I just missed the end of AHPC15 with some 1848 era artillery.
Rather than park them like last year I decided to get these Properly finished.
Tag: miniature figures
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AFV April – What a mess
Jumping on the back of John at just needs varnish and Zauberwurfs duel over some mechanised models I determined to follow up my AHPC15 logistics Lorries.
https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/?m=1
Well it seems experimentation is the order of the day. Instead of just painting some vehicles in plain military colours I seem to have drifted into a look at contrast colours, and it’s a right mess. I had no plan – just paint a lighter base colour and let the contrasts do the rest.
Not the best outcome since I undercoated in grey or white then the Vallejo olive green seems to be quite translucent. End result is the shading is just highlighting my poor main colour work.
Ho hum.
During AHPC14 I got into modelling instead of painting and specifically building models from household recycling – cardboard and plastic. The net is repleat with simply magnificent models done this way. I thought why not have a go.
Skinflint Games was an early discovery….
https://skinflintgames.wordpress.com/2023/08/08/hau-nau-haunebau-diy-flying-saucer/
https://skinflintgames.wordpress.com/2024/10/
Anyway back in October 2023 I started off my SciFi adventures on Fauxterre….
https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/2023/10/18/painting-pedestal-23x-tacfos-the-game-episode-3/
I started to collect bits together for some spacecraft only to see the idea fade during AHPC14 as WW2 models took centre stage including a white reconnaissance spitfire – my first aeroplane kitbash in years.
https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/tag/fantasy/
Well AHPC15 rejuvenated my modelling again. And so the scrapheap challenge spacecraft arrived – in fact two!
First up was my take on the Red Dwarf TV series red spaceship – now mine is a “klim” class space freighter often used by rogues.
https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/02/from-johnb-filthy-lucre-or-wheres.html
Second was my Policing vehicle – a space customs machine in blue. Again its basis is a “klim” class frame!
https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/03/from-john-b-abyss-violence-oi-their.html
Into the bargain I managed to paint up some magazine “freebie” dwarves and hobbits. AHPC15 as with AHPC14 drew me away from my projects and regular painting. While that meant less progress with my chosen periods the change was as good as a rest – as they say.
Indeed I have tended to use these APHC challenges to experiment with painting and modelling methods. Also the AHPC participation has certainly speeded up some of my painting habits. And that must be a good thing for a slowcoach like me.
Another entry from AHPC15. This time I was preoccupied with the challenge theme – Dantes Comedy where you had to descend each level into the abyss. Gluttony was the theme.
This is the link to my AHPC15 entry
https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/from-john-b-28mm-space-marines-of-puls.html
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The Painting Portrait 25f Logistics
AHPC15 not only saw me make progress with my mid C19th century armies. Much delayed Fauxterre 1930 or my Lockdown Bricks and Mortar Shop project actually got in on the act.
Back in Covid times I decided on a whim to try and build some WW2 armies by walking into shops and physically buying stuff! Yes I know this is a bit of an old technique nowadays. At the time the logic was “get out and about”.
As it happened I had found a book in a shop window and snapped it up by………walking in and buying it. At the time shopping was a weird but satisfying escape. Sold as a vintage item it was Charles Grant Snr’s Battle! Practical Wargaming (B!PW)
Now this book gave me a way into WW2 on the limited basis I was looking for. Also Grant was quite happy to use german and US kit for his Russian forces – in other words country kit for that country only was not that important (of course the Russians used any kit they could lay their hands as did the germans) and indeed his forces were RED v BLACK – pure fantasy. Ok so that meant Russians versus Germans in reality.
Now this fed my need for a “fantasy historical” WW2 set up. I would use the technical aspects of the period but mess up the actual forces involved and of course the countries would be make believe. Thats Fauxterre. Sorry no zombies or rayguns.
In keeping with a theme I had developed, Fauxterre 1930 started to take shape. Why 1930? Well I had on this particular journey become more and more interested in the early war set up and less and less the final years. This escalated into pre war when I started to look at aircraft. I was quite taken with the transition from biplane to monoplane. And before you know it I was looking at AFV technology.
Did you know – the fairy swordfish biplane flown by the British Royal Navy fleet air arm in the 1930’s was still in combat duty in summer 1945 armed with rockets! so much digression….
The net result is I am trying and failing to get Fauxterre 1930 off the ground. My Plastic Soldier Company US and Russian troops were my first choice for figures when it was Fauxterre 1940 and are fine for the early war period but somehow I don’t like the figures if I roll back a decade. I do like them but not for Fauxterre 1930! They work for Fauxterre 1940 so would be ok but that is parked for now.
On a trip to a toy show I picked up some bin end corgi trucks.
And before you know it I had added to my Fauxterre 1930 logistics kit.
This is a link to my AHPC15 entry.
https://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/from-johnb-sinews-of-war-143-corgi.html
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Spring Clean or Spring Board?
I suppose participation in the annual analogue hobbies painting challenge (No15 has just finished) has affected my normal year end musings.
AHPC15 started in December and finished in March. It meant I was heads down painting for that time – so no looking in the rear view mirror let alone out through the front wargamers truck windscreen at the turn of the year.
This maybe explains why I suddenly had the need to look at my plans for 2025.
Out of the blue I created a sharp pencil production tool.
Really it’s a funnelling idea with the visual aim to get to the point!
Of course I have two versions already…..
Of course the second image could be a virtual “log jam” with nothing getting through as they say……
My project Schleswig Holstein in 1/72 continues if a bit slowly.
This time this unit – piquet field of battle battalion, is offered up as my final entry in this winters paint what you got painting challenge https://wargamesculptorsblog.blogspot.com/2024/12/paint-what-you-got-painting-challenge.html?sc=1734736394728&m=1#c801656457305268158. It is run by Dave Stone.
The figures are hat Nassau Napoleonic infantry. 1/72 or 20mm plastics.
I picked them because they have the nearest shako look for the Dane’s bell shako.
I could do some head swops to get other sets in on the act but wanted to try a straight paint job here to see if I liked the result.
The basing is my standard 40mm square mdf with budgie grit pva then 3 colour brown, ochre and yellow/white highlights. As it’s nearly spring the grass is dead tufts from gamers grass over Javis sawdust green.
Quickly following on from breaking my duck in the analogue hobbies painting challenge I submitted these fine horsemen.
Now Modena was a small duchy in 1848 and the Dragoons were both mounted and a foot based part of the ducal army.
In fact the mounted arm stretched to just a few squadrons.
That was fine with me – I just had to have some sky blue cavalry in my collection.
The miniatures are Irregular (now based in Kingston upon Hull). They are easy to paint and have the detail I want for gaming.
My AHPC15 entry is here http://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/from-john-b-friday-crew-1848-modena.html?m=1
Back to the paint table as they say.
My first entry into the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge No15 were figures left over from last years challenge. They were primed but that was it.
So having a LIMBO section in this years theme of the Divine Comedy by Dante was most helpful.
The figures were Hat 1806 Prussian Hussars repurposed as 1848 Prussian Hussars. Fortunately the Prussians in 1848 were going going all new with frock coats and pickelhaubes but also retro with flugelmutzes!
You can read the entry here
http://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.com/2025/01/from-john-b-friday-crew-1848-8th.html
This year I have got off to a slow start with AHPC15 and Dave Stones Paint What You Got challenge is well challenging me.
hey ho.
Next up for my Painting Portrait is another Paint What You Got effort, this time it’s the 4th line who differ only from the 7th line in their facings – yellow for the 4th with white metal buttons while the 7th sport pink with yellow metal buttons.
Painting Portrait 25a details the scenery.
My mid nineteenth century units are four 40mm square bases coated with pva and budgie grit followed by a three colour paint job – burnt sienna then heavy dry brush yellow ochre finally light dry brush a yellow white to highlight.
Peco railway scenic grass is the final addition. I tend to match the base greenery to the uniform colour accepting my armies are mixed based.
The Wargaming Erratic 