, easy, and highly effective!

Sarissa Chateau and Power Station

A quick post for today - here's the Sarissa Chateau and Power Station I completed recently. These kits are very nice for the price and go together relatively easily. Each took about a day to paint and assemble, but could each be done in an afternoon . My one complaint (and it is a minor one) is the lack of interior detail and that it seemed impossible to make the attic's roof on the Chateau removable due to the angles of the supports. The Chateau is BIG and could easily fit 4 large squads of infantry on both floors! I made some minor changes in the Power Station. I cut away a small section of the railing, cut the ladder in half, and placed one section on the side of the wall for ease of access to the roof in-game. I cut away the outer portion of the roof, glued some MDF scrap pieces inside the walls, and added some 1/48 fuel drums as a handhold to make the roof removable. I also used some scrap plasticard pieces to make a small boiler door by the smokestack.

These are great pieces and could be used for multiple time periods from the early 20th century to the Post-Apocalypse. 

Hesco Barriers

Inspired by this Reddit post on how to make Hesco barriers, I decided to try my hand at making some. I basically followed the tutorial until the very end. To more accurately represent realistic barriers, I used self-adhesive repair tape (spray painted grey), stuck to paper bags and then glued around the center piece. While a bit more fragile, I like the end result.