Well its been a long time.

 But I've finally finished something, 1 full 12-man US rifle Squad.

I'll probably field squads of 9, to simulate casualties, the 1ID had been in Normandy almost 2 months by the time of Cobra, which is the thing I'm aiming at. 


Oh and I also finished a Sherman, my first 1:56 scale tank done with Airbrush.

I'm just gonna photo dump the pictures. next up will be my attempt at Panzer lehr using the Wargames Atlantic panzer lehr, it's questionable if they all used their fancy unique uniforms. But since all other german 28mm miniatures are grotesque bear-men unless I do fallschermjegers or SS. I went with these as they match Perry in style. If I ever do find regular Heer infantry that looks somewhat human I'll add them. 

StuG III and StuG III killer.

More is done for my WW2 20mm project. Which I guess have become my unofficial self-isolation project.

First up is a PSC StuG III

 The dunkelgelb is less forgiving than British OD.

 I had just gotten an order from MIG AMMO, so several new effects were tried. Green grime and rust being the major ones. But also some mud.

 I'm only half satisfied with it. I think I overdo the effects, to hide the lack of airbrush.

Up next is something that kills the StuG dead, really dead.

 The 6pdr was a great AT gun. Here I went for more subtle, it only has some streaking grime, and light dust effects, mostly on the wheels.  

 Ready to kill off german armour.

Next I'll glue together another StuG, this time, the main focus will be to try and use the MIG AMMO chipping effect thing.
I'll also most likely get some AK paints tomorrow. That I've been waiting on before I do more British infantry and start on the german one.

Lets fight them on the beach.

Which is the noise these tanks made when they rolled off the assembly line, that's why they are called Churchills, true story. 


I've decided to redo some WW2 projects, I was tired of the stupid out of scale infantry next to 1:56 vehicles, it annoyed me so much I stopped my Chain of command Market Graden project.
So now I've decided to do 20mm. Stuff is more in scale here.
First up is a Plastic Soldier Company Churchill.

 I did the same as I did for my British 28mm Shermans.
Standard paint job, followed by various effects. 

 I went heavy on the dry mud, these are infantry tanks, they crawl along the dirt roads and muddy fields with the infantry. 

I plan on using it for Chain of Command but also Battlegroup seems interesting. So I plan on ordering those rules. 

Go Pak yourself!

So with two tanks and a jeep, the Germans needed some equipment or it would be a very short war.

I didn't want to go straight for a German tank, I felt I need to learn the dunkelgelb stuff, and If I did a tank I  probably wouldn't do it pure dunkelgelb but some camo, and that to would need some testing.

So I did a Pak 40, still Rubicon models and still AMMO paints and effects.
I only used 3 out of the 4 dunkelgelb paints, as I felt it became to light when I can't airbrush.

The whole thing might be too dirty and gray?

Also, I'm not happy with the sumpfmunster camo smocks.

 A PaK all my it's lonesome. 

 The PaK is now happy with it's new friends.

Commonwealth Airborne jeep

The second kit I got from Sven for my birthday was a Rubicon Airborne jeep.

It was lovely to paint up, but led to some complications.

First, the instructions showed the airborne jeep with a Browning .50 cal I had glued it on, when Sven pointed out the airborne should have twin Vickers machine gun.
Well, I didn't see any Vickers, not realizing that it was, of course, Vickers K(I had completely forgotten those even existed. I thought those in the kit were Lewis Guns.
Well I managed to rip off the fifi cal without damaging the paint(the green part of the jeep was done by this point)

Now the second problem, apparently 1st Airborne never used the twin Vickers, they wanted to but the weight was too much, so the never got them. And the kit didn't come with the possibility of fixing a single Vickers on the dash. In the end, I used part of the getup for the fifi cal and the side mounted Bren/Vickers, and so managed to make a single mounted Vickers on the dash.

I'm very happy with this one, I think I got a nice look on this one, though I'm unsure about the Denison smock.

But this led to a second problem, I had more or less given up on painting those Warlord American airborne plastic figures as they are just horrible, they are also giants, next to my Jeep Rubicon crew, they look like grizzlies in uniforms.

And this had led to my hunt for actual 28mm infantry, and I also gave up that hunt, it was hard enough finding figures that are prone with an MG, finding none giant 28mm WW2 figures seems impossible.

I'm painting a PaK 40 now, and the heads of the Airborne figures have about 120% the volume of the heads of the Pak crew, the kneeling airborne is almost as tall as a standing PaK crew.....

Anyway here is the Jeep.

 A nice and dirty Willys Jeep

 Beret might be too bright.

 I'm slowly getting somewhat better at the decals

As I said, I'm unsure how well the Denison turned out.

There once was a firefly

That blew a giant hole in a Panther tank!

So I got a surprise birthday present from my friend Sven, a Rubicon Sherman and a Rubicon Jeep.
I was very confused, I hard ordered a Sherman and a Pack 40 from Fireforge games, but I didn't expect it(since they were shipped 4 days before I got the package (two of those days being Saturday and Sunday.) I was even more confused when there was a jeep in there.
But I quickly surmised that Sven had been sneaky!

I got working on the gluing and priming and did some work I did the first part of the tank on Friday then varnished it, and let it dry until today when I started on the weathering.

I did basically the same as with the previous tank, I added more dirt this time, to make it look proper battle tested. I had some more success with the decals this time(only 50% failure rate, compared to the 90% the first time I tried) I felt I did the streaking grim quite well now and the track wheels etc look better. however, the chipping is still far from what I want.

 I'm quite happy with the tank, I did not expect my first few tanks to look this good.

The decals are for the Irish Guards(cliche I know) But when your favorite war movie since childhood has been A bridge too far, you don't have much choice!

The undiscovered country

So, a very long time no see, I was working on some Swedish pikemen when I get this annoying scratch in the back of my neck, and naturally, I need to scratch it, and that scratch? Well, WW2 tanks of course.

One of those things I've said multiple times, I have no interest in at all and will never do, just as I did with Medievals, and we all know how that went.

It was my friend's fault who added me to the Rubicon facebook site, and filled my facebook feed with fantastic looking tanks! Not that I'm impressionable or anything.

So 3 weeks followed with research on the subject, which is rather confusing WW2 tanks is not a light subject.

I knew only the most superficial things, I could see what a Sherman was, I could see what a Tiger was, Churchhill etc. I could tell a German tank from an allied, but I had no idea about the difference between a Panzer III or a Panzer IV and stuff like that.

Nor did I know just how many Sherman variations there was, I might have been somewhat aware of the different size cannons, but I didn't know the difference between an American 76 or 17pdr.
So yes lots to learn and I've only scratched the tip of the first cm of the iceberg.

Besides the historical research, I had a lot of research on what tank to buy and what supplies I needed.  I planed on my whole project being centered on Market Garden, so I bought the "British Sherman" Sherman III, thinking well XXX Corps is British so they'll be using the Sherman III.
But no, they mostly used the V and V/c maybe a few I/c. Not a big deal this was a practice tank after all.

The supplies are all from AMMO, that seems to be one of the big ones, so with my birthday money I ordered various supplies, like plastic cement, acrylic and enamel thinner, streaking grime, filter, wash, dust, earth etc etc. As well as the actual colors. My shopping list was basically taken right from guides on facebook and youtube.

So I got the tank and supplies before Easter, but didn't do much, I did glue together the "spare parts" you got enough spare parts to make a second turret and you got a second top hull, so I practiced on it, and I think that was a very good idea, it did not look good.

But I had two days to work on it this week, I had primed it and tried to paint, it went a lot better than I feared.

So here it is.

It looks like it's finally spring, which means rain, so I had to make a photo box.

I don't have an airbrush, so I did the drybrush method, after the dry brush and botched attempts to get the decals on there, I did the equipment and added a coat of varnish. 

After 20 ish hours of drying, I started on the effects, filter, grime, chipping, wash, fuel stains and mud/earth/dust. 

Given it's my first attempt I don't think it could have turned out much better, I did a few mistakes, stuff could be improved across the board, I'm quite satisfied with the streaking grime effect.

But the chipping and dust/mud could be better. 

I did get a taste for it, and I plan on continuing on this project.

It's fun doing something completely different. 

Review The Kings Choice(Kongens Nei)

On the 8th of April 1940,  sightings of  war ships close to the Norwegian waters were reported. For some reason the Norwegian armed forces were not put  on alert.

The movie starts with King Haakon VII of Norway at Skaugum, the loving grandfather playing hide and seek with his grand children. King Haakon started life as a Danish  prince. choosen by the norwegians to  become their king in 1805. He arried with his son  Olav. Now 35 years later, he is a widower, feeling his age with a bad back.

As night falls on the 8th, more sightings  happens. The commander at Oscars Borg fortress, Birger Eriksen puts  his men on allert. With out  orders from  above.  He gets reports of german  ships fireing on norwegian ships.  He orders his troops to train  and make  ready.

At the same time, a  german diplomant gets sent to the Norwegian  foregin minister. Germany is only here to protect Norways neutrality from the British.  The cabinet is asked  to sign a  document  that would more or  less  agree to ocupation of Norway by Germany. This poopr diplomat  didn't know  anything about this before this night.  He honestly  wanted Norwegian   neutrality.

At around 4 AM search lights light up a siluet of german  Cruiser heading straight for Oslo.
The commander gives order  to fire, when told he has  no  orders from above   he simply states.
" They have fired on our ships,  they are moving in our waters with no  lanterns, these are enemies, we fire on enmies. They fire of two  28cm costal  guns, Both score a hit. The weapons  on the other side of the  sound fires of everything they got, At the last  moment, Two tropedoes also hit the enemy cruiser. Fires spreads and  sevral  hours later the German Heavy Cruiser Blücher sinks,  With   the loss of up  to 900 sailors and soldiers.

The  28cm  guns going  off

Blücher was at the head of a task  force, tasked with   taking Oslo,  the cabinet and the royal family.

The sinking means, the cabinet,  royal family and gold reserves escape.

We now follow the king for the next few  days, The german dipomat tries  to secure a peaceful solution,  not  easy with warmongering german officiers trying to capture the king.

The movie shows  the king as a very  human character. He misses his  wife, He learns  his brother the king of Denmak has submited  to  the germans.  He is in constant pain from his back. And all  the while he is hounded by the fact he can't do anything to  stop all this from happening.

Even after  the escape, the cabinet still wants to negotiate with the invaders. They hope to get the same "deal" as Denmark. The Crown prins, a man trained in military matters, But not only  trained, he is skilled,  having the respect of  the army  and even foregin leaders.  He want to take an active role, And have been advocating  for making Norway ready  for war for months.

Royal family taking cover under a railway brigde as German warplanes fly over.

His father, has another view of it. He strongly belives in the constituion, He has no  real power. He does not want to meddle with the democraticly elected  goverment. But in the ned,  it comes down to  him.


Besides showing the battle of Drøbak  Sound(a battle that has facinated me since I almost lived at the armed forces   museum, it had a diorama of  this battle. Watched it for hours.  Now I have seen in in a big budget war movie,  And I can die happy.) It also show the battle of Midtskogen,  where about 100 Norwegian  royal  guardsmen and some voulenteers hold of an attack by about 100 Fallsjermjeagers.

Battle of Midtskogen

There  aren't that many norwegian wars movies,  And those we have, have consentrated on the resistance movment, the Heavy water sabotage  ect. This is  the  only one I know of that  shows full scale open  warfare. The Battle for Norway lasted  62  days, Making Norway second only to  Russia  in holding out againt the invading Germans longest.(with  Russia never being conquerd)

The effects are great be they from a  buring Blücher, to Colt machinegun fire. Most impressive is how  they made Oslo ca. 1940. This must have been  done  with heavy use of CGI, As no   way could this have been done by simply closing down some streets and putting some old cars on the road.

Having grown up in Oslo and lived my first 29 years there.(now  at a ripe  old age of 31)  It was wonderful to see my  Oslo  from  the past come  to life.

But what drives the movie is the great acting of Jesper Christensen  as King Haakon VII and Jesper Christensen  as Crown prince Olav.

The king  is shown as loving father and grand father.   And  the Crown prins  as a  enegertic  and profesjonaal man,  yet also  a loving father and son. The both have great respect for each other, Even   tho  they disagree on how to "rule"  The  dynamic of  these too  are really what drives the movie.

Olav ended up as a great peoples king, Many  stories about him exist.
One of my favorites is from the Oil crisis of the late 70s, Driving cars was banned on the weekends. And so show solidariry, instead of taknig his   car(which he could have) He got his skiis. And took the train   into the forest. When asked if he  wasn't afraid to go out with out his body guards, he simply replied  "I have 4 million body guards"

So it was great seeing this man  potrayed in the big screen.

King and Crown  prince running as bombers and fighters attack.

I'm embarrased by not knowing sevral  things   that happend those 3 days in April. I  didn't know just how damn  close the  cabinet  came to accepting the  german proposition. I didn't know the  King met in private with this german dipomat.  I didn't know just how close the king and crown  prince came  to be killed in those early days.

I think its great to have  a movie that shows and honours not only the king, but the norwegians that fought those 62 days in 1940. These men and  women  have in many ways been forgotton, Instead  concentrating on  hour resistance heroes.   This is a movie that needed to be made, and  I'm very glad it was.

I recomend everyone  to  see this movie, It's not a your typical WW2  movie(it got princes and princesses)  It's a vital part of modern Norwegian histroy, that has not been told in this way before.

Mini Marines 2

 More small marines! This base is "advancing! Again trying to make "peleliu"  bases with coral upcrops ect.