A Few Buildings More

I managed to get the steps done on the first two buildings I did last week and finished off another house, shed and pig sty. I am happy with how they came out.

I took them down to the game room and got some better pictures. Not sure if I achieved that or not.

These are the originals.

These are the new ones. All in all, I like how they turned out. There is one more of the Red Vector's houses left to do. I have it primed and depending on how I feel, it may see paint.

What I have next on the work bench is some Things From the Basement Models. I have a shed, a blacksmith's forge and a small house. I really like the look of these buildings. They are finer detail than the Red Vectors buildings. I am not sure how they will look together but until they are done, there is no way of telling. Both the blacksmith forge and the shed will be wooden roofed. The house will probably be a tin roof like I did for the Wild Lands building. I need to figure out how I will do the roof detail as I am not entirely happy with the engraved look. But at 15mm, it may not matter.

I am also working on 10 pieces of fencing. These were unfinished from before. All are straight pieces that are four inches in length. This with the order I placed for Things From the Basement (fences) should give me a nice mix of ratty looking and nice looking fences to create the village.

So where does that leave me? I still have a Star Fort Miniatures water mill to paint up. I have a bunch more Things From the Basement Buildings. Both of which intimidate me. I really like the models but they look better than what I can paint if that makes sense. What I would like to do is have a different color scheme for the TFTB village. Being partially color blind, that is daunting. I liked the blue I used for the Red Vectors. Not sure what would look right? A light green or a yellow?

After this, I plan on making some garden plots for the back yards and those chicken coops from TFTB when they come in. I also have an order for the Red Vector's ruined village that I want to get done to replace anything blown up during the course of the game.

Now since these are primarily wooden buildings that would burn up most of the way if there was any artillery bombardment, I also wanted a bunch of brick chimneys to have around for terrain. I know that Total Battle Miniatures has one. I have that building and really like it. But it is 8 pounds for just one. Surfing the web, I found some from Novus Design Studios that are more factory chimneys that won't fit the bill. Then I found on the Balagan website that Ironclad Miniatures used to do some. They are not part of their current catalog and the Balagan post made it seem like they were discontinued. So I sent them a quick mail. Turns out they are remastering these with the intent to release them again. Depending on price, I may be buying a bunch when they come out.

Bit of a long post today but lots of thoughts rambling through the brain today. Until next time.

Progress at last

I finally got some painting done. Two of my Red Vectors russian village pieces are now complete.

I used an old washcloth for the thatching and I think it came out alright. I still have another shed and two houses to do as well as a pig sty. Then that little corner of my village will be complete and I can move on to Things From the Basesment's Russian village. Those are far more intricate buildings and have intimidated me to paint them so far. I am hoping to overcome that and knock them out by next week.

Speaking of Things From the Basement, they are run by a great guy who is adapting his 28mm chicken coop to 15mm for me just because I asked. I ordered some fences from him and he offered to send me a test run of the chicken coop in 15mm. That is an item that I have been wanting for some time. I have an HO scale chicken coop that I am not entirely happy with.

Yesterday, I engaged in retail therapy. Besides the fences I ordered, I also ordered the ruined version of the Red Vector's Russian village. And some roof shingles from Warbases. I am excited about this and it should help me finish the Second Kharkov campaign. Speaking of which, I and well into the second campaign that will be in the book. Have been working on scenario 2 of 6 for the second campaign. The map is done and I think it looks pretty good. I am doing all of the game maps in Campaign Cartographer instead of using aerial photos like I did in the first book. Hopefully they will be clearer.

Once this is done, I will be back to making 1/300 sailing ships to wrap up the last bit for my KMH supplement. Onward and upward.