ClockWork Goblin Miniatures 28mm Grizzly Walker

Time for something a bit different! 
I occaisonally like to do things outside of my normal historical stuff to give a bit of a change of pace and one thing I've wanted to do for a long time is some Weird WW2 stuff. Into the breach then steps (stomps?) Clockwork Goblin Miniatures Grizzly Walker. 

Clockwork Goblin have a small but steadily growing range of Weird War 2 15 and 28mm mode



ls, more of which I'll be showing off over the next few weeks. Particularly cool is the fact they also have Bolt Action compatible rules on the website as well!

The Grizzly comes extremely well packaged, and is a resin kit with some metal detail parts. Everything is clean and crisply molded, and it's impossible not to play with it for anything less than an hour making stompy robot noises. It's worth noting this is a really imposing model as well, around 4-5 inches tall! 

Over on The Tale of Bearded Gamers blog I'm constructing a historically fairly accurate force based around the Battle of Tarawa, and you can see my recently constructed Sherman here. Whilst working on my Sherman I painted the Grizzly at the same time, and decided it would be particularly cool to have the Grizzly wading ashore to support the Marines. You can read the painting notes on the tale of bearded gamers, and the techniques used were the same here. 

To do the base I built up the ground work and beach using Vallejos Sand texture paint, drybrushed with white. The water was made using Vallejo Water effect tinted with some pale blue paint, and once it had dried I added wave crests using Vallejo Water effect mixed with white paint.

I've thoroughly enjoyed Clockwork Goblins Grizzly and look forwards to working through the rest of their range! 

You can see more of their work here http://www.clockworkgoblinminis.co.uk/

As always more of my work can be seen at Volley Fire Painting Services

You can also follow the progress of my US Marines as well as Jez's Indians, and Brian and Jamies SS forces here Tale of bearded gamers

Warlord Games 95th Rifles

Tonight I present the next part of my Napoleonic forces for a Waterloo game to mark the bicentenary of the battle.

In the interests of full disclosure these figures were very kindly provided by for me by Warlord to review, however I shall be as unbiased as ever! 

When these figures were first released my first thought was 'Do we really need more 95th figures?' As they have to be one of the most represented regiments in the wargaming world. Having seen the models in person now I've come to really love them as being full of character and charm, and I shall explain why. 

 The set includes 14 figures and 1 dog. I have added an extra rifleman from the freebie figure included with Warlords Waterloo supplement for Black Powder to give me 3 stands of 5 figures.

The set includes 10 different poses, and features an officer, sergeant and bugler. the other poses I believe are a random mix and to my eye all look very natural. I'd have liked a kneeling or standing loading pose rather than the figure preparing to fit his bayonet, however the model is nicely sculpted none the less.

 

The models are all one piece castings and have a minimum of flash. All faces are in Warlords slightly exaggerated style, which although not to everyone's taste I'm very fond of personally, as to my eye it makes the character of the models shine out from a few feet distance. All personal equipment appears accurate, and I particularly liked the hang of the slings of the Baker Rifles. Detail is very crisp with no deformities or mold slippage. 

In terms of size the figures are chunkier than the Perrys and Victrix, though don't look too out of place when placed near them. Naturally the figures fit perfectly with Warlords British Line figures! 

To paint my Riflemen I used Vallejo Game Colour Dark Green as a good match to rifle green, and built up colour using layers of strong tone inks, green inks, and layered highlights. Bases are Warbases movement trays, and each figure stands on a penny within the trays.

In summary, does the world need more 28mm 95th? Maybe not, but these are outstanding figures that are a joy to paint! As always more of my work can be seen here at Volley Fire Painting Services More of Warlords models can be seen here http://www.warlordgames.com/

Rubicon Models 28mm Panther D review

In Plastic Soldier Company's Black Friday sale I picked up a couple of Rubicons kits at a fantastic price. For a long time I'd been tempted to do an early Panther Tank as seen at the Battle of Kursk and this seemed the perfect opportunity to do so.

Rubicon actually produce 2 Panther kits, one that produces an Ausf D or A, which I have built here, and another kit of an Ausf G, which I've not got (Yet...)

 The kit comes on 2 sprues, and is exceptionally well molded and detailed. I found the kit very quick to assemble, maybe around 20-25 minutes, and the only thing to be careful of is identifying the parts for the version

your wishing to build. The kit does have Schurzen plates, however I left those off this particular build.

 The models builds into an accurate and handsome model of this famous vehicle, and also comes with a comprehensive decal sheet full of numbers and crosses, of which you will have plenty of spares. 

I painted the tank using the techniques I used on my Cromwell . I favourVallejo Middlestone as the base for my Dunklegelb, then mixed Iraqi Sand into this to create a highlight layer. On top of this I sprayed Vallejo Yellow Olive in a disruptive pattern. Weathering again followed the techniques of the Cromwell.

For those who are interested in seeing how the model matches up to Warlords Resin Panther A I have included a few comparison shots, and in terms of size difference there is very little in it. I don't have one of Warlords new plastic Panthers yet to compare with, however when I do I'll do another comparison then. 

All in all I can't recommend this kit highly enough, it's fantastic!More info on Rubicon can be found on their website here and as ever more of my work can be seen at Volley Fire Painting Services. 

Warlord Games 28mm Cromwell Review

I'm back and finally recovered from the plague! 

Appologies for the long gap between posts, however I'm back with two today that should have been up before the new year...

First up we have Warlord Games 1/56 Cromwell Tank. This came out a little while ago, but Warlord were kind enough to provide one for me to review. The kit comes on two sprues enclosed in a celophane bag and has detailed instructions and also a fantastic transfer sheet. I would have included pics of this however I forgot to take pics before cutting it up for my tank. The sheet includes stars, squadron markings, weight markings, and markings for the Guards Armoured Division, the Polish First armoured division and the 7th Armoured division, as well as a few others. 

The model is tooled by Italeri and features very impressive and crisp detail, with next to no flash. The tracks and suspension I particularly liked. 

Warlords Cromwell is a very quick and simple build, I think it took me less than 30 minutes to put together. I added arials from bead stringing wire. and then it was ready for paint. 

I sprayed the model with some Super Dec Grey Cellulose primer, then sprayed black into all the recesses and white onto all the high points of the armour to add some pre shading and highlighting. 

On top of this I then sprayed Vallejo Brown Violet mixed with some gloss varnish to create a fairly opaque glaze that allows the pre shading to show through. After allowing these layers to dry for a few hours I then sprayed some Vallejo Middlestone into the centre of most of the panels to add an extra level of depth to the paint scheme.  Once this had dried I sprayed the model with gloss varnish, applied the transfers and re glossed the model in preparation of weathering.

To weather the model I first applied some chipping using a bit of packaging foam dipped in Vallejo Gun Metal. To add depth to the tank I painted a wash of Burnt Umber artists oils into the recesses, removing any excess with a cotton bud. The dust was done using Games Workshop Agrellan Earth, and then the model was done! 

All in all I thoroughly enjoyed this kit, I don't currently collect a late war British Force, but when I do I can see myself getting several more of these, details great, fit is great, and it's full of character. 

As always you can see more of my work here at Volley Fire Painting Services and you can see the rest of Warlords range here at Warlord Games

Warlord Games Ostfront

In preparation for their upcoming release of the latest source book for Bolt Action, Warlord Games have done a little feature on my work!  The piece can be seen here, and features some of my various German models.
 
Very flattered to have been featured in this way, especially as the Eastern Front and Early war books are my two favourite theaters to game.

http://www.warlordgames.com/hobby-andy-singletons-eastern-front-german-forces/ 

28mm Coldstream Guards from Warlord Games

Happy new year everyone! 

Here's my first completed project for 2015, a regiment of Coldstream Guards to use in a game Jay and myself are planning at the Marquis of Lorne in Gillingham to mark the 200th anniversary of the battle of Waterloo.

These figures are Warlord Games British Waterloo infantry set. for £20 you get 11 flags, 30 plastic 3 piece marching figures and 6 metal officer/character types including an officer, a drummer, two ensigns, a sergeant and a pioneer. Each plastic sprue contains 5 figures with separate heads and packs. The heads are full of character, and include a few extras to allow you some variety.

Models are very cleanly molded and only have minimal flash. I've used half the set to make the Coldstreams, and will use the rest plus an extra Warlord metal command pack to make the Scots Guards for my Brigade of Guards. 

 

The figures are nicely sized, and fit well with the Victrix line. I believe they also fit well alongside the Perry range, however I need to get some of their plastic British to really compare them. 

When painting these my main goal was to do as simple a paint job as possible, that also looked striking.

 

 As such I sprayed the figures with grey auto primer, then picked out the tunics with Vallejo deep red, the belts and lace with Vallejo Sand yellow, the facings with dark sea blue and all the black parts with black grey. Muskets were painted flat earth and gun metal. The model was then given a wash of strong tone ink from army painter, then highlights were painted on using Scarlet for the tunics. I mixed white into the scarlet for the men, and yellow into the scarlet for the officers uniforms. This was done to show the difference in quality between the officers and mens uniforms.

When highlighting a figure I start by painting the base tone colour back on, the gradually mix increasing amounts of a lightening tone to create a graduated later, and repeat this processed adding more and more highlights up to the level required.

For basing these figures I used Warbases movement trays and based each figure on a 1 pence piece. To texture the bases I used Vallejo Dark Earth texture paint, then added various shades of green static grass. to add some more interest and add to the character of the muddy fields of Waterloo I added some puddles of dirty water to some bases, and added some mud to the legs of each man.

I'm extremely impressed with these figures and will be using Warlord for the bulk of my Waterloo force. I also have a box of their 95th Rifles which was very kindly sent to me by Warlord to review. If I wasn't currently struck down by plague these would be painted too.

As ever more of my work can be seen here Volley Fire Painting

Assembling plastics

Hi all, with the Christmas Holidays upon us I suspect there could be a lot of people putting together their first plastic sets for Bolt Action (And any other game for that matter). As such I thought I'd share a few thoughts I have on the subject. I origionally wrote this piece for the companion blog I write for, A tale of bearded gamers. You can follow the progress of my US Marines, as well as the forces of Jez Allum, Jamie Tranter and Brian Ward, as well as our thoughts and processes in collecting an army.

1.  Proper tools. Glue Glue Glue Glue Glue. I build probably thousands of figures over the course of a year and have learned that a pair of side cutters, a good knife and some plastic solvent glue are the most important tools around. My recommendation is this Plastic Weld. It creates a very solid join, and applying a little with an old paint brush to each bonding surface melts the plastic a little and gives you lots of play with the posing before it fully dries.Humbrol and other modelling glues are similar, but not as good as a pure solvent. If you don't have some, get some. When bonding plastic to metal you want Superglue. Superglue for plastic to plastic will cause you endless frustration and irritation. Did I mention using proper plastic glue? No? Get some. 
2.  Proper tools. A pair of side cutters are cheap, here's an example of lots of types of Side cutters. The allow you to get the part off the sprue and without warping or bending the part in the process. When working on smaller parts like tools or pouches, I hold onto the part and clip the surrounding sprue away away along with the part still attached. This makes it far easier to trip the part without loosing it in the process.
3. Proper tools!!!! A decent modelling scalpel is another must have. They are also cheap, and are fantastic for getting rid of mould lines and sprue connecting joints. 

There are other tools you can use, but to be honest these are the only ones I generally touch. I do have a pin vice for drilling small parts like aerials and gun barrels, and also  some wet and dry sand paper in a few different grains for particularly stubborn sanding areas, though for the purpose of building figures these aren't so important.

When putting plastic figures together don't get hung up on thinking that parts have to go specifically with a body or that two arms always always have to go together. What I tend to do, especially on sets of figures with a variety of arms is just play around and see what works aesthetically for me. It's worth using the position of the feet as a guide to getting the figure to look natural. The feet pointing one way and the arms and head pointing in different directions tends to look subtly wrong to the eye and can be somewhat dissatisfying.

Soldiers in the Second World War were trained to move either with their weapon at the port or trail positions, In the picture to the left are 3 Germans, the one on the far left is carrying his rifle at the trail, whilst the other two are carrying theirs at the port, so having your figures posed in this way can give your force a nice and subtley period look. 

When posing your firing figures try to keep them with the weapon tight to their body with the weapon tucked into their shoulders. I'm not a fan of figures running and firing simultaneously, so tend to save these for figures with their legs suitably braced or kneeling. 

The beauty of plastics is it's very easy to do conversions without having to resort to extensive work. The SS Officer here was built using a Warlord Plastic Blitzkrieg figure as a base, and then had a head taken from their late war German set. The smock was sculpted on using White Milliput. 

The loader in the Japanese LMG team was built straight from the box, with not chopping around required, I simply used one of the arms used for carrying a rifle at the trail position to make him appear to be changing magazines on the weapon.

This late war Waffen SS squad features a 3 man LMG team from Artizan Designs, and all the other figures are from Warlord Games Late War German Infantry. The NCO has had a metal head added from the Warlord range, however all the others are straight from the box.

I hope this has been of help, and as ever more of my work can be seen here at my site Volley Fire Painting