The Road to Falaise Bobs on going 15mm WW2 Adventure

Dont usually do a mid week update, but on my new mid week break, got quite a bit of bitty stuff done, did all but varnishing on M18’s and last bit of Kellys Heroes( will do a full update an post on what are you painting forum on them)

Did the texturing on British infanry platoon below and varnished the Germans pre flocking.

But the important , started work on my Tiggers, Now got to say the Battlefront Tigers are glorious models and a lot easier to put together than they look on instructions

So having done the base Zandri Dust coat and overall wash with Agraz Earthshade with dry brush of dust again over top, time to camouflage them.

As they were in independent Battalions and not part of Panzer Lear wanted a different camouflage for them, with the 3 I had built I also added the Sturmtiger and the 2x 105 Stugs for anti/infantry support.

Now I’d love to say I copied above, but in actual fact went by gut feeling and only after the even did I find I had something close.

As I wanted that the same effect as I got with the blotch scheme on the other tanks I 1stly added  stripes of Athonisan Camoshade, starting with the Sturmtiger (in case got it wrong easiest to re do)

The original plan was for the green stripes to start on the right and fade as they got to left side and the vise versa with the brown stripes using Agrax Earthsade, but space and the fact it didnt look right made me go all across for both

I again dry brushed Zandri Dust over the top to fade them down a bit and ended up with a simpler (needed on 15mm models) effect to the one above.

I should be able to finish the painting stage by Sunday so will add to this entry then.

Saturday update

Finishing them after all the work on Wednesday was fairly quickly done so here they are ready for decals.

Painting infantry in any scale tends to be the longest thing to do, as you dont have to just paint them , but base them as well, often the basing can take as long as painting the figures,

Although I have to finish the later on my last Platoon of Panzer Grenadiers, and 3rd Platoon of British. I have done all the painting, which hits two actual landmarks :

One I’ve painted all the infantry for all 3 forces I intend to do (well rifle platoons some heavy wpns to for Germans and British to do)

Two I’ve done the infantry for both British and German starter boxes

Will still be some odd figures to do, as in above hvy wpn teams and gun crews for various guns, but compared to the bulk painting of above!

The British were done differently from other two forces,in that no contrast paint was used.

Base coat of GW Zandri Dust

2x washs of Seraphim Sepia to get nice khaki effect

Then block painted belts and gaiters  GW Nurgling Green.

Rifles and entrenching tools just got a GW wash of  Reikland Flesh shade

Metallic bit on guns was the Dark Gun metal from Vallejo.

The and overall thinned out wash of GW Agrax Earthshade

I them picked out the face details with White Base ( more a cream really) from Privateer press.

Rank markings were done with a Wolf grey from Army Painter, and yellow/black 11th armoured shoulder pads added.

And from the back!

Now I managed to finish above and two more lolly pop sticks worth to complete Motorised Rifle Platoon  (Rifle Brigade) and 3 bases for foot figures for carrior section ‘

Above took a good chunk of Sunday and Monday morning, so yesterday afternoon finished of base painting of Hellcats and in the evening put on most of the Decals, just need to put on vehicles names

When I finished my 1st Zug of Panzer Grenadiers I realised that with a few additions from on the Beach Germans I could build a 2nd Zug, so I did and the main focus of this week was to paint them. Annoyingly I miss counted and need one more mg42 , luckily one was left on sprue so they will be done during the week.

In the spirit lets get all the infantry out of the way so I can paint more tanks, I decided to start the British or finish them if earlier instalments, so based the platoon from the starter box, now the cover shows only 3 bases , so I assume that’s the figs needed for the carrier squad. But there is enough for a Motor platoon and a enough extra to still do bases for carrier squad so that’s what I have done.

I also sprayed my jeeps and Halftrak for the last bits of Kelly’s heroes and 4 Hellcats I picked up on e-bay

I had found a site doing Zveda kits at reasonable prices so I got some German heavys for later in the war:

3x King Tigers

1x Ferdinand (sorry John)

1x Jagdtiger (Kevin likes them)

and ermmm! as Sturmtiger, only one I’m not going down the route of having more than were made.

so in the evenings I built them

With these the selection was pretty much decided by what I had painted, I’d only picked up the starter box in last couple of weeks, the tanks were all fromm bootcamp but still fit as hadn’t put on decals till got home,

For narrative,  these fit with a hastily collected response force of Panzer Lear Division,  racing to stem the Invasion.

Panther Tank Company HQ

1x Panther                                11pts

Panzer IV mixed tank Platoon

3x Panzer IV                            16pts

Panzergrenadier Platoon

7x mg 34 team

1x Skdz 251 (3.7) half track

3x Skdz 251 (MG)                     12pt

With panzerfaust                      1pt

Skdz 222 light scout troop

3 x Skdz 222                              3pt

8.8cm Heavy AA platoon

2x 8.8cm AA gun                     6pts

Which again comes to 49pts so just fits.

Not sure the two forces are balanced but intresting to find out.

1. With all the Frantic painting and building forgot this bit!

Luckily now I don’t Wednesday’s I can have a look at this.

For the American’s I have a bit of leeway in that I’ve painted up more particularly as I only wanted to select units I have painted since the league started. I didn’t paint with any real force in mind for both sides, more of what took my fancy, so don’t  think either American or German are going to win any trophies. Saying that they do fit a campaign idea and sort of fit D-day +1 , so we have a beleaguered  Parachute platoon with Anti tanks, and a unit of Light tanks and tank Destroyers racing to support.

So for the Americans we have :
Parachute Rifle Platoon (note these were the ones left unpainted at Bootcamp.)
5x M1919 & M1 Garand Rifle teams
1 60mm mortar
1x bazooka team 11pt
1x M1919 LMG 1pt

57mm Anti Tank Platoon
4x 57mm 10pt

Vet M5 Stuart tank co Hq
2x M5 5pts

Vet M5 Stuart tank Platoon
3x M5 Stuarts 7pts

M10 3 INCH TANK Destroyer Platoon
4x M10 16pt

Which if my maths hasn’t gone totally squiffy is 50 pts exactly.

Well everyone else is wavering away on 40k I’m continuing my FOW/IABSM project, today I finished the painting stage on most of what will be 1st Zug of Panzergrenediers. a 2nd platoon is now sitting on the lolly pop sticks.

This week I decided as part of the game I needed a more mobile German infantry force, hence the painting up of the Hanomags, so now I started the German infantry from German Starter box.

I’ had been playing around with contrast paints , using the gun crews for the Pak 75’s , the 88’s and Hanomag crews to try and find right combination.

1st I tried the the Grey Seer as base on the pak 75’s and Black Templer but found it too dark so had to dry brush Field grey to tone it down.

I then tried wraithbone base and above  on the 88 crews and found light bits to light so had to dry brush to darken up!

I then tried above base with Basilcanium Grey on the hanomag crews  which was still a bit light but closer

So thought need a darker tanish darker base, and used Karak Stone from layer paint range

This seems to have worked and brought up a nice range of Field grey shades as can be seen below:

Well on my 1st free Wednesday now gone part time thought I would use some of new free time to do end of hobbying holiday update.

I firstly finished the Maultiers   but forgot to photo them so will add shot later.

I then decided to start on the mid and late war US Armoured companies has using the former for formally painted a.comp and the latter for Kelly’s Heroes. Specially as found a lot of figures were armed with BAR’s. Not apparently carried by Armoured infantry ( @oriskany?) according to FOW, so used them to make BAR heavy bases to represent A.N.other members of the Heroes,  in film they were armed predominantly with Thompson’s but Artistic licence. Two of the best painted not armed with BARs were selected to be single figure commands representing Kelly and Big Joe  with one with BAR for the corporal.

For my Game as in project report

Decision at Le Mer D-Day -1

I decided needed a bit more of a selection of units other than my current collection of Tanks and infantry.  So from German Starter set , built the 4 hanomags and the 2 x 88’s and the two PAk 40’s from on the Beach( Only the two inf Zugs left).

I also built a 2nd Puma and 3 more 222 armoured cars (Zveda) for a recon unit, and whilst waiting for various stages on inf above to dry finished painting them all!

I also built the remaining vehicles from Stuart’s, as an M8 battery and with the Staurts  and got them all painted.

In addition I finished the 2 Suarts to finish company, the T70 and 3rd Sherman for Kelly’s Heroes.