Roman Legionnaires - part five

The four Victix Legionnaires finish. Based, painted, varnished and flocked set up on the latest terrain board (more to follow) and photographed in subdued sunlight.

Stay safe and

Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Roman Legionnaires - part four

The four Victrix Roman soldiers have been varnished with Galleria Matt Varnish and I have added some static grass and ground foam to the bases. I am well aware that I could have spent more time painting these plastic figures, particularly the shield design, but they were only needed as decoration for another project (more on this in a future post).

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Railway Modeller

Earlier this week, Holly dropped of our weekly shop (we are still in lockdown/shielded as my Mother-in-Law is living with us) and as a surprise, I had the latest issue of Railway Modeller as a special treat.

Thank you Holly. I'm sure I will enjoy reading this magazine.

Keep Calm and Carry On Reading

Tony

Roman Legionnaires - part three

The latest update shows both red clothing and flesh areas painted. I know that not ALL Roman Legionnaires wore red, but it just looks good.....

Detail painting and base painting. Not much to add.

Finally the shields have been added. I went with a simple IX motif rather than spending too much time on them.

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Roman Legionnaires - part two

The four Legionnaires were undercoated with a light grey spray can primer.

I choose to undercoat or basecoat the miniatures with a brown undercoat, thinking black would be too harsh.

The first paint - some dark Chainmail metallic drybrushed with silver.

I think the drybrushing has shown up just how much detail is on these plastic miniatures.

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Roman Legionnaires

During the Coronavirus lockdown, I've kept myself busy by building wargame terrain and writing magazine articles for Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy and Miniature Wargames. One of these modelling projects required some standing Roman Legionaries. I purchased a sprue of Victrix Roman Legionnaires via e-bay and set about basing them.

The four miniatures were mounted onto small plastic discs. I used superglue to secure them.

The bases or groundwork has been built up with standard household filler.

Further texture was added by sprinkling on some fine sand, applied over diluted PVA glue.

The heads and arms were glued in place with a mix of polystyrene glue and superglue.

I found the figures were a little fiddly to work with, but have to admit that the finished soldiers look very good. I am nervous about the plastic spears or Pilum's as they look very fragile.

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

The Chapel at Rofenburg - part fifteen

At long last the model can now be viewed as finished.....

The image above shows the finished model with a Flintloque Trollkin alongside to give an idea of scale.

The woodwork has been checked and touched up, the roof tiles have had additional streaks and detailing added while the roof supports have some added grain-effect painted on with a very fine brush. Smaller details have been touched-in, again with a very fine brush.

I have varnished the whole model with some Galleria Matt Varnish and as this slightly tinted the whitewashed walls, I have given the walls a further extreme highlight of Titanium White. This was added with a large brush and in a blotchy or scrubbing motion.

The base has been decorated with died sawdust around the edges (to match in with my existing gaming table) and I have glued down some clumps of nylon grass and static grass clumps. Finally there are a couple of larger clumps of ground foam vegetation all glued down with PVA glue.

As stated earlier this is not a slavish copy of the original Chapel, rather a smaller, more compact model for use on my gaming table. The style being Middle European to Eastern European could fit in with many periods and genres. It was a simple model to make, but is still packed full of character.

I am well aware that this 'how-to' tutorial was originally published in Miniature Wargames some time ago, however these images and extended descriptions would hopefully add some information to the original article. Should anyone have any questions about how I build my terrain models or paint them, please comment below.

Finally; I would usually state the dimensions of the model, but in this case I cannot as I neglected to take any measurements and the Chapel was sold-on some time ago via e-bay. I would estimate the footprint of the building to be around 120mm x 120mm.

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Keep Calm and carry On Modelling

Tony

Airfix Model World Magazine

Yesterday I received in the mail the latest copy of Airfix Model World (issue 115 June 2020). It is the first issue of an annual subscription that my daughter has set up for me.

I have written in the past how I enjoy reading model making magazines and with the sad demise of Military Modelling, Airfix Model World is my favourite model making magazine. I usually pick up the odd issue from W H Smiths or secondhand via e-bay, but now I have a whole years worth of reading enjoyment to look forward to. Thank you Holly.

I can report that prior to the lockdown, I had visited The Midlands Air Museum and managed to pick up a bag full of secondhand magazines, which have helped me deal with the stay-at-home blues. This new subscription will give me some more model making reading.

Stay safe and

Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Eldar Scrolls Ruined Tower

Back in late 2019 I was approached by Modiphius Entertainment to build a pair of gaming boards and a couple of resin terrain pieces, after sending and receiving a number of e-mails with various sketches and designs, I was commissioned to build two gaming boards an Eldar Scrolls Ruins board with modular walls and two towers and a Bleak Barrow Falls board as featured in the computer game.

Issue 446 of Miniature Wargames (June 2020) features details of how I built and painted the largest ruined tower from the Eldar Scrolls Ruins board while the image above shows just some of the pieces on the 1mtr x 1mtr sculpted board.

The walls and towers were built over a core of corrugated cardboard and cardboard tubes with blue foam stonework and MDF bases.

For full details of the magazine see this link.

Hopefully, more images will appear on the Modiphius web pages very soon. Stay safe and

Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling.

Tony

Blisters and Peaches by Mark Backhouse

Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy issue 108 from June/July 2020 has a fantastic Napoleonic wargame scenario called Blisters and Peaches written by Mark Backhouse. While reading it (and re-reading it) I was struck by the possibility of using it as a Flintloque gaming scenario.

Basically a hungry French army is retreating from the battle of Vitoria with British dragoons hot in pursuit. The French army objectives are to leave the opposite gaming edge before the British catch up, however there are one or two temptations scattered across the board. Will the hungry French succeed or can the mounted British cut off their retreat?

My only addition would be to add an inn or tavern to the village set up and thereby confuse the situation with an another temptation - Strong Liquor or Demon Drinke.

I think the magazine was worth the cover price, just for this gaming scenario. I was even tempted to set up my own gaming table for a solo game using the same mechanics but with reduced troop numbers (to fit in with the Flintloue skirmish game) however I have a couple of un-finished projects that need my time this week.

Check it out via this W, S & S link.

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Keep Calm and Carry on Gaming

Tony

The Chapel at Rofenburg - part fourteen

The groundwork was basecoated with Snakebite Leather and highlighted with some Snakebite and Skull White. I have also mixed up a couple of very weak washes which I use to blend the lower wall sections into the groundwork. I use a two brush technique – where I wet the area to be painted, add small dots or streaks of colour (green, black, dark brown) and then blend these colours from top to bottom. The effect I am after is to just tint the whitewashed walls darker at the base and lighter the higher up I go. I think the images show this better than words.

Prior to finishing the groundwork I have picked out a number of larger stones with grey (which was mixed from Chaos Black and Skull White). The final job was a quick wash of GW Sepia wash.

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

The Chapel at Rofenburg - part thirteen

The whitewashed walls were built-up over Vallejo Stonewall Grey, highlighted by adding more white to the mix and a final highlight of pure Titanium White tube acrylic applied with a hogshair brush in a scrubbing motion. I don't usually recommend using pure white, but in this instance it just works.

I basecoated the spire with Dark Brown paint from Vallejo mixed with Dwarf Bronze from GW. When fully dry I used Burnished Gold and Dwarf Bronze to drybrush the detail and then mixed a Dark Blue/Bright Green mix to add verdigis. This effect was further exaggerated by mixing Stonewall Grey to the mix and again a second highlight with even more Stonewall Grey in a light drybrush.

I have also washed the whole roof area with GW washes. The plasterwork was painted with a warm cream grey, mixed from Skull White, Snakebite Leather and Stonewall Grey. Then highlighted with the same mix with a little more Skull White added.

The model was now nearing completion and soon I will be finishing it off.

Stay safe and

Keep calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy - issue 108

The latest issue of Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy (issue 108 May/June 2020) features another article written by me.

Dandied up Dark Ages

Back in 2019, I was visiting a local carboot sale (remember those?) and came across a guy selling a whole host of Games Workshop, Lord of the Rings figures. Also on the table were a couple of resin buildings and I picked up both for just £5.00 (that's right £2.50 each) - at those prices I thought they were well worth taking a punt.....

Both buildings were either damaged or heavily modified with doors and some features either cut off or broken. I cleaned up the castings and mounted them onto plastic card bases before painting and decorating the bases.

I had originally written the articles/tutorials as two separate pieces but Guy (the editor W, S & S) has published them as one. The first, the Roundhouse is a 15mm casting by Hovels (modified to 28mm scale with new doors), while the second is a 28mm Longhouse from Gripping Beast.

For more information about the magazine see this link

Browsing my virtual W H Smiths store I currently have three magazine articles in three different magazines on display. The W, S & S issue 108, Narrow Gauge World 147 and Miniature Wargames issue 445. Although I have in the past had two magazine articles displayed at the same time - this is the first time I have had three!

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

The Chapel at Rofenburg - part twelve

More work on the chapel roof....

The terracotta tiles to the edges have been painted and the cement or mortar rendering painted in.

The wooden bell tower has been detailed and the steeple has been basecoated in a very dark blue/grey colour ready for the main colour.

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Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony

The Chapel at Rofenburg - part eleven

Painting of the chapel started with the roof which was undercoated or basecoated with dark grey acrylic paint. Individual tiles were picked out in lighter greys and darker browns. I find that it is best to apply the basecoat in two or three light coats and try to ensure that the paint gets into all the groves and gaps.

I tend to take more care when painting roofs as it is usually the roof that you spend most time looking down on - It you are going to lavish detail on only one part of your wargame terrain - lavish it on the roof.....

Subsequent highlights were done with a mix of grey and mid brown paints drybrushed on in layers.

The basecolours painted on earlier still show through the drybrushing and the drybrushing helps to highlight all that texture. The variation in colour also helps to give the model some 'warmth' and makes it look more natural - if I was to offer the novice one more piece of advice it would be to add lots of different colours to roofs (not just black and white or a single tone of grey) as the variation helps to make it look more natural and interesting.

The doors to the front and the windows were painted in a similar manner.

The windows were also highlighted with a blue drybrush to highlight the plastic weave.

I have been asked why I start with the dark roof and detail before painting the whitewashed walls. I regularly paint in this fashion as I think it is easier to add the whitewashed walls later than try and mask off the white while painting the roof and drybrushing it.

Don't get me wrong, I know that this technique is thought to be the wrong-way-around. But it works for me. If you have a different technique - fine, whatever works for you.

Stay safe

Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony