Hauptsturmführer, SS-Totenkopf Div.

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I've finally got through the lethargic slump of adding on the finishing touches to this short painting exercise. One exception here is that the satin effect of the leather coat was rendered in oils as it was much more convenient than acrylics; especially with larger scales such as this.

Overall, it's quite a simple and friendly kit to build and paint. The characterization of the sculpt is very well handled by Young B Song; making it truly a pleasure to paint. As mentioned , I kept it to a short painting exercise so as to alleviate whatever stress I'm experiencing with the other project I'm currently undertaking. Anyway more pictures of that soon.

Calvin

Military Modelling Magazine, Vol38. No.11

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After months of deliberation (no doubt on my part), the full detailed write-up on the LSSAH, Taganrog 1941 project is finally available as a two-part article in the current and up-coming issue of Military Modelling.

Calvin

Young Miniatures - Hauptsturmführer, SS Totenkopf Div.

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A small package from Young B Song arrived at my home earlier this week and upon careful unpacking revealed some pleasant surprises. Though I was supposed to be finishing the sculpt of another commission, the irresistible urge to start painting one of the package's contents made me swap my sculpting tools for paint brushes instead. The clean-up was pretty straight forward; with no cumbersome molding plugs to remove. This process was further quicken by applying heat to soften the resin via a heat-gun and carefully slicing it away with a fresh scalpel blade. This resulted in minimal sanding, no grinding plus one could even slice though an inch of solid resin like a hot knife through butter!

With the clean-up done, painting began with my standard preference of Vallejo Acrylics over a black primer undercoat. I particularly enjoyed painting the face; the chiseled features tempted me to push my contrasts a little more. In addition, the larger canvas also allowed me to incorporate more tonal variations to the flesh tones such as hints of green, blues and purple; previously limited on a 1/35 figure.

Here's the work done so far after three days of intermittent painting. I'm trying hard to discipline myself to get pass the "feel-good" phase to complete the leather jacket and left hand.

Calvin

T-34/76 (1/48 scale) by John Tham

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This month the spotlight will shift to Singaporean armor modeller John Tham whose works have been making waves in both local and international waters. One such particular is his superb rendition of Tamiya's 1/48 scale T-34/76 enhanced with updates from Hauler. This gem of his won John's first ever international award at the World Expo 2008 in Girona last July and it's with great pleasure that I'm privileged to showcase some pictures of it here.

 

Work in progress shot revealing John's neat and delicate construction.

 

 

 

 

John with his well deserved Silver medal from the World Expo-Girona, 2008.

Calvin

Alpine Miniatures - 3rd SBCT, 2nd Inf. Div., Iraq 2007. Sneek previews.........

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....and a little something more for inquiring minds.

Colours mentioned are from Vallejo Model Colour range.

Calvin

Representing the ACU in 1/35

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Thank you all for all the nice comments and keen interest on the painting of the digital camo pattern of the ACU. All of you might have guessed that I was pretty tied up trying to complete the two figures and their spare heads in the past couple of weeks or so to reply to some of your responses. Thus in appreciation for your enthusiastic support and patience, I thought I'll prepare a short pictorial description on my representation of the ACU digital camo.

My first immediate concern was to figure a way to represent this seemingly complex camouflage pattern in 1/35 scale and I found out that the most effective and manageable approach was not to copy the pattern but rather giving a convincing impression of the pattern instead.

What I meant by this is to focus on the general shape of the pattern and not on the little pixels that make up the pattern. And for this to happen one will need to take a step back and observe the pattern from a distance when all the tiny pixels appear as a series of abstract shapes. The digital pattern camouflage is rather arbitrary and one could make up the shapes along the way so long they appear to look "digital". A good idea would be to build up the pattern with Polymino shapes in mind.

Looking at the actual ACU digital camouflage, there are actually two very similar shades of grey that make up the pattern. Considering the effect of scale, I choose to ignore the lighter shade first and used the darker shade to define the general shapes of the grey. This is so that I could get a stronger contrast to define the general shapes. The lighter shade later be introduced along the areas of highlight on the uniform serving both functions of shading and representation.

The darker shade of grey is first applied over a black primer coat of Gunze Sanyo Flat Black.

The base colour is carefully applied to define the camouflage pattern. Notice how the grey pixels are defined with base colour.

The process of defining the pattern.

Outlining and highlighting.

Lighter shade of grey is glazed over the darker shade to enhance the highlights.

PAINTING THE FACE

Base colour

More base colour with reds for cheeks.

Preliminary shadows

Preliminary highlights

More highlights and details

Refinements.

Just for the record the names of the troopers are are Bill Paine and Shep Horan :P

Calvin

Alpine Miniatures - 3rd SBCT, 2nd Infantry Division

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Well finally after a hectic week of balancing of work and family, I was able to get some bench time (courtesy of the national holiday) yesterday to make more progress to the painting of the second installment of Alpine Miniatures's upcoming release. Yup, it might seem sensible attempting to paint this scheme no more than once in one's lifetime but unfortunately for me I'm experiencing twice the masochistic pleasure of this endeavor.

Calvin