Revisiting the French-Indochina War in Greyscale

Has it really been five years since I've last worked on this project? Feels like yesterday really. I've never completely forgotten about the project and always intended to get back to it. But frankly I was intimidated by painting camouflage using this technique. I wasn't quite happy with my first take, but never quite could put my finger on the why. But when our beloved Over-Snowlord let me choose one of three tasks in order to claim the price for climbing SnowLord's Peak I decided to finally man up and tackle this particular problem.

Figures by Empress Miniatures

You know, being something of a pedant can become quite a challenge in itself sometimes. Initially I had planned to paint up the remaining minis in my stash for this location. But soon I realised this to be a decidedly over ambitious. Idon't know how often I re-painted these two fellows but if I'd hazard a guess they've suffered through at least five different versions of desaturated camouflage.

With the Viet-Minh I painted five years back it was rather straight forward using mainly desaturated brownish tones with some black and just a few greenish spots mixed in. It was only after much brain wracking, swearing and actually considering to give up and admit defeat that finally inspiration struck.

Most uniforms and equipment used by the French in the theatre were some hue of green. So when painting not so much real greyscale but what Curt so aptly called "desaturated" why on earth was I simpleton trying to paint desaturated greenish uniforms using brownish colours?

Once this realization sunk in it was pretty straight forward from then on. For the French it was to be desaturated greenish tones with black and a few brownish spots. At first I thought this might come out to samey in the end but using different greenish greys and light greens to lighten a base of a dark brownish green did work wonders.

So that's it from me for this years challenge. Over the next few days I hope to get a few minutes in to take a few pictures of all I painted over the last few months and finally get Michael Awdry's car for his sadly postponed Schloss Itter game as well as Jamies prize money posted.

Points wise this submission should be rather straight forward with two figures plus the location adding a final 40 points to my total bringing me to a whooping 795 points. I'd never have dreamed of reaching such dizzying heights but this challenge was a blast once again and I'm already looking forward to December for the next iteration of this madness.

A huge thank you to all the participants for making the challenge to what it is, to the Minions for their tireless efforts and of course to our beloved SnowLord and his lovely Lady for organizing, or in Sarah's case putting up with, this most enjoyable of hobby events year after year.

Princess Patricias Canadian Light Infantry - 1st Section... and some KSK

Being ordered to stay at home for the day till the company has decided on how we field-service technicians are best and safest to proceed with our jobs in face of the virus I've taken the chance to take pictures of finished stuff. These lads have been sitting on my desk for a few days now as I haven't had found the time to finish the basing. 

In comparison to my usual basing I went for a more basic approach but I have to confess I rather like it. I wanted some WW2 Canadians for quite some time now and stumbling over a good deal over on the Lead Adventure Forum I decided it was high time I gave it a shot. Being Canadians these fine chaps are intended for service in Sicily, Italy and France/ The Low Countries, maybe even the Reich itself.

When it comes to Canadians in WW2 most gamers seem to go for generic British and use them as stand ins. If they're modeling Canadians anyway that is. A rather sensible approach really as organization and equipment was largely the same. I on the other hand, being somewhat Canadio-phil (I don't think that's a word, is it?) wanted to do it just the other way round.

The Canadian Battle Dress was generally markedly greener than its British counter part and didn't undergo the 1940 changes to the so called P40 "austerity pattern" and thus was highly coveted be other Commonwealth troops as well. That said Canadian Battle Dress like that of other nations varied greatly in both fit and colour due to different producers. Re-supply issues also meant that Canadian soldiers also often wore Battle Dress produced in other Commonwealth nations. A good primer for those interested in the Canadian Battle Dress can be found here --> www.canadiansoldiers.com

Figures used are by Crusader Miniatures and are your typical ill-proportioned wargaming miniatures. That said they're fun to paint as there's not too much small detail on the figures. In the long run I plan on expanding the force using Artizan Miniatures which should fit quite in.

Also recently completed were two German KSK (Kommando Spezialkräfte or special forces command) soldiers made by Lead Adventure Miniatures. I decided to go for Multicam instead of the more common German Flecktarn or the less often seen but more modern Multitarn.
Figures painted up nicely and I hope these are the start of a bigger foray into modern wargaming in 28mm... now I only need to decide on the theatre.

Some much needed terrain at last

First I have to apologize for my lack of comments both on the Challenge blog but also on your individual blogs. Live has suddenly gone crazy around here and there wasn't much time for anything hobby related. That said since the start of the painting challenge I've been doing something rather unusual for me. I've been slowly but steadily adding to my terrain collection to a point where I feel I have enough buildings to comfortably fill a table. What I need now is some scatter terrain like fences, billboards, road signs and the like.

Most of the buildings are 3D printed using files from Najewitz Modellbau with some Sarissa Precision, Ziterdes and Warbases mixed in for good measure. I have to apologize for the abysmal photo quality but I have the sinking feeling that my camera is slowly dying on me. I can't for the live of me get any decent pictures as pictures on the camera screen look good but later on they're either too dark, too bright or the colour balance is totally off.

I was aiming for a rather generic middle European look for these buildings. In the long run I of course hope to add enough buildings and ruins to better represent specific theatres like Holland, Germany or maybe even France. But in the mean time these will have to do.

Ziterdes

Sarissa with Warbases lean to and Renedra fence

In my view both MDF and 3D printed buildings are a little too flat, or better have too straight corners to look natural. The walls of the MDF buildings were given a liberal coating of tile grout while the roofs were done using embossed plastic card.

The 3D printed buildings have more detail than the MDF ones but still the walls are too clean for my taste so I slapped some Vallejo Rough Pumice on and actually I'm pretty pleased with the look.

3D print

3D print

3D print

3D print

Sarissa

Warbases scatter, road blocks from Baueda

schratch built culverts after an idea by thetacticalpainter.blogspot.com

And some scenic shots taken with my phone camera so even worse but I'm pretty pleased with the overall impression. Maybe adding a few posters and adds here and there...

So with all the Corona-Virus malarky out there stay safe everyone!

Cars and the issue of the "perfect" scale

One thing I really love about 3D printing is the possibility to get my grubby mittens on stuff otherwise not commercially available in 28mm. And I can scale it to my own visual preference as well...

Final Soviet Infantry Section... for now

Some of you might remember I've been slowly, very slowly indeed, building a Soviet force. Initially this was for use with the Operation Squad set of rules, later on for Bolt Action. In 2018 it's latest incarnation came in the form of a Tank Rider Platoon for use with Chain of Command. All of these various forces had one in common: They were never really playable. Well, until today! This last section of Tank Riders and accompanying PTRD AT-rifle give me a full Platoon of these hardy veterans.

Early War German light mortar

Several weeks ago I was gifted a sprue of the plastic Afrika Korps by Warlord Games and while I didn't like the figures some bits still can come in handy here and there. One thing I still needed for my other wise rather complete force of Early War Germans for Chain of Command was another 50mm light mortar and luckily there was one in the DAK sprue.

Cats big and small

I'm burning a lot of midnight oil at the moment and actually get some stuff done for a change. Work is still extremely hectic and I've spent most of my weeks away in Munich (imagine disgusted gurgling sound here) and thus I've started to take some stuff to paint with me. It's always a little difficult to set it all up in an ergonomic way in a hotel room but definitely better than staring at the TV most of the time.

Nun with gun

Surprisingly enough I feel like I'm doing quite well painting wise this challenge. It's just the photographing and editing which seems to take ages, if I can be arsed to do it at all that is.
As I want to take advantage of a ride with Lady Sarah's Balloon to Snow Lord's Peak I needed a 'female' miniature of some kind. Luckily enough there was one in a recent order from Wargames Foundry...

Vintage car for Schloß Itter

The good thing with being all over the place painting wise is that somehow in the end things come together nonetheless. So, while I continue to paint stuff without anything approaching my usual "focus" I got another piece finally off the table. 

Hans! Hände hoch!

Another entry to the Annual Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge by yours truly:

A last stand you say? Well, if there’s been one iconic last stand in WW2 than it must clearly have been the Battle for Arnhem during Operations Market and Garden. Of course there were others too but this one instantly sprang to mind and coincidentally I'm slowly collecting a force of Paratroopers for it.

Paras on their way to the bridge