What's currently on the paint bench?

Hey guys!

Recently I have been able to finish up my 15mm American Paratrooper platoon for Chain of Command, and while I have a couple more bits and bobs left on my todo list in order to run a couple campaigns, I have currently gotten completely side tracked. As often happens with us wargamers we like to switch projects and game systems at the glimpse of an eye. So, out of seemingly nowhere, this week I decided to work on two very different sets of miniatures. The first little project was to get started on finally painting some 6mm Baccus Napoleonics which I have been sitting around untouched for nearly a decade. These were extremely quick and easy to paint, in two days I managed to paint up and base 96 little Russians. I'm very pleased with how they turned out and now have on my hands the task of painting a whole bunch more infantry, cavalry and artillery. In any case here are the little fellas!

Completely unrelated to historical wargaming I decided to also set on the side some old Games Workshop Lord of the figures, I have never actually painted 28mm miniatures and found that, while they naturally take a lot longer, it is a lot easier to get some nice realistic highlighting. I tried to work with different colors and have some fun, not aiming to actually replicate how they look in the movies. You seldom get to paint some exciting and bright colors when working on historical miniatures, so this side project was fantastic in helping me stay motivated and to have some fun on the side. I am extremely please on how they both turned out, particularly the fella on the right!

Darrell "Shifty" Powers

Hello again,

For once this won't be a big update on any of my projects, after finishing my 15mm US Paratrooper platoon for Chain of Command I kept thinking: "well I'm theoretically finished, but what could I add?" Well I hadn't bothered painting up a sniper for the platoon, but at the same time I didn't want another prone figure with a scoped rifle covered in foliage (usually what my sniper units look like). So I thought, still keeping Band of Brothers as a reference, what if I depicted Darrel "Shifty" Powers? The man who in Easy Company was famous for having a great set of eyes and being a phenomenal shooter. 

I vividly remember that in Stephen E. Ambrose's Band of Brothers, there was a story about "Shifty"  during the Battle of Bulge which shocked me. He had been able to spot a tree a mile away which had not been there the day before. This "tree" was actually part of the camouflage used to hide a German AA battery, and was later bombarded and destroyed by battery fire thanks to him. So here is my attempt at depicting Shifty along with Sergeant Carwood Lipton, somewhere in Normandy, maybe in the fields leading up to the attack on Carentan? Here they are:

Hope you guys enjoyed this different post!

Finished US Paratrooper Platoon

Hey guys!

So the 15mm Chain of Command onslaught continues... Well after a long break, mostly due to having to focus on my final dissertation and other school work, I finally decided to start a new project altogether, at this point painting more Germans will simply fry my brain. 

As most WW2 buffs I have always been a huge fan of the HBO Band of Brothers mini series, using it countless times as motivation whilst painting. So this summer I decided to get on with it and finished up a little US Paratrooper platoon along with various support options. I decided to experiment with some new photo techniques. Yet, I made the mistake of not using a large enough sheet of paper so was forced to end up making some clumsy cropping which is a shame, but I was still quite happy with the final result and was not bothered too much. Here below is the full platoon with all its support options:

The core platoon is completely different to that of my previous German and British platoons, it consists of only two sections, but is nicely supplemented by a 60mm mortar section (unfortunately without a Junior leader attached). In any case being elite, making them extremely hard to hit, and being equipped with belt fed LMG's and Garands these guys truly pack a punch!

When it came to support options I didn't want to go overboard so I mostly focused on what I am planning on using on some of the campaigns I saw online: an extra squad, a 5 man MMG team, a forward observer for off table mortar support, a medic and finally 4 SMG gunners. If I deem it necessary in the future I might simply paint another Bazooka team and possibly a sniper.

In any case I'm quite happy with the project altogether, I tried out some new techniques and was able to paint these guys pretty quickly so I'm looking forward to trying them out!

Thanks for reading!