Double Joy at Six, Tiger Lillies, bare winter trees and headswaps

A little bit longer blog this time…

Neil Shuck doing Sharp Practice in 6mm at Joy of Six

There are some very good news indeed with regards to Joy of Six this year, from my and I believe many others perspective, as Neil Shuck will be running some Sharp Practice in 6mm using my French Indian War stuff I did last year. You may recall that I and Neil did the Saga in 6mm last year. Neil will be developing a scenario so we are not yet fully sure what will happen on the day, but we will let you know as and when the mystery unfolds.

Most of you, I suppose, know that Neil Shuck is the man behind the, in my opinion, best wargames podcast available called “Meeples and Miniatures”. If you have not listened to Neil and his co-host give it a go, it is more than worth it (there is a link below). I have been listening to it for years and it has given my joy, inspiration as well as sound investment advice.

There are of course other podcasts out there, including the new, and equally, addictive Veteran Wargamer as well as the long running Wargames Recon show that are also very good. As I have said before listening to podcasts and audiobooks is my way of keeping my hands free to do painting and modelling.

Joy of Six is a show that from one perspective could be seen as an exclusive 6mm event but that would be a very (did I say very) narrow view, instead I, and perhaps you should too, see it as a fantastic event that bring something to all wargamers. To get an idea what it is all about you should check out the link to the show report from 2016 below. Personally it is another chance to see Dan Hodgson’s amazing Star Wars stuff that I totally missed out on last time due to the demand around the Saga tables.

Thanks Neil! Looking forward to seeing you again.

I will be running the Great Northern War Battle of Lesnaya 1708, if I ever get there!

Here are a few useful links with regards to the above:

Joy of Six to be held in Sheffield on the 16th July 2017
Sharp Practice in 6mm (many more associated posts on the blog)
Saga in 6mm that I did with Neil last year.
Joy of Six show report from 2016, Part 1 and Part 2.
Meeples and Miniatures webpage, the best wargames show.
Veteran Wargamers webpage, the best new wargames show.
Wargames Recon webpage, the longest running wargames show on the planet.

Bare Winter Trees for my Chain of Command Winter War Project

I am finishing of the stuff I need for running some Winter War battles with regards to terrain and markers (see more background here and here). Trees are very important to get the right feeling and my current focus are on these. I already have a fair few pine type of trees (Christmas trees) and these are just the same Summer and Winter apart from some snow flock on top, but also wanted some bare (leaf less) winter trees. To get the right look I have considered Sea foam (but it seems to brittle for my requirements), making it with wires (but it seems too time consuming to do large quantities) or to go out looking for twiglets (but this gives limited amount of branches, unless you look very hard!). What follows is how I intend to do my bare forest.

A picture of a river with some bare trees in the foreground during the Winter War, the objective of this little note. Picture taken from SA-kuva (Finnish Armed Forces Photographs) and you can find their webpage here.

I went to eBay and found these trees (see below) and thought I give it a try. As they come from China it could have taken a while to get them in the post – but I was pleasantly surprised to get them delivered in a week.

tree0

The look pretty much like the picture and if you were in severe rush you could probably base them and field them like this. I took a few more steps and I have written a narrative of what I did in the text for each picture on what I did. I thought this could have some general interest.

What you need:

The trees shown above (go to ebay and search for them, you can by other quantities, the one above is for 50 trees 5X 10X).
Something to cut with (whatever you have clippers, nail scissors, etc. The plastic is very soft)
Washers (for bases) mine were 25cm in diameter.
Super glue
Putty or green stuff
Primer (I used Black Gesso)
Paints for the trunk and branches (see below for the ones I used)
Modge Podge (Matte), but perhaps PVA is as good
Modelling Snow Flock
Some sealer (have not done that yet) – maybe a matte spray varnish would be best?

tree1 — As they come, a plastic brownish feel and those arrow heads at the end. I suppose they are there to help keeping it together if you apply clump foliage. There is some nice structure on the trunk making it look like a tree.

tree2 — I cut away all the arrow heads (and also the bottom part that is still present on the picture).

tree3 — I superglued it on a washer (yes I did forget a few of the arrowheads but sorted that out later) and put some putty to support it at the bottom.

tree4 — I prime it black using Black Gesso. I find Gesso very good for priming plastic stuff.

tree5 — I used Vallejo model colour and did a heavy drybrush over the whole tree and then a 50/50 mix with whire of light drybrushing. I feel this is a better generic tree colour than the brown before! I may do a few to look like birch trees when I do full production later.

tree6 — I applied Modge Podge (Matte) on the branches where I wanted snow to stick. Do not cover everywhere as it more effectful to see some of the branches too. Put some on the base as well. Try to put on generously wihout too much drip (if that makes sense!).

tree7 — Let it snow, I use spoon to apply the snow modelling flock from above. Shake off and apply more Modge Podge until you are happy with the result.

tree8 — The finalized tree next to a little Cabin (I do not remember who produced these and it broke my heart covering the nicely modelled roof with Modge Podge and Snowflock!, but now I think it was worth it) and a Finnish Submachine gunner in 15mm (from Resistant Rooster I believe with a Peter Pig headswap). Maybe the trees would work in 28mm too? I will try to make the bases less bulky in the future and will not put on any sand and keep them as they are after applying the putty as they will be covered with snow anyway. All I need to do is to put the production machine on and do another 119 of these!

Tiger Lillies

I went to see Tiger Lillies perform at the Camden Roundhouse in London this Friday. The concert was in celebration of their latest album released last week called ‘Cold Night in Soho’. It was their only gig in London as was advertised and promised as a night to remember. As I may have uttered before, the first time I heard them I was not sure whether it was absolute rubbish or bloody brilliant – I settled for the latter and this concert yet again proved that decision was the right one, being a mixture of old and new and I really enjoyed every minute.

This is one of those very fine British cultural treasures and to quote the roundhouse webpage, “The music they produce is a mixture of pre-war Berlin cabaret, anarchic opera an gypsy music, echoing the voices of Bertholt Brecht and Jacques Brel”. Check them out here.

Could not resist chopping some heads

With regards to the Genisys project I did say I did not need any more miniatures, but I got a good deal on the John Connor and a Lieutenant set the other day so I could not resist getting these. What would the resistance be without John Connor?. Also I thought I would convert some of the resistance soldiers by using heads from Badsquiddo games (link here., I recommend a visit) to bring some gender balance in the resistance to the machines. Just as a note, one of the miniatures on each sprue in the box is a woman, but I wanted some more variety. I had also waited for an opportunity to use these heads since became aware of what Annie at Badsquiddo is doing.

Here are the shots of the resistance miniatures with the headswaps done (have not yet started painting them).

You may think the heads are a bit too big, and perhaps they are? They are good enough for my purposes. However, and this is great, they are sold in three different sizes fine, pulp and heroic. I bought the heroic ones and perhaps a size or two down would work better.

fine-pulp-and-heroic-scale-female-heads-bald

Incoming ships

I also got my order of “wave whatever” ships for the X-wing miniature games, I have lost count of what wave it is (I think it is Wave 10!). However, they are very nice indeed and I suppose we have to test fly them soon.