Tank Art Volume 2

I picked this book up as an early Christmas present to myself (I gave myself a lot of gifts this Christmas). For some reason I though that this would just end up being one big advert for AK Interactive, I'm not sure why I thought that, however it isn't.

This book is a 228 page practical and very useful guide with step by step instructions on working, weathering and detailing allied tanks. The mix of techniques is vast from hairspray to pigment washes and can be translated to any scale.

I found the winter wash effect particularly useful when I did my King Tiger tutorial. Another thing I found useful was once you came to the end of an article it would have the steps broken down in a two page summary.



(This is from Tank Art 3)

The price for a book which is graphic heavy is reasonable at $59.95 NZD and should by on every modellers bookshelf whether you're a scale model builder a Flames of War player or even and Imperial Guard Tank commander it's worth it. Two more volumes are available or coming soon focusing on modern armour and more German armour (this first book was also about German armour). 

 

    

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Brace yourselves, Winter is Coming

Winter worn tutorial time!

Here we go folks it may be summer where I am but it's winter somewhere and my Tiger needs to look the part....

Step One: Paint your tank as you normally maybe a quick in wash and do the details doesn't have to be fancy I just use 4 layers cos I'm crazy once done give it a coat of satin varnish.

Step Two: I use AK Interactive because it's trendy, new and smells slightly better than oils. Anyways coat your tank in the Worn Effects (this essentially replaces the the hairspray technique).

Step Three: A light coat of white just enough to cover the tank (remember we're going for a worn look) At this point it's worth noting that I forgot to decal the tank don't forget to do this. Leave this to dry and get a glass of warm water.

Step Four: Warm water and old brush attack the tank go for the parts that would get worn down the  quickest where crew would get in and out and where trees and bushes would scrape against the hull. Once done I gave it another round of Satin Varnish.

Step Five: Remember to take pictures if you're doing a tutorial!!!! What I did here was go around the tank with AK Interactive Rust and Winter Grime just blotting or putting little stripes on here and there but you can't see that due to the lack of pictures.

Step Six: Get out that thinner and start dragging it down if you've used too much of the wash just keep at it with the thinner drag it down, wipe it off. Don't go overboard on the thinner less is more you want the brush damp with thinner not soaking. 

Well that's it hope you enjoyed the tutorial lemme know what you think.

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Kings of War

Another game I've been sold on is Kings of War. I always wanted to get into Warhammer Fantasy but the price and the rules and the 4+ hours for a game kept me away. Then I saw Beasts of War were doing a Kings of War demo and it honestly seems pretty fast and fun.

From what I've seen it looks as though you don't remove individual mini's but when the unit fails a test the whole thing is gone and that your opponent does all the rolling (no saves etc) this cuts down on time. Secondly the price for $87 NZD I have a starter army and for about $25 - $30 I can add on extra boxes of goblins, zombies or whatever. This is definitely something for 2014.  

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Malifaux 2.0

Woot new Malifaux 2.0 is out and I couldn't resist getting another crew this time I went with the Guilds Judgement it's 100% plastic it's still their 30-32mm heroic style, just thinner. So if you've got big ham hands probably best stick to the metal mini's.

One of the awesome things about the new plastics it the weight which allows for some awesome poses and balancing that you just couldn't do with metal. Below is the pic of the one piece Lady Justice and the new plastic version of her.

Previously know as Lady Beewbs I guess she won't be anymore. Another awesome thing about Malifaux 2.0 is the new cards they've finally reduced them down to one double sided card which means they'll fit in card protectors now. 

The new Judge looks a lot more dynamic as well plus he has a hat and everyone knows hat's make for a better mini.

Because it's a plastic mini you can do things like have a guy held on by one hand balancing on something on an angle and not have it topple it's pretty awesome. 

Having only seen one game of the new version I'm keen to get my game on and see how the new thing ticks.

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Back to the painting table!

With Flamescon  over it's back to the painting table however I don't have any projects or commissions so that means I'm a free agent ready to get stuck into that pile of grey and silver. I've got a few AIW tanks to do and I'm prepping for Malifaux 2.0 I'm going to run Lady Justice this time as Sonia Cridd has become pretty boring.

At Flamescon I got Commended Army which is pretty good considering I didn't finish the heavy mortars and only had decals on one tank hopefully this means I'm getting better at painting and other folks are starting to recognize it too. I will however leave my commission prices the same, see this link http://kingdannz.blogspot.co.nz/2013/05/i-paint-for-you.html .

One of the things I want to invest in, or get as a Christmas present, is a new chair as you may or may no know my painting chair died after about 10 years in service first her gas went then the pan became loose and more recently an arm broke. Usually this wouldn't bother me but because the chair is sitting so low it's causing my hip to ache and that whole nerve cluster sucks so many balls.

So before I go here's a picture of the unfinished army if I'd been more diligent I may have won best painted but that's life.

And of course there was the Iron Painter which I completely forgot about but I remebered that Gav was using his US Tanks. I painted his Eightball for him I asked if he had it (and wasn't using it) and entered it into the comp. I got an Excellent and a certificate which I was pretty happy about.



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MOAR THINGS

Day 2 of FlamesCon and it's over for another year and I came somewhere near the bottom :P but on my downward spiral I caught sight of some other new things (the benefit of a quick game is all the mucking around time/angel of death I get to do between games) anyways stupid me forgot my camera but Greg was on hand with his i-Thingee and emailed me some pics.

Jets pew pew pew

And some more Real Estate including a really big Mosque looks like the coming months are going to be expensive!

Corrections: Yesterday I advised that the tanks and the crewmen were being made by the same place that does Perry mini's however it is just the crewman/commanders the tanks are made by a third party.

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Life in Plastic, it's fantastic!

So as some of you might know today Flamescon is being held in the Mt Eden memorial hall and as usual I'm doing a wildly mediocre job of driving tanks. However there's another reason why I go asides from getting to play with toy soldiers it's to get the goss on new and upcoming toys and releases. Unfortunately and NDA prevents me from telling you about upcoming books but these were on display to the general public.

I talked with one of the Battlefront staffers about the plastics and I'll write about that shortly but for now here's some pictures of the upcoming Fate of a Nation infantry.

Now onto the Plastics first of all they had these awesome schematics up at first I didn't understand them but apparently from each kit can form one of each of the variants shown i:e the Panther box can also make the Jagdpanther box. These aren't just plastic parts and resin but full plastic tanks.

 Now as an astute wargamer the first thing I asked about was the price on these and much like the all plastic M113's they will be cheaper than BF's current range however the staffer was unable to confirm if the boxes contained decals and magnets which would more than likely justify the price.

Also speaking of magnets the staffer informed me that the Panther/Jagdpanther box with care magnet placement can be interchanged so no more buying to boxes just click and go.

What do they look like in the flesh? Fucking amazing! They are made by the same place that does Perry Miniatures (not the place in China so I was informed) they're a hard plastic and the sprues are full of options pretty pictures with descriptions below.

T34 and T34/85 all Plastic

 Awesome Magnet holder so the turret sits flush

M3 Halftrack with plastic crew

The Halftrack sprue with the options for both M3 and M5 Halftracks

 The US crew for the Halftracks

The German crew for their halftracks which can been seen above in Schematics 

Here are the new tank commanders no I was told that these are not their final forms as these are a sort of master type thing but they still look really awesome.

I hope you've enjoyed the spoilers from FlamesCon 2013 hopefully tomorrow my dice are a little less poos. One other final thing is my blog will soon be getting guest writers and painters with their own articles, content and tutorials so stay tuned.

Thanks

-Daniel

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Work in Progress

16 Days til FlamesCon and I'm the most ready I've every been here are my works in progress.....

Bit of work to do but I'm sure it'll be done before the day.....maybe. 

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