Some good news for those of us waiting for the French sets.
Coach has said that they are starting on them very soon.� I’ve been waiting for these for a while, so I am looking forward to them.
That is great news. I’m looking forward to that set. Thanks for the info.
Keen as for the French. Obviously I’ll be using them for EW French and Vichy forces, in addition I’ll be painting quite a few sculpts as Belgian, Romanian and Spanish republic forces
Man now I wish I had some new stuff to share. But I didn’t finish any pieces I started recently…. I did do quite a few Hungarian pieces but I was waiting till I did the Air Force as wel before I snapped a pic.
I lost a lot of time recently on the battlefield 1 beta.
Your lines are so clean! Are you using Vallejo acrylics or something different?
And for the decks on your ships and aircraft carriers: do you paint the decks after your ink wash or before?
Great work. I love the Luftwaffe. Please keep posting as you work!
Some Vallejo but mostly citadel as that’s what’s available locally and what I’m used to.
For the ship pieces I paint the deck on after the superstructure has been washed on pretty much all the nations I’ve done, the Japanese and American navy’s were some of the first I did and I hadn’t quite worked out my technique yet so they are a little different.
I’m at work for the next 2 weeks but I brang up maybe 120 pieces with me to work on but I won’t make much progress as I left some key paints at home which now limits what I can achieve with these.
New stuff!!!
German jet fighters and heavy bombers. Maybe now I’ll invest in tech?
And some Anzac fleet and air
Awesome, your cranking them out faster than I can look at them. Nice job.
Well thats pretty much it now, progress will come to screeching halt.
The kriegmarine pieces count is excessive but I like to cover all the bases, I have all the pieces anyway and it doesnt take that much longer to paint a few more of each type. One rule I am using is only one sculpt of each unit type per nation…. I dont mind adding new unit types like the escort carrier and early battle ship as long as it a different unit and not 2 pieces sharing a stat line… May get confusing in game is all…
My HBG order included a heap of the 1941 pieces so If I use them in any of the main nations it will be instead of the global40 pieces.
Italians, british, FEC and ANZACS will probably get the same piece count as kriegmarine where as the Russian, French and canadians will get half as many… I wouldn’t be far off the counts on those smaller fleets now actually… The French navy may get an upgrade when they eventually get that HBG release and jump up a piece count to match the larger group.
And ambitiously enough I imagine the U.S. and japanese navies being double the size Of the kriegsmarine!
HBG order didn’t rock up today like I was expecting/hoping so I didn’t want to work on my Dutch/Finn navies till I had all the pieces in hand…. Instead the kriegsmarine got bulked up. I did have plans to also make a start on my Chinese pieces but I actually had a lot on today so did get much painting time…
This is what the piece count was this morning.
And then another shot tonight once I’d done all the essential work.
That’s probably it for me for the next few weeks since me and the wife are off on a holiday for the rest of October.
Yeah I’d recommend the citadel washes. I got hooked on them with the previous range they had…… Devlun mud was a one stop wash for every purpose… This weird green/brown/black mix. Pure magic
Ha! Awesome, that is what I need. Thank you.
What I have used predominantly is a black ink wash, but it is much too intense and pools in an annoying fashion. I need something softer and more subtle. Delvun mud sounds like the ticket.
I think In the current range its closest replacement is agrathx(or something) earth shade…… I’m pretty sure the company that originally made the mix for games workshop now do an exact replica under a different name for army painter… I’ve not had to look into it myself yet as even though devlan mud was discontinued years ago I’ve still got 4 pots of it.
Great. Thank you for the insight.
I am pretty good at drybrushing, but I need to work on my washes. Excellent stuff.
Yeah I’d recommend the citadel washes. I got hooked on them with the previous range they had…… Devlun mud was a one stop wash for every purpose… This weird green/brown/black mix. Pure magic
Your washes are superb. What kind of paint do you use and what is your liquid ratio to get the desired effect? I have trouble determining the sweet spot for proper application.
Very well done. They positively glow.
Vast majority of my paints are games workshops citadel paint range. My spray cans are all from the army painter range however.
Generally I’ll try and use a spray as the color to work from. the citadel range of washes are amazing, They do most of the hard work for me anyway so all Im really doing is blocking flat colours.
Aircraft seem to benefit the most from actual painting detail and that’s generlly roundels and other markings… There’s not really much use for washes on aircraft since the pieces look the best with a smooth look since the eyes drawn to The roundels… Although I did use washes on my Finnish planes to help me get the shade of green I wanted…
Ships really benefit from some drybrushing since the sharp edges of most sculpts can really make the most of the technique. Most of my ships started as the same shade of spray grey before been washed up to change the shade or dry brushed down to lighten it.
Infantry and ground units I mostly just use the spray colour as a base then pick out boots/guns/belts in a suitable shade of brown… I always water down my paints even though this may mean doing a few coats to get the right shade. Next step i wash the whole piece with a citadel Wash, there’s 4 different washes I choose from depending on what I want the final piece to look like. Once that dries I pick out the skin and paint the base… Which takes quite a few coats generally since I want it to look like flat like cast plastic rather than something that’s been painted.
Welp. Finland round one is nearly done. Just need to finish off the 3 strategic bombers which I started to do in a different scheme but decided against it….
And the Netherlands round one is done!!
Next will be Finland and the Netherlands navies! I’ve actually not worked on a single ship in this current round of painting
Oh wow. I love the “Italian brown” you’ve used on the decks of your Italian fleet. I would have thought it would be to dark so I went a different way on mine but yours look way better and unique!
I may steal this approach when I expand my own Italians
I’ll try and take some pictures of my main paint brush but I think you’ll be surprised at its size.
I probably should be focusing on finishing off all the unit option for the core nations before I do anymore work on the minors but these are way more interesting at the moment.
My minor builds will include
12 infantry
6 artillery
6 tanks
4 mech infantry
4 AA guns
6 fighters
3 tac bombers
3 strategic bombers
If they have a navy they get
3 subs
3 desgroyers
2 cruisers
2 transports
Plus I’m likely gonna include expanded units
6 light tanks(or medium if first tank was light)
2 trucks
2 armored cars
2 SPG
2 tank destroyers
1 elite infantry
1 transport
1 paratrooper
Still working on those Dutch ground forces… But in the meantime… Finland has an airforce!
I’ve clocked up quite a few hours on these over the last few days however quite a bit of it has been fitting the flight stands…. I’d be coming up to 100 done so far if not already past it.
Flight stands are actually just some thumb tacks I got from a office shop. They come 40 to a box for the small headed ones and 20 a box for the larger ones… Either size is only $3 a box!!!
They all use the smaller sized base. My plan would be for fighters, tac bombers and jet fighters to use the small bases with transports, medium bombers and heavy bombers using the bigger bases…. I would have liked the bombers to be higher but the pins only come in the on we length.
I’ve been working on my US planes but they are pretty boring since I’m resorting to decals for the U.S. Roundel and I haven’t even order them yet so they just look like blue planes with painted cockpits. I went with the navy’s blue planes since it’s a fairly unique scheme and now that my planes have stands which will get done in the national colour I don’t have to worry about making the aircraft the same color as the rest of the units.
Hitting a dead end with my US planes and anticipating the same thing with the soviet aircraft I decided to fire up my first minor nation!
I’ve only finished these but I also have the land units about 70% done on my painting table.
These are still available on FMG’s store but only in a much reduced offering… Since I’m only really after a few of the pieces to mix in with E40 second ed sculpts I can’t justify the current retail prices…
Anybody got more that they want and want to trade off a few?
In home again! Thing that’s bothered me the most about air units is how they just lay flat…. Well once I started painting them I realized that wasn’t gonna be good enough… So.
Also here’s a head count of my painted infantry and artillery…. Somethings are clearly falling behind.
I’m getting ready to do that HBG order and getting piece to bulk up a few things. I’ve got none of the 1941 sculpts and now I’m looking at subbing them in for previous pieces. Also getting pieces to do up a range of minor powers and neutrals.
I’ve got most of the HBG sets anyway but I’m just bulking up some piece counts to give me a decent enough amount to do each nation.
I’d actually really like some battle of the bulge or Guatal Canal style maps that focus on a campaign rather than a theatre just so i could get more use out of these HBG pieces.
Great work sir! Your superstructure work on the ships really makes it stand out.
Agreed! Do you wash the superstructure (and sides/hull, or no?) and then paint the wooden decks?
Great work sir! Your superstructure work on the ships really makes it stand out.
i do make extensive use of washes on all my pieces(except some aircraft)and the ships superstructures also generally benefit from a dry brush before getting a coat of wash.
I rely heavily on army painted spray paint to get the pieces to a colour I can work straight from. Most of my fleets get sprayed grey as a first Step.
Every nation I’ve done so far I’ve used a different method. There are similarities and common approaches but it order to make each fleet look unique and like all its components belong together I’ve not used the exact same method/colours…yet… Once I get started on some of the minor nations I’ll have to retread methods with only the national colour changing.
I often do the whole fleet in one hit and just wing it as I go and see what happens. For instance on the French I had no plan until I sat down and looked at the spray painted pieces and thought a clean and lighter set of colours would pair well with the national blue. That would end up on the hulls…
I do superstructure first as the drybrush and wash is very difficult to keep tidy. Depending what I want the decks to look like I may paint them before the wash and coat them in at the same time. If I didn’t include the deck in the wash I’ll pick that out next which is probably the most time consuming part as you really can’t afford to get deck paint onto your superstructure at this stage… Once you get use to a particular sculpt you get quicker and quicker. Then the hulls get a quick paint with either the national colour or a shade of grey. Probably knock out a 40 ish piece fleet in a solid 2 hour stint but I rarely do the whole job in one sitting. The roundels I’ve painted have been really easy(not done US or soviets) and that’s probably a 10-20 minute job for a fleet.
Since its been many years since I started and by just winging the method I’ve actually forgotten the exact colours to use on most of my older jobs… I’ll be able to reverse engineer them though if I wanted to add new sculpts or units to the existing stuff.
And for something different.
Japan. This obviously wasn’t part of the setup but was a joke pic taken to stir up my chief rival. This was at the time the extent of my Japanese land forces…. Which then inspired me to work on artillery and infantry to bulk them up. Japan is very close to being my First Nation with 100% painted pieces! Just need bombers next
I’ve tried multiple times to upload these pics all in one post but I’m having internet dramas and the post keeps refreshing before I’ve got it all together and I end up having to start from scratch…. So I’m going to have to do multiple post and spam the thread unfortunately.
Russians. The second infantry I did. A lot of compromise to get them looking distinctive. I’m not too fussed about the soviets since there fleet and air forces don’t see as much use as other nations. I will swap out the OOB mech for HBG pieces however
UK. Where as the other nations navy’s have there national piece colour either on the sides of the hull(French, soviet) or spot painted on the stacks(German, Italian, American) I decided to do the UK and dominion colours on the decking. This allows the scheme for them all to be quite similar yet still distinctive.
I’m not a fan of desert uniform Brits fighting in Europe but is a compromise to keep things simple
Germans. Seems I don’t have enough painted infantry. I actually also have a full range of land equipment painted grey but grey panthers don’t sit right with me. I did these 3 tone pieces more recently and even though it feels wrong using them for early war I can make my peace with that.
Italians. My favorite nation to play and paint. I’ve gone more accurate on these Probably as a result of enjoying them so much. When I bulk up my Italian navy I’ll also redo those deck stripes since they were a rush job before a game and it shows.
Very impressive work Mentok! I’ll echo the others and say that your work is very clean. The lines are crisp, the camouflages aren’t distracting, and the color schemes are pleasing to the eye. I assume you use acrylic paints, from what I can tell from the photos. What brand do you use?
I’ve got somewhere in the vicinity of 150 paints that I’ve amassed over my 15 years of war gaming. Half of them would be the previous generation of GW’s citadel paint range and then the remaining half is a 50/50 mix between the newer citadel range and Vallejo paints.
I lost interest in games workshop games 7 or so years ago but I was in truth I always loved the hobby and army building aspect more than the gaming and every now and then I get nostalgic and break the paints out on different things…. Flames of war, 28mm medieval, dystopian wars… But none of these I lasts long on and I just end up with expensive half finished projects…
Thank guys! I’m pretty bummed that I’m not gonna be able to make anymore progress on these for the next 2 weeks…… But that’s what happens when you work away.
The grand plan I’ve got means this will never reach a point where the project is completed. I’d like to have small assortments for all the minor allies and axis nations… Plus a handful of neutrals like Sweden, Spain, turkey and Argentina. this level takes it beyond what will realisticly see use in game but its pretty cheap compared to the other hobbies I’ve been involved in.
Also I do have a few closer shots of that setup I did last week so tonight after work I’ll post them up and probably do a big HBG order for some things I wanna focus on when I’m off work next!
Over the years since anniversary edition came out I’ve gotten the urge from time to time to paint the pieces… I’ve started a few times and I’ll do a few dozen components here and there but generally Ive barely made a dent. I’m going for a hybrid look between accuracy and ease of identification when in use on the board afterall these are gaming pieces not scale models.
On my last RnR from work I was in the mood for some painting and knocked out quite a few pieces! The following pictures were taken over a few days to show my gaming mate the progress and get him keen for a game soon… I have got more stuff from previous painting fads done up but at this stage no photos to show.
First of all on this round was the French navy.
In previous painting stints ive managed to knock out sufficient japanese, American, British and soviet fleets with only german, italian and australian having minimal painted pieces and I’d like to square them away soon.
Next up was a random impulse… I did a spare set of British navy pieces and a set of the ships from the HBG allies set as the Canadian navy, this was mostly just for fun and the celery green decks are in the same vain as tan decks on my UK fleet and the lighter Blonde on FEC ships. This is a prime example of the gaming piece aspect taking over from the painted model angle.
Next I did a quick set up to draw inspiration on what to work on next
I ended up doing more italian ground units, which I didnt snap a phot of but I shouldn’t ever need anymore after how many I did!
It also became clear that I’d been avoiding the air units for too long, with only a dozen german Me109’s and a few dozen mixed RAF units done I’d need to bunker down and make some headway
Needless to say I’m very pleased with the results and the look great with the IJN As well
Inspired by my japanese planes I decided to get started on the Italians!
And that’s us mostly up to date…. I did do another 22 japanese infantry but I didn’t quite get them 100% before I flew out for work.
Those are nice and helpfull plates but for the immediate time I’m thinking flat colour. Eventually the piece will be fully painted with only the base of infantry and spot colour on the armor and aircraft that will tie them back to the national colour….
Spanish Republic is plum but other shades of purple are open and I reckon there’s another shade of blue I could use. Anyway… Was just wondering if anyone else has given the subject some thought
Not that there’s anything wrong with using generic neutral pieces but the hobbyist in me would like my hbg 1939 game to have individual neutral nation pieces, eventually fully painted but in the mean time I was just gonna get extra pieces and paint them in a flat colour……semi unique to each neutral… But what colours?
Turkey
Greece
Sweden
Argentina
Iran
Norway
…
Many more
