Come and join us for another delve into the Projects to find the best of the best from the last week or so. We'll be getting stuck into lots of great-looking miniature wargaming painting and hobbying this week...

...always let us know what YOU have been working on and share it across the site.

Rough Riders by scribbs

We start off this week's Community Spotlight, where we're going to be looking at some of the work by scribbs who has been working on the Desert Scorpion Rough Riders from the folks at Victoria Miniatures. This Project Warhorse endeavour has turned out very nicely indeed.

scribbs has been painting these for the last week or so and they have turned out exceptionally well. They have walked through the process of painting both the riders and their mounts as well as some of the decisions they made along the way from a hobby point of view. For example, this was their first encounter with SioCast and they have talked about the pain in cleaning them and straightening elements like the lances but otherwise having a nice enough time with the miniatures.

They also talk about how their experience painting a lot of Napoleonic cavalry has ended up helping them in the process of painting these miniatures. That is especially the case when it comes to the uniforms for the riders themselves. The set has a really nice, clean finish that showcases some nice shading and highlighting whilst retaining the bright colours.

This was just a small project but it enabled scribbs to get stuck into the details. I really like the details brought out in the faces of the riders and the painting of the horses as a whole. I like the change in colours from the hooves and up the legs. Adding the white "socks" and the black lower legs helps to give the horses a little "something" extra and ground them in reality. A great project!

African Warriors by zoidpinhead

Next up, we're heading to a real-world desert in the form of the Darkest Africa project by zoidpinhead. They have been working away on some older miniatures from their collection to build up an army from a different corner of the world.

This is another Spring Clean Hobby Challenge project from the community, where zoidpinhead is looking to refresh an older project. They are focusing on a particular leader in the form of Bornu-Kanembu and getting stuck into the painting of Azande, Turkana, Sudanese and Congo Arab slavers and Congo tribal forces. That is a lot of different regions to cover in a project.

Some of the most recent painting for this project has focused on the Shuwa Arabs. This is an exercise in plenty of different colours and making use of a very pure white and how that sits alongside the deep blue. This provides a great contrast when set against the darker skin of these warriors. I like that zoidpinhead has managed to get the tones just right and I think the basing also works very well, giving off the feel of a hot landscape with rough ground all around.

zoidpinhead has also been working on some archers in the form of these Mungu warriors. Again, a relatively simple scheme but one that looks very effective when all of the miniatures are grouped together.

There are some really nice tips and tricks in here for those wanting to paint darker skin and make it look realistic. There is the temptation to just go brown and leave it at that but there is plenty to learn, some of which is found within this project.

You can find out more about the miniatures being used for this project over on the link above. It looks like it is turning into quite a nice Death in the Dark Continent army.

20mm World War II by piers

Last but not least, we're having a look at more World War II awesomeness from piers, which seems fitting for this time of year. We're getting a look at the new 20mm US vehicles they have been working on for use in Battlegroup and beyond.

This is a new batch of US vehicles which are going to be joining pier's ever-increasing set of miniatures for use in World War II. I would imagine that at this point piers might actually have enough figures to field some of the actual armies that fought during various battles in World War II.

This set of miniatures here represents a selection of Jeeps plus plenty of tanks for good measure. They have a distinct "piers" feel to them, which feels realistic with all of the dirt and grime that manages to work its way into the miniatures alongside the battle damage.

If you want some reference images for painting up your very own World War II miniatures, then you can't go too far wrong when it comes to the work by piers. There are so many different vehicles and troops in this project that you'll probably find something that you can use to help you get started on your own collection. Perhaps this will encourage you to have a look at 20mm as a scale for World War II wargaming?

What Are You Painting Right Now?

Every week we’re absolutely blown away by the incredible topics that are put into the Projects, it’s getting more difficult to choose Community Spotlights! We love your work and we hope to see a lot more of it in the future!

If you fancy getting your hobby fingers out and showing off your newest paint job, terrain piece or even greatest gaming achievement, we want to know about it! We don’t mind if you’re a newcomer to painting or a veteran of the brush, everything you do inspires us to create more and more content together!

What do you think of the entries this week?