Civs US 82nd Airborne – 28mm

A pic of the entire force. They may borrow some British armour support but for now its all footsloggers.

This is all ill be painting for this force as i specifically want to keep it small. The idea is it will be an independant US platoon which i can use as allies for my Canadian armoured division or my British paratroopers (i also dont want the project to get out of hand as i dont have the room for more models!)

1. These five will be my first go at apinting the US paras. I have a 15mm US para force and so have copied the colours used on them (FOW youtube tutorial for reference).

Im a bit concerned at how green they are looking compared with my references (mainly band of brothers). The Para uniform seems to be more of a dark beige colour so i think i may have to change my painting receipe. THese are fairly far along now though so they will stay as they are, maybe i’ll mark them as rangers or something.

If anyone can suggest a good set of paints using the vallejo range do let me know.

So after painting up the first five i thought they looked too green, im going for a Normandy/Band of Brothers look.

Ive done a test model based off another painting tutorial i found but now feel its too brown (you dont have these problems with Napoleonics!)

What do you guys think, Green, Brown or somewhere in the middle?

EDIT: I think ive settled on the middle colour below, i feel its more band of brothers.

So what do you do when you have a cold and are sleep deprived…thats right struggle to sleep. So in an attempt to avoid electronic devices before bed i have started on the second batch of airborne.

The faces are done and most colours blocked out in the new browner green uniform.

Im quite pleased how the faces turned out as i have been struggling with them recently. The new uniform colour is making them look a lot more band of brothers too, even though these are destined to be the 82nd airborne and not the 101st.

Next steps are to base colour the webbing and the use army painter dip to shade the uniform. Once thats done its onto the highlighting and then i can call them done. Ill base the whole army together when i decide on how im going to do it.

So apart from just realsing the above picture has all the points cut off (its 599 youll just have to take my word for it), im quite pleased i can fit all my force into a 600 point game with maybe a light tank as back up should i need to get to 700/750.

8 order dice and im a bit light on troops but hey ‘he who dares wins’ right.

On a side note another 6 troops have been started which leaves me with another 10 left.

So here we are a few more models in. Im pretty happy with how they are turning out, especially their faces as thats something ive not been happy with in some of my previous projects.

Ive tried adding a bit of an unshaven look to these guys and again pleased with the result. The highlights on the uniform are a bit too extreme so will need to tone it down for the next lot.

So i decided to do the american flag patches the paras wore and realised the decals i got didnt have them on. So i thought “you know what i bet i can just paint these on”. Yeah it was waaay more difficult than i thought and im not massively happy with the outcome.

Ill keep them like this until they are finished and if i still dont like them ill invest in some decals.

In hindsight trying to paint perfectly straight lines of red on a white background wasnt the best idea, you can really see every wobble.

Apologies for the picture but if you zoom in you can see the results.

The paintbrush has not been idle and ive finally got round to painting the HQ and weapon support.

The BAR models from Artizan are a joy to paint, not too much detail helps a lot.

The only thing i have left to paint now is the mortar crew amd thats the original army done. I have manged to get some rangers at a reasonable price so there will be some new additions soon.

Next steps will be doing to basing and then thats these guys done. The grey plastic pile is getting smaller at last.

I do however need to finish these guys up quickly now, as i have started a slow grow Bolt action campaign and im going winter germans.

So i got a 28mm leaf cutter from Greenstuff world and wanted to finally add them to my bases. What do you guys think?

I feel they need a bit of an ink wash to help them blend in as they look too flat.

Also too many leaves? not enough? Anyone with experience using these to decorate bases?

Any help appreciated!

So its a little lie i still have a mortar team to finish but theyre mostly there.

Ive learnt quite a bit about basing too so a worthwhile little project.

Next up winter germans.