Hazmat team...Khurasan style and some randoms

Howdy folks,

A busy January has come to a close bringing on a much more productive February...we'll see how many posts we can get out this month.  The first actual minis painted up for the year belong to an awesome looking Hazmat team courtesy of Khurasan Miniatures.

I am a very big fan of the figs that Khurasan is putting out...they look outstanding, they have an amazing level of detail, they paint up super well, and they are some of the cleanest figs that I've seen.  Inspired by far to many sci-fi and thriller movies I had a plethora of ways in which I could have painted up these figs...

With a potential Force on Force or Tomorrows War use in mind I elected to paint a couple of the team yellow to show who is the boss...es.  I painted the Hazmat wearing flamethrower dude in red...highlights the support weapon and well, its a flamethrower...it literally screams red.  To finish off I painted one fireteam orange and the other in a brown violet (ala something I saw in Serenity).

Hope you enjoy the pics...straight from the workbench...I'm also throwing in a couple of pics of the German Fallschirmjagers that I was working on over Christmas...as well, if you look you might see a preview of what I'm unit I'm working on next...needless to say, I've been in construction hell with this unit.

More next time.

 

 More great looking Khurasan figs...

 

The entire team...with and without lights

 

The boss...

 

The nails...

 

Group shot...with small preview in the background

 

 

Some random Battlefront shots... 

 

German Fallschirmjager recoiless gun platoon...

 

A couple of BF US Vietnam figs done up as Canadian Airborne in Somalia...

Vimy Ridge...research, check-in

Howdy folks,

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I'm looking ahead to a long-term project for 2017 to coincide with the 100th anniversary of Canada's victory at Vimy Ridge.  I've been very interested in collecting a WW1 CEF force as well as do up some terrain that although inspired by Vimy could work for other Great War battlefields.

As a start to my research I've been collecting a variety of Vimy related reading as well as images, documents, and other books on trench warfare with the goal of getting some detailed looks at how the trenches were constructed and their general layout.  This was part of my objective with my fall visit to the Canadian War Museum, especially their mock-up and diorama of a typical trenchline.

A couple of gems I found over the past few days was a big-picture map from Canadiansoldiers.com with a great overview of the offensive.  I also found a Canadian Corps level map that showed the regimental, brigade, and division boundaries of the units involved in the assault.  Finally, I found a great map from the Birth of a Regiment (website on the history of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry).

More to follow as the research progresses.

 
www.canadiansoldiers.com, overview of regimental locations and objectives 

 

www.cbc.ca, overview of unit objectives and axis of attacks

 

1:10,000 topo map of Vimy Ridge trenchline and unit boundaries...awesome find.

10,000 views...THANK YOU

Happy Monday everyone...

Well maybe not happy, however a big thank you to all of you for your views and comments.  Sometime over the past couple of days we jumped over the 10,000 views...so:

More pics coming soon...I just finished up a Hazmat team courtesy of Khurasan and just finished gluing up some WW1 heavy metal last night...more to come.

Thanks folks.

2014 re-cap...s'up 2015??

Howdy all,

Officially, now the new year can begin...I think many can understand that the first part of the first month of the new year is a bugger of a go.  My brain is in holiday coma...and has proven to be for a few weeks now...and the stressors just aren't welcome.  Of course, the stressors don't listen...sooooooooooo...

I am taking my mojo back...

The Year that Was...

The last year has been pretty big for me...I made the decision to focus my painting and gaming activities, motivate myself to keep going, and to try to get in some more gaming...and perhaps most important, it was the inaugural year of this little gaming blog of mine...thanks for the views, comments, and attention.

How did I do? Well, as I may have p&m'ed about on a few occasions, the focus does elude me...but my posts from the last year show that I did have moments of clarity...here's to trying to improve on that in the coming year.

If I put it into actual results...the last year saw a decline in how much I purchased (secondary objective #1 accomplished) and saw me put out:

• Figures:
• 15mm: approx 45 little dudes painted and complete.  100's more were prepped and mold lines removed;
• 20mm: approx 15 Elhiem sculpts joined the fold...mostly modern;
• 28mm: over 40 figs joined the rank and file ranging from Old West, WW1, WW2, Modern, and sci-fi.

• Vehicles: over 45 tanks, trucks, and other vehicles were completed covering WW2, Modern-ish, and sci-fi.  The pride of this lot was my Canadian Kandahar Cats Leopard 2's and mid-east heavy metal batch.
• Air Support: 11 aircraft joined the Gaming and Utility Support Wing, mostly helicopters for Vietnam.
• Objectives: 7 battle worthy objectives to spill gaming blood over were completed.
• Other: a few larger extra's joined the fray...bring on the guns.

I didn't get out gaming as much as I would have liked but I did increase my participation in Cangames and tried out a new ruleset and era (thank you Saga...).

And now...

 

My gaming objectives for the year ahead are simply this:

1. Have more and more fun!! Goes without saying.
2. I'd like to try a major gaming convention this year...I'll have to get some input from the guys
3. Vietnam:
• Finish my Air Cav helo's
• Start to put paint to my Viet Cong
4. WW1: Start to assemble and paint my Battlefront Germans and Vimy Ridge Canadians...Mike has already kindly offered to steal my research, so I've got that going for me.
5. Cold War: Start to paint some 4CMBG infantry and convert my Battlefront 'nam M113s to A2 and A3 variants
6. Keep working through the past project pile...Afrika Korps, Old West, FJs...increase my painting output...

Have a great new year folks, best in all your endeavours real and miniature.

Cheers.

 

Happy New Year Vietnam...

Hello everyone,

The final pieces of 2014 and the first pieces of 2015 that I completed were towards the heap of metal from Battlefronts Vietnam range that I am slowly getting finished.  I decided to tackle the HMG nests from the PAVN HQ set as well as the crashed Huey objective marker.

All of the pieces have some great details on them...because of this I decided to try a different approach to completing the bases.  As I didn't want to loose any of the detail amidst the flock, I decided to instead just paint the various colours in lieu.

I'm happy with the finished product.  Perhaps the best reason why is the Huey objective...there is some very detailed woods and foliage details that would be entirely covered up if I chose to flock the base instead.  To complete this, I layered the bases with earth colours and then tried using Vallejo 890 Reflective Green and 833 German Camo Bright Green.  As I said I liked how the models turned out.

I will try a mix of this technique and coloured flock when I get to finishing the infantry.

Take care.

HMG Nests, 1 with log roof, 2 with corrugated sheet roof... 

Log roof...

Corrugated metal roof...

Crashed Huey objective, love the detail on this one.  The root system and fallen tree limbs really bring a great level of detail.  I wanted the weathering on this model to reflect the tropical wet climate of SE Asia...I intentionally went heavy on the streaking to make it stand out...

Couldn't bring myself to cover up these details...

All of them together...nice bit of symmetry...

Random objective I finished that should work for multiple theaters and time periods...

Dead Man's Hand...Desperados

Happy New Year everyone!!

I hope the end of year went well for you and that the new year is greeting everyone well.  I took a little hiatus from the internet over the Christmas and New Year holidays, however I still worked through my to do pile on the workbench.

Over the past summer I drove through North Bay and took the time to drop into NorthBay Hobbies...I always try to drop by when I'm driving through the city and support another LGS.  This is the same store and trip that I bought "The Cops" and I also bought the Desperados pack for Dead Mans Hand.  Great looking miniatures! The poses were awesome and there's a really good mix of iconic Western bad guys.

Enjoy the pics and as always, constructive criticism is always welcome.  Cheers.

The entire crew...

 

Bad ass Bandito...

 

Bad ass Bandito sidekick...

 

 

Navajo Brave... 

 

 

 

The nameless drifter...

 

 

Disgruntled Confederate vets...

 

 

 

Mandatory bowler-wearing bad guy...

 

 

 

 

The less than Magnificent Seven...

 

A couple of townies from the Undertaker pack...