Terrain: 10mm Woods

With my hedges almost done (just waiting for them to dry) I thought I'd turn my attention to the trees I need to base.  While these trees are N scale the process is pretty much the same as what I did for my 28mm trees, I just used bigger bases (50-60mm MDF) and used a bit of modelling putty to help fix them to the bases.

The process is simple enough, just drill a hole where you want a tree.  You want the drill bit to be a little smaller than the trunk width, if its too big then you will find it fiddly when gluing the tress.

I went for a mixture of two tree and three trees per base.  I found that putting the tree closer to the edge of the base so that the limbs overhang looks best.  It helps hide the base and allows you to bunch up trees to represent thick or heavy woods.

Since the trees were the same height (all 100 of them) I trimmed a little bit off the stem/trunk of each tree before pushing it into the base.  As you can see here the fit is quite snug and probably wouldn't need gluing but I did anyway just make sure, after all these are going to get a bit of handling on the table.  Just a small dab of superglue at the base of the trunk will suffice.

My first few completed stands, even now it's starting to look like a little woods.

As you can see, I forgot about the slotta tab slot.  A bit of paper will do the trick but it was fiddly getting it in there.

So I stopped drilling and glued over the slot on the remaining bases first.

After all the bases had been drilled and trees glued into place I painted all the bases dark green (from memory GW Salamander Green methinks).

Almost done and looking good, just a bit of flock and they'll look even better.  So out comes the flock and my trusty tub of "watery glue sludge".

And then I'm left with this:

Just a few shots of the trees in action.  I'm really happy with these, and best of all is that it only took around two hours from start to finish.  I'll be getting some more of these for sure, you can never have too many trees on the table.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Six (and a few)

I've been slowly working away on the Pendraken minis, and with the long awaited plasticard arriving yesterday I got to work on basing the remainder of the minis.  I should have enough bases left over to cover the extra German stuff, hopefully arriving sometime before Saturday.

Basing the HQ and CO stands proved to take a little longer than I had thought it would.  You're basically building a little diorama so I had to keep my grand ideas in check and keep the base functional and quick to build/paint.

My first attempt at 10mm miniature hacks.  The passenger has had his head removed and replaced with a commander torso (clipped off at the waist and glued to the neck of the passenger).  The radio operator has been removed from his base, he was originally kneeling on the ground, and repositioned to sit on the seat.  You can't really tell from the photos but the radio operator is missing his left leg.  I had clipped it off and was in the process of gluing it on when after dropping it on the floor for the third &%^%$-ing time I decided to just glue him in as is.

My favorite CO stand has two German officers "discussing" which way to go.  I'll model this base as a crossroads with the road sign knocked over or missing.

I'm on the home stretch now with most of the miniatures having varying degrees of paintwork and almost everything based.  I'm hoping to get all painting and basing done by Wednesday night.  This give me Thursday and Friday to put together some cardstock buildings and base up the trees.  Hedgerows may be possible, I'll glue some flock to the dark grey foam I have and see how that comes up.

More photos to come as I get stuff finished.

Some More Pendraken German Infantry

Due to a complete brain fade I left out the MG-34's when I based all my German infantry.  I only picked up on this the other day when going through the few bags of what's left to paint.  Initially I thought I'll just buy a pack or two of miniatures to redo the three stands that I was supposed to put the MG-34's on.  Due to postage costs and the breakdown of the packs it worked out more effective (not necessarily cheaper) to buy a dozen or so packs and get another 12 stands made up.  This should bring the Germans up to 3 full platoons with HQ and support platoons.

I picked up a pack of jeeps for the British CO/HQ stands and some German dispatch riders and motorcycles with side cars for either recce or CO/HQ.

1 x GR1 - Riflemen
1 x GR2 - MP40
2 x GR3 - MG34 (2) x3
1 x GR4 - MG42 (2) x3
1 x GR5 - Pz Shreck (2) x3
1 x GR6 - Pz Faust
1 x GR42 - Riflemen with STG44
1 x GR65 - BMW & Sidecar (3)
1 x GR66 - Dispatch Rider on BMW Motorcycle (5)
1 x GR165 - Late war tunic firing smg
1 x GR177 - mid war panzer grenadiers
1 x GR198 - Rifleman reversible jacket
1 x BR19 - Jeep (2)

Need I say that I'll eventually have to get the same done for the British but for the moment at least I can field a platoon of commandos and maybe a platoon and a half of the Australians.  I know there weren't too many Aussies in slouch hats NW Europe (as far as I can tell there were next to none), they will eventually get based up and used for some Italian campaigns.

Besides I'm thinking of playing the Calais campaign where the British held out against superior numbers of Germans so it shouldn't be a problem in the short term.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Five - Late Edition

Finally got some stands finished.  Don't look at me like that... it does happen... sometimes.

Anyway I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Next up: Shermans, lots and lots of Shermans.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Five???

Been a few days since the last update and haven't touched the paintbrush that much even though I've been on holidays since Friday.  It's not entirely my fault: real life, health and other matters have kept me away (yes Final Fantasy XIII I'm looking right at you).

I've spent most of my time putting on coat after coat of Olive Drab (XF62 onto my British vehicles.  The colour dries flat and looks wonderful on a mini but it has horrible coverage.  While I'm not painting green over green over green I've been painting the German armour.  This is slower going than I had originally hoped.  I've gone back and touched up the Tigers as I didn't like the contrast of the camo stripes, they're more subtle now and I like it so much more.  I finished the Jagdpather and I liked the mottled camo so much I started to paint the Panzer III's in the same manner.  Three down and five more to go, these ones are boy tanks (don't have skirts) so they should be quicker to paint.

I'm finding it difficult to get a supplier of 2mm plasticard that has it in stock for a reasonable price.  I can get it locally for $50 per square meter if I buy a 2440 x 1220 sheet.  That's probably a little too much for what I need.

I'll still press on though (we can use vehicles un-based if needed) and at this point I'm hopeful of getting everything done by the weekend.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Four

So very tired right now so I'll just post pics, commentary will be added later... need sleep.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Three

Didn't get any more painting done this weekend.  I did manage to stop procrastinating on the base sizes and start cutting up the plasticard.  I ended up going with an almost standard BKC base recommendation.  The only difference is that I decided to base my specialist weapon teams on individual 25x25 bases.  That way I can use two bases side by side for BKC and individually for other games such as IABSM.  If moving them about gets too fiddly then a bit of tape on the bottom should hold them together (I don't think it'll be a problem though).

I'm really happy with how the miniatures look on the bases, they present very well.  Cutting the plasticard was an interesting experience.  Following the instructions that came with it I made a cut by running my hobby knife along a straight edge 3-4 times, no need to press to heavily as a straight cut is more important than a deep cut.  Turn the plasticard over so the cut is face down and pull up on one edge of the card while placing pressure down behind the cut.  The first couple times I tried to bend it I couldn't get it to snap.  Applying just a bit more pressure and *SNAP* I had two pieces of plasticard with very straight edges.  The only issue I had was where I had a few pieces where I needed to trim off 2-3mm, I needed to use pliers to bend and snap the plastic and in every case it left a wavy edge.  Nothing to worry about but just looks untidy compared to the rest.

So then out came the super glue and I'm left with what you see below.  The 2mm thick bases just the right size for my fingers to pick up a stand by the base and not the miniature.  I need to order some more to finish off the rest.

Painting the Pendraken: Day Two

Haven't done as much painting as I'd hoped (real life *sigh*) but I thought I'd post a few shots of where I'm at.  I started painting the British armour but the Tamiya olive drab goes on like green water.  It goes on almost perfectly if I use the airbrush but that's in the shed, and it makes a lot of noise, and I'm lazy... so multiple coats it is.  While they were drying I started on the German armour, I'm using Mr Hobby (H403) for these and that paint goes on very smooth and behaves much like the GW paints I've got.  I may have to get some more of this range.

I was intending to do a more subdued camo scheme on the Tigers but I thought the bigger tanks could handle a more striking scheme without it dominating the model.  I'm not completely happy with the one in the left of the photo but I'll hold reservation until after the army painter goes on.  The smaller tanks will have the subdued scheme.  The camo was built up with multiple layers of very watered down Red Brown (XF64) and Olive Green (XF58) and finally a thin darker more defined stripe was painted over the top of the layers.  I like the effect I just think my pattern just need more work.

Tomorrow I'll finish the camo and then go over and detail the equipment, hatches, grilles etc.  Once that's done I'll put the decals on and then make the decision if they need any more work.

Painting the Pendraken: Day One

Here's some shots of the first days work, nothing too special just a lot of flat colour, I'll come back and do the webbing, weapons, boots etc and when they're dry I'll give them a nice protective coat of army painter.

More tonight, should get these finished and then I'll start on the Germans.