Ollie paints…. Flames of War (Take 2) (Slow Grow League)

This afternoon has been spent cleaning up infantry ready for priming….. urgh….
An Armoured Rifle platoon, the halftrack crews and tank crews for 8 M10s…. (Pic below) and after doing that you remember there’s more tank crews and another 2 AR platoons to do….
…. and then I went to the OTT Store and ordered more tanks! 😀

Little bit of progress this past week, but been away for 2 days this weekend so Bank Holiday monday was spent playing catch up. Got the first round of Shermans painted earlier this week ready for gloss varnishing ahead of decals and pin washes…. however it’s too frickin warm today to airbrush anything so spent the day assembling 2 units of M-10s

Unfortunately Battlefront are out of US decals and as a result, everything is in a holding pattern for 3-5 weeks as they’re on back-order, so it’s tank assembly and painting up to pre-decal point…. and infantry….. oh the infantry….. honestly not looking forward to all of them! 😀

Realised I had 2 little bits left for the desert force to finish, my 2 objective markers – an M3 Stuart providing some cover for a mortar team, and a Bazooka team taking cover behind the burnt-out wreck of a Honey.

In the meantime, Shermans have been built and primed…

That’s North Africa dealt with, 109pts in 2 months, fairly successfully I think…. time to move onto D-Day! I picked up 2 US Starter Sets as with some minor additions I can create 3 very different core armies. I had an Armoured Rifle platoon sat around from my faltered start in v3 so that’s now added to the mix as well.

2 sets gives me:
10x M4 Shermans
6x M5 Stuarts / M8 Scotts
8x M10 Wolverines
2x Armoured Rifle Platoons
6x M7 Priests

Added to that will be:
4x M10 Wolverines
4x M4 Shermans
4x M4 Sherman 105s
1x Armoured Rifle Platoon (mentioned earlier)
1x Armoured Rifle Platoon HQ
2x Recon Cavalry

Which gives me….
A Sherman Company – a staple formation of armour
A Tank Destroyer Company – well, after a North African one would be rude not to have a D-Day one with them as veterans 😉
An Armoured Rifle Company – always needs boots on the ground
plus various support assets to back them up

So for my first Late War 50pts, 10 veteran Shermans comin up!

Well, there we go! The Fighting First are ready for the deserts of North Africa. This week has been spent finishing the units – the 2nd M10 platoon, the Armoured Recon platoon and the M7 Priest batteries, so here they are in their final glory

Of course it would be rude not to show them in their entirety 😉

Now, onwards to D-Day….

This weekends productivity has been all about detailing and some more detailing… Tracks, tyres, tools, guns, shell casings, crates and seats all done ready for oil washing.
I thought I’d nearly broken the back of it…. then I remembered I still need to paint the crews! 😀 They’re now drying after a brief visit from the airbrush, but in the meantime here’s the remaining units in their near complete glory.

The war effort continues and production is ramping up…
Hot on the heels of the first unit of M10s comes the Tank Destroyer HQ in the form of 2 M3 Stuarts, a 3rd Stuart as an Artillery Observer whilst the 4th is going to be part of an objective marker

(PS – there is place reserved in hell for those turret decals…. even with the use Micro Sol/Set!)

After last weekends mass airbrushing session, I decided it was time to focus on some individual units. As the infantry are finished, thought I’d get their taxis done to complete the unit, and as it’s a TD formation, best get one of the M-10 units done as well.
Taking the units to the next stages from the modulation stage in the previous entry, they were given a pin-wash using AK Interactive Dark Brown was for Green Vehicles to provide some definition. Then came the decals so a coat of gloss varnish in the applicable places, and of course always use Micro Sol/Set on decals to get as decent finish. Next, the crew! They had been painted alongside the infantry platoon so they just needed gluing in place. Finally a coat of matt varnish, before a light dusting with VMC Ivory to add some sand effect. Decided not to go full weathering for these (paint chips, scratches etc)… maybe on my D-Day force instead 😉
Turned out quite nicely, my only complaint being that after adding decals,  varnish and dusting, the modulation looks like it’s disappeared and the paint scheme looks a little flat in the pics, although they don’t look quite so “bad” in the flesh
Now to finish the rest…. and then onto the D-Day force!