Painting Update - Enemy Spotted Studios

Howdy folks,

Here’s hoping that the summer is treating you all well so far. The weather here has definitely been on the warm side, especially for a guy who really likes winter weather. So with the remnants of Beryl projected to make its way north, I thought I’d post the latest batch of figs to come off the workbench.

I picked up a blister of African Regulars from Enemy Spotted Studios; 8 figures that have some pretty dynamic poses to them. I really like the team leader pose. Anywho, I wasn’t sure how to paint them up,so I hit the google for some inspiration. Looking at various pics of Kenyan, Nigerian, and South African troops I ended up settling on a bit of a mix between them…but if I had to narrow it down, I’d say the paint scheme was leaning more to the Nigerian side.

The figures themselves look really great. Like I said, they are pretty dynamic. I did have some issues with assembly and arms lining up with hands…that kind of thing…but I’m really happy with how they painted up and the results.

Enjoy the pics.

You can see the leader in the front rank, second from the right with his left arm pointing forward.

Journey up Lead/Plastic Mountain

Painted

15mm         27 

28mm+       43, +8

Fabricated

Terrain          2

Bought          8

Progress   +64

Spectre Miniatures - Ops re-boot and Kill Team

Howdy folks,

I hope all is well on your respective ends. For anyone familiar with Spectre Operations, you may be familiar with the Spectre Miniatures website as well. I’m not sure which came first, the minis or the ‘operations’…I’m sure someone knows, but this feels somewhat like chicken vs. egg. Regardless, at the end of the day, Spectre Miniatures have been focused on modern to ultra-modern figures and wargaming. 

They have tried other ventures/elements of their ‘brand’ to varying success, but one thing I did not know was that they had a license on Spectre Operations the ruleset. Now, if I remember it all correctly (apologies if I do not), they did not extend their license on the ruleset over a year ago an instead went into partnership with another gaming provider/studio. The next thing they did was announce a pre-order for an updated version of Spectre Operations mid-last year, which is what brings me here today. As an assisted birthday gift to myself, I opted in on that piece of the action, securing a very spiffy looking pre-order carrot (the Nomad), also picked up a Kill Team pack of 6 figs. I have finally gotten the time to finish up those 7 figures and post them up.

The Kill Team was an interesting pack, and definitely perfect for anything NBC Warfare related…or any slick heist movie or some such. I took a long look at google and found some really good pics of Soviet Cold War era suits and masks that were rather inspirational. I tried my hand at 3 different colours, the blue-green definitely standing out from the others (brown violet/olive drab and Russian uniform).

The Nomad figure was a very clean sculpt and the figure came out of the box in great shape.There was an annoying sculpt line from the 3d print, but otherwise, was a very smooth figure. I settled on a mix of colours for this guy…camo pattern trousers, straight Russian Uniform green for the tunic, and a quick pattern on his carbine. All in all, a very enjoyable figure to paint up and I have no doubt that they would fit very well in a variety of rulesets and settings. 

And in the modern theme, I also happened to drop by my LGS and snag an African Squad box for INCOUNTRY and the folks at Enemy Spotted Studios (I’ll be posting this squad in a few posts).

Enjoy the pics!

The group shot…Nomad on the right.

Kill Team

The Nomad.

Journey up Lead/Plastic Mountain

Painted

15mm         13         

28mm+        7 (6 x Kill Team, 1 x Nomad)

Bought         8 (ESS Squad box) 

Progress   +12

Last Post of the Year - Modern and Old West

Hey folks,

For the final post of the year, I thought I’d share with you a few figures that I just recently finished. I finally got some Great Escape Games figures off the workbench and put some paint to them and a few figures that I happened upon at my LGS, from Enemy Spotted Studios (ESS).

The Great Escape Games figures were originally released as part of their Dead Man’s Hand game, and with the re-release, I’m sure they’ll figure in the game again…not to mention they’ll work with any other Old West game. It was good to finally get to these figures, I’ve had them for a number of years…and it made a great reason to watch a western or two - Young Guns and Hell on Wheels definitely had some good characters to be inspired by. Buckshot Roberts looks pretty much like Brian Keith’s character in Young Guns, and Common’s as Elam Ferguson in Hell on Wheels looks a near spitting image to the Ely Fergus, and the Preacher - well there are too many to list by name, but are some great examples on the Silver Screen.

Enemy Spotted Studios is a company that is totally new to me. I discovered them online end-summer/early fall and their two lines In-Country (ultra modern) and Killwager (sci-fi). They are a US based company with physical and digital store offering on-demand physical models and STLs - what I particularly like about the company is that the figures have a very dynamic look and appeal, and the company’s business model is to support Veterans causes with a 10% portion being donated to Vet’s programs. As well, they offer their rulesets as free digital downloads on their website. I was pretty happy to see some inventory when I was at Red Dragon a while back, and a little disappointed when I dropped by a few weeks ago and saw that everything had been sold…a good problem to have for ESS, but a little disappointing nonetheless. Anywho, I bought their INX Security Team blister, 4 unique figures each with a very dynamic pose. They were a lot of fun to paint up.

I hope you all have a Happy New Year, all the best, and enjoy the pics.

Painted 

15mm          133

28mm+          62, +7

Bought         131

Progress      +64

Painting Update - Last batch of Empress Miniatures

Howdy folk,

For any of you who have been checking in regularly, you may recall that I had bought a few packs of figures from Empress Miniatures, going on almost 2 years ago now. Well, I have finally finished the last of that group of 20+ figures…and I gotta say, it feels good. 

The figures overall were a lot of un to paint up, I think I really pushed myself on the paint schemes…they were my first real crack at multi-cam, and I had never tried CADPAT at this scale. I also didn’t have a guide to go by, so I did my best to colour match…I just hope that I wrote it down somewhere, sigh. I did have a few challenges with the figures, and these were mostly at the assembly stage. I’ll chalk it up dodgy fingers and my classic glue them together strategy.

Oh, I noticed afterwards that I had made an error on assembly. The team leader comes with a tomahawk that looks like it is fitted to go on the back of his ruck…I missed this cause I was focused on the idea of having it hang off the hip for close access. 

Anywho, I have a few places where these figures will fit in nicely…so, looking forward to getting them on the table.

Cheer…enjoy the pics.

Because I have some future plans of a Zona Alfa campaign using a mix of figures from the collection including these fine gents, I purposely went with a mix of clothing and camo patterns. Not only are SOF troops renowned for wearing what’s comfy, but it also fits a progressive campaign narrative.

From left to right, the SAW gunner has plain tan pants with Mulit-Cam top, the kneeling grenadier and the team lead are both sporting Multi, and anti-tank missile troop is wearing multi pants and desert CADPAT top (ala Canadians in Afghanistan, and CSOR in Iraq)… 

I really like the poses of these 2 figs…so a little more focus on them.

Painted 

15mm            47

28mm+          28, +4

Bought         121

Progress      -46

Painting Update - Empress Miniatures

Hey folks,

Hope all is well on your end, the end of the month is drawing near quite quickly so I am well past due for a painting update. I am making my way through a bunch of Team Yankee 15mm figs while also working in a few other packs and scale. Hence the title…I really like the dynamics of these Empress figures. I have recently finished some of their Chechnya range, and this time I’ve got a few from the US Rangers, US Army, and British Special Forces ranges.

Again, some very dynamic figures…and the single figs that I picked up from the US Army and British ranges are very dynamic an may well be my favourite amongst them. The figures have definitely given me a chance to retry and gain some competence with painting multicam. I’ve tried some slight variations with some element of the figures, mostly the helmets and the tac vests, but have a few more ideas in mind for the 4 others on my paint bench.

Anywho, I hope you enjoy the pics..if you’re looking for a great guide on painting Mulitcam, I would suggest going over to the Spectre Miniatures website, it is an excellent resource.

US Rangers pack...so looking at the Empress website, I've obviously mixed up the packs, so the 3 figures on the right are from pack RAN03.

The 2 figs on the left are from the US Army range (US11 and US12), the 1 on the right with the wicked Operator hair is from British Special Forces range (NZSAS1) based on real life New Zealand operator

For this realworld operator, I used some realworld inspiration...I had a pic of some CSOR operators from the Afghan Mission commemoration at Parliament Hill a few years back...the multicam pants and straight green top were a catching combination.

I gotta say, I am really happy with how this figure turned out, it painted up very nicely and the pose is extremely dynamic. Great looking figure.

Painted

15mm            10

28mm+          16, +7 (empress minis) 

Bought         120

Progress      -94