WWII German Wehrmacht Infantryman 1/16 Winter Uniform

Yesterday, I was woke up in the middle of the night by my dog. Can't get to sleep so started to work on my German soldier. I continued to work until morning and managed to finish it in dawn. Whoo.. What a rush. Here's the promised photo of the completed model. Now to describe some background of the work in progress..

This is a long time since I painted my models by HAND. Yes, airbrush is used only for the base coat and accessories. The rest (mostly the main body area) are painted by hand. You could see from the photos that my painting skills with a brush really sucks... Still can see some streak marks. Need more practice and improvement. I know what causes it, too much paint and my strokes are too hard and inconsistent pressure. It looks so easy done by the experts but for me its tough. Still the final result is quite acceptable to the front row of my display case in the living room.. hehehe

This particular model is a 1/16 replica of a Wehrmacht Infantryman during the late 1940s. Originally, the hooded uniforms are designed for war with Russia and comes only in white or field grey colour. Later of the war, the Germans managed to incorporate the Water pattern into the design for better camouflage purposes. There is also a Splinter and an Oak Leaf pattern specifically for the Elite Infantry.

I did it!!

I suck at painting figures. Especially the facial part(skin tones). But after some practicing with the Japanese soldiers. I kind of have the confidence to paint a 1/16 figure. Bought a WWII German Infantry and started the face. Result is the picture shown on the left. (A bit handshake due to low light, will try to take another when I finish the whole thing) hehe... I am glad I finally understand and really know how to paint a bloody face... hahaha

Its actually quite complicated and I need to thank Bernard from theMworkshop to introduce me to some great books, especially Clavin Tan. Check out their galleries, they are amazing!! He's a Singaporean modeller and his models are published in a lot of International model magazines.

My painting skills still really needs a lot of improvements. Best way is to practice more...

JGSDF Light Armoured Vehicle

I have been working on this little bugger for the last 3 weeks. Its one of the more complicated builds. I am suppose to work on my SCUD Launcher but I feel not skillful enough to build such a big model. So I took this as a practice session.

Initially it was simple, very little parts and it has a die cast lower hull. So most of the time is super glue. The original kit comes with only one driver, so I bought another an additional Japan Ground Defense Force (JGSDF)infantry set (separate) which comes with 5 additional figures. 1 commander, 2 rifle man, 1 squad leader and 1 machine gunner which I placed on the turret of the vehicle.

Then it dawned on me that the amount of different colours are needed to paint the model are much much more then the usual ones I have built. (The max I have used is almost 17, on average models only need less then 10 colours.) This one beats all of them. For the figures, 4 different colours for the camouflage uniform. Flesh uses 3 tones...etc etc Total colours used on the figures and weapons are 12. The jeep itself has interior colours and accessories like fire hydrant, seats, dashboard and etc. Colours used on the jeep itself is about 15. Total 15+12 is 27!!! Wat lau..

And painting this jeep takes steps. I have to paint the interior. Masked them before painting the exterior. For an example of the complicated process. The door itself has 6 colour schemes. First, overall base coat grey for the door. Then paint the interior light blue. Masked the internal and paint the external with the olive drabs. Then remasked the edges and external to paint the NATO green for the armoured panel. After that, glue the painted (black) handles and glass panel (clear blue) to complete one door. Shiong.

The kit is very well modeled so I did not do any conversion. Everything is out of the box build. Also I am lazy... heheh so dun bother. The jeep is airbrushed and later lightly washed with black.. Although should be light wash but you can still see quite heavy black marks on the jeep. Its difficult to weather a modern military vehicle as most of them are new and are well kept. So I did nothing major on it yet.. want to slowly see how to make it more appealing.

I actually plan to build this as a Diorama set. Still in planning stages. The figures I have to say have improved a bit.. hehe.. I am poor at painting figures but I quite like this result so far. All figures are first airbrushed with a base green colour before hand painting the camos... Took me quite some time to do it.

Hope you enjoy the model as I do.. Still need lots of improvement.

Russian KV-1 (light)

Think this should be the last model I shall complete in Thailand before heading back to SG. KV stands for Kliment Voroshilov who is suppose to be a politician in Soviet Union. You could read more about the tank history here.

This bugger is quite easy to build as it has minimium accessories. I did a wash this time and it came out looking fine.. I decided to try weathering it in snowy condition. I bought a Tamiya Snow weathering stick and decided to try it.. pretty good, the stick works like a crayon. The pre results are the first 2 photos.First try just using the stick.

Another photo.

Later at night, I was powdering my baby after her bath and it dawns on me how to improve my model.... hehehe

Looks much much better... but have to be careful when handling it.

M42A Red Army

Another Model completed today. Its actually the first time I build a US tank. (The M8 Armoured Car does not count as its not a tank)

This tank is the famous WWII M42A "Sherman" tank used by the allies against the German panzers. According to Wiki, it was run on Gasoline and pretty dangerous when it got hit in the fuel tank (gasoline is more explosive than diesel).

I have to give credits to Dragon Model as they throw in a lot of goodies. Besides the photo-etched parts, there is a full metal barrel, a set of one piece steel track (so easy to fix this time) and a flexible dust cover.

This particular M4A2 as mentioned in the title, belongs to the Red Army of USSR. The USA loaned over 4000++ of Shermans to the Russians during WWII. This particular model has the isignia of the Russian 8th Guards Mechanized Corps, 1944/45. I actually don't like the US version as it has a big ugly star infront of the tank.

I had many problems with this model actually. Its has quite a lot of photo-etched metallic parts and they are bloody tiny to glue. Worst still, I have to use super-glue which is very hard to work with. (One mistake means you jialat liao). !@##$%#@# to the superglue.

Painting this bugger is also troublesome. I have no pre-knowledge of painting Olive Drab. (Sandy Yellow Brown is my norm). The model came out much darker than I expected. So I mixed a lighter tone by adding white. It helps ut the overtone still looks greyish rather than green (see photos). I tried pin-point pre-shading this time. Which means I only shade those darker areas with black. No more red-brown paint. Which kinds of make the model a bit brighter. Lucky I used this method or my Olive Drab will look even darker.

Rest of the pictures here..

I airbrushed my accessories this time. Makes them look more realistic.

The guards for the headlights and rails are photo-etched. Took more than a day just to fix these.

The corps isignal. 21b 6/4

Dust cover and roughened surface of the turrent.

French Hotchkiss 35/38

Its been some time I started to build military models. Here's the first one I had build recently in thailand. Its a French pre WWII light tank. Build from the box and with heavy weathering. (Tracks are muddy and tank is dirty)

You may also wish to read up on the history of the tank here.