Grasshoppers and Elephants

5 soldiers armed with m16s they have a mixture of packs and equipment including one dude carrying a law strapped to his pack.

I’m still deciding what to do with the basing for this squad

Just finished painting some of the superb gringo40s US army sculpts.

The models a full of character as always with nice crisp defined details.

This unit is the first part of a rifle squad.

These men will form the point team which will be supported by 6 other dudes one carrying an m60 split off from the weapons platoon and another as his loader the rest will be rifle men.

I’m still trying to decide what to do with the bases I kind of want a red/brown  finish with some foliage, I have read about people using coffee grinds and tea leaves or mixed herbs but think i need to so some experiments.

Ooops got side tracked by my allegiance to the war master and shiny new heresy shenanigans.

Thought I would try out the new vietnam us paint set from AK in the 3g acrylic range.

Generally I use vallejo paints but wanted a different look to my  us army rifle  platoon from the us marines.

Plus the ak paints I have used in the past have been great.

To paint the fire base I used a cheap burnt umber acrylic over everything.

The next step was to mix red into the base colour to make a clay like colour then splashed that everywhere.

Once that was fully dry I gave the whole model a Drybrush of zandri dust.

Then using Martian iron earth I painted blobs around the bases and to create paths down the hill connecting the bunkers.

Finally I gave everything a second Drybrush of zandri dust really focusing on the sand bags followed by a light brush of wraith bone.

The wood areas were then dabbed in with brown speed paint and the barrels were painted with vallejo russian uniform.

Once all that was dry I mixed contrast medium with a terracotta earth weathering powder and I worked that into the bunkers and around the sandbags removing any excess with a damp cotton bud.

Last but not least I drilled some little holes to poke the barbed wire into.

I thought it was about time that I started working on some more scenery.

Thought it would be cool to build the corner of a fire base for my 20mm US infantry platoon to defend.

Using up  some resin bunkers and dug outs I already had from Brittania miniatures, I started working out how I was going to place the separate areas.

The bunkers will hopefully look like they have been dug into a hill side with a protective burm with sandbags on top protecting the fire base.

The hilly part is built onto an 8″ by 8″ Cork mat with two 8″ by 4″ defensive berm sections and one corner section on a 4″ by 4″ tile.

My plan is to use up bits and bobs I have laying around, the hillside is airdry clay covered in kitchen towel and pva glue sprinkled with sand.

The sandbags are milliput and greenstuff and the defensive berms are the tops of some vacume moulded trench lines I had laying about.

To get the levels of the bunkers I balanced them on odds and ends that were the height I wanted then back filled with clay.

I got a load of unissued Chieu Hoi bags at the war and peace show a couple of years ago.

They were made to go over ammo magazines keeping them waterproof.

They were part of the open arms program.

Once used they would be left on the floor and was supposed to  be used by a North Vietnamese fighter as a token of safe passage.

They also make superb token and dice holders.

After watching a gerrycan about token making I thought I would give it a shot.

Ordered up a 1″ paper punch and some bottle top thingies and away I went to find my printer.

Switched it on to an array of flashing lites, so went into town to grab some ink.

Got home instaled the new ink and created more flashing lites and beeps so gave up and took the files I wanted printed to a shop in town.

To put the info on side b of the token I went old school with a stencil and a pen.

I’m pretty pleased with the results although I should have been more careful when stamping the tokens to get the star more central.

These minis were great fun to paint, the detail in them is superb.
some have hammocks rolled up tightly and wedged into the web gear and the selection of ammo pouches fits the weapons the figure is carrying.

Doh just realised i did not paint the neck scarfs will have to go back and do that.

Salut was a grest day, i had a chat with Ged on the gringo40s stand and picked up some nee bits to add to the collection.

The resin tank is awesome and i cant wait to get started on it. I have a few ideas for some conversions that may involve me cracking my 3d printer out.

I also picked up some more of tye superb ARVN minis.

these include a rto, a female officer and a dude with a shotgun as well as a group of carbine armed infantry and a superb nco with a thompson machine gun. As always the sculpts are crisp and clean and full of character.

cant wait to finish work today so i can splash some paint on them.

These little dudes have been painted the same way the larger NVA were but they looked very dark on the table top so i went back and re highlighted them with the base colour of vallejo russian uniform mixed with increasing amounts if vallejo ivory.