SM81 Basecoat

I have eventually managed to get some painting in this weekend, although it's taken until 9.30pm on Sunday to find a couple of hours spare.

Anyway, the result is the SM81 in a basecoat and with some tenatative camouflage mottle pattern as you can see in the photo. At this stage I'm always thinking that there's a 50% chance of it going either right or wrong, to put it politely, but it's looking OK so far (it looks better in real life than in the photo...honest).

I've also basecoated a schwarm of BF109 F's for the Luftwaffe but they look a bit boring in comparison with the flashy Italian, so I haven't taken any pictures yet. I'm hoping to make further progress tomorrow evening on these.

VBCW BUF?

Although I haven't yet got my hands on the sourcebook for VBCW, which hopefully will be in the post tomorrow, I've been thinking about the various options and have decided to go for the BUF. There are a number of reasons for this, not least of which is that the Musketeer figures are very nice. Other factors include:

1. I have some leftover Copplestone, Brigade and Artizan figures that might be useable including some late war Germans MG08 teams and some back of beyond German officer mercenary characters.

2. I have a very cool Smer 1/48th scale CR32 kit somewhere which would look very good and fit in well (thanks to Il Duce!).

3. With planes in mind, I could use some of the neat Artizan sky pirate figures as well, which is cool as I can't think of anything else I'd use them for?

4. I have a box of various Lledo diecast trucks that would be easily converted into a BUF armoured column of some sort and I could even do an armoured train!

5. They're all in black, which should make painting quite quick and less of a pain in the proverbial.

6. It's a bit different from my usual French and Bolshevik stuff.

7. I'm sure they could pop up just about anywhere as either allies or enemies of the various VBCW factions (it's all pretend after all).

The only downside is that the range of figures is, at present, a bit limited and that they're fascists but these are minor issues (never thought I'd say that).

I'm going to check out the VBCW books first but I'm pretty sure this is the one to go for.

Salute 2010

Well, the club participation game is now up on the Salute 2010 website, so the clock is most definately ticking for me to get the Ju88's done by the end of the month. Today has been a bit of a washout as far as painting goes bit I'm hoping to scrape some time tomorrow to do at least the base layers on the SM81.

SM81 Pipistrello

Here's the based and undercoated Scotia SM81 Pipistrello that I'm hoping to tackle this weekend, in an attempt to brush up my painting skills in 1.300th scale. It's a really nice model although not up to the standards of Raiden or Leading Edge. A bit of a classic and the fixed undercarriage and spats are very evocative.

It should paint up well and the mid-earth undercoat has evened out some of the flaws in the casting making it a good base for the sand and spinach camouflage scheme. I vary between light green, light grey and mid-brown for undercoating as they provide a solid base for the pre-dominant shades on WW2 planes. It should be fun to paint up and I'm hoping to get it done by the end of the weekend.

Junkers 88A1 KG51 paint schemes

I've been building up some painting references for the Ju88A1's and am trying to work out the best way to go about the splinter camouflage pattern on the upper fuselage and wings. I was lucky enough to find some well detailed profiles from a 1/32nd scale decal sheet which should give me a good starting point.

I painted up some Dornier 17's a while back and used Tamiya tape to mask out the pattern over the mid-green basecoat before painting the dark green splinter. I decided to simplify some of the acute angles on the fuselage pattern but kept the wing design as close to the original as possible. You can see the results in the photo below.

As a method for camouflage pattern painting it worked quite well so I'll try the same sort of approach with the 88's, again with some simplification to keep it manageable.

A Good Day!

The Ofsted inspection at my school is now over and things seem to have gone well.I can now get back to normality i.e. back to the workbench and painting table.

As if to encourage my return to real life, the Crusader Late War British have finally arrived. The delay was due to stuff having to be cast but, reading between the lines, I think they just lost the order in the system somewhere. Anyway, no compaints as the figures are very nice and I'm a happy shopper.

I also got a parcel through the post from Mark with the first installment of the JU88A1's for the participation game. There are six in the initial delivery and very nice they are too. The panel scribing should come up very well with a bit of a wash while the little 500kg bombs to attach to the underwing racks are very neat.

With the imminent arrival of the rest of the Raiden planes I'm going to have to leave the Kittyhawks to a later date but I will still get the SM81 and Bf109F's done as a lead in to the bombers. I can't wait to get cracking on them and will start at the weekend once I work out a temporary way to stick them to a painting stand of some sort.

A very long day...

Says it all but I've been cheered up by this:



Very, very funny.

A Very British Civil War

I've been resisting this for quite a while.

I could easily justify a diversion into the alternate 1930's given my extensive collection of Days Gone By diecasts, 1/48th scale Smer plastic biplane kits and multivarious handfuls of 28mm pulp era leftovers from Copplestone, Musketeer, Artizan and so on. I've also got several potential sets of rules for including Triumph and Tragedy, Warhammer WW1, Rate of Fire, Contemptible Little Armies etc etc (blah de blah).

On the other, I've already got plenty of other things to tackle in the leadpile without having any additional diversions. Perhaps I could get away with a few vehicle conversions and character figures?

Fellow gamer Jon has already turned to the dark side so it's only a matter of time...

Incidentally, no progress so far on the planes this week due to work getting very much in the way...bugger!

Raiden goes Tiddly

Yes, your read it here first...well, probably third or fourth but who cares!

Mark has decided to fill in the gaps in the Tumbling Dice and O8 ranges with his own 1/600th scale lines for both Luft 46 (huzzah!) and 'what if' cold war oddities like the cancelled TSR2.

I have to say that, in my febrile opinion, he has hit the nail very firmly on the head with these two lines, which will fill some gaping holes in the otherwise excellent Tumbling Dice range and which will be compulsively snapped up by airheads with a taste for the obscure. I have already got a load of his superb 1.285th scale stuff for 1946 but could easily be tempted into the arcane arts of 1/600th scale...

The only problem is that he will now me inundated with propellor heads demanding the production of obscure Soviet hybrid rocket fighters, alien uber nazi space planes and Heath Robinson style flying bedstead prototypes. They'll also demand to have them in the opposite scale to the one he's sculpting them in.

Good luck Mark!

BKC2 France 1940

I've got a game of BKC2 on Tuesday at the club so I've dug out my French and have tried to work out how to organise them. I had an orbat sorted out for BKC a long time ago but I've managed to lose it.

So, with the help of the chaps on the BKC forum, here's what I'll be fielding tomorrow, depending on the scenario we use:

1 CO

1 Infantry Battalion: HQ / 12 x Infantry / 4 x HMG's / 1 x Mortar / 1 x 25mm AT gun

1 Recce Platoon: 1 Motorcycle Recce

1 AT company: HQ / 2 x 47mm ATG / 2 Lorraine Carriers

1 Attached Tank Company: HQ / 3 x Char B1bis

1 Artillery Battery: FOO / 2 x 105mm Howitzers / 12 HE Asset / 4 Smoke Assets

1 Bomber: LeO 451 / 3 x Ground Attack Assets

Total points = 2070

I may swap out the bomber and replace it with a fourth Char B1, although this would break the special rule about tank allocation.

The bomber, which is a nice diecast model I picked up in France will probably get shot down or fail to turn up but it's a shame not to use it!