As discussed in our last podcast [here], my project for 2020 (yes 2020 and I need to start now to make sure I gets done in time!) is a large number of some really nice scratch built Western France WWII buildings, however this technique would work for any era historical or fantasy. Before I clear the hobby desk for more pressing projects I wanted to share with you the small amount of progress I have made so far.
 
All the cool kids are making really nice buildings using clay over foam core that has been sculpted for the appropriate texture and I thought I would try may hand at that with/without subsequent duplication by casting in resin. To that end I have made a small test piece and explained the steps below.

Step I:

In the image below (1) I have rolled out some Das air dry clay to about 2mm thick and then stuck it to a scrap piece of foam core board with PVA glue.

Thing I learned in step I:

• Use Das clay not the random stuff you find at you closest art or junk store. My non branded clay all cracked within 24 hours
• Don't use too much PVA "just in case". A thin, even smear holds a lot better then what you might think.

Step II:
I used two different methods of sculpting some rough bricks, I have heard that people use both methods. Method A (2 in the image below) was a very rough try with a wooden cooking skewer (essentially a large wooden toothpick) immediately while the clay was still wet. Method B (3 in the image below) after 24 hours the clay was very dry (it's hot here currently) and the light, somewhat pathetic, scratches were made with a light duty craft knife and metal ruler.

Things I learned in step II:

• If you want a decently deep brick line without having to press REALLY hard then do it when its wet.
  

• Consider waiting a couple of hours? (testing required)
• If you do it when its wet it will leave some ridges. However they can easily be scraped off later

I made the brick engravings various sizes to try to work out what would look reasonable size-wise against the 28mm minis (not necessarily to scale). After thinking about final usage and working in with other configurations such as damaged walls with piles of bricks alongside I decided to purchase some precast bricks and look at what size they were. They have now arrived and a couple of sample bricks are shown in 4 and 5 below.

As a couple of final shots below show I have roughed up a design for single building frontage and compared everything to a 28mm Warlord games plastic miniature for scale.

This project is officially on the back burner now but it has been an encouraging start.

In theme with Budapest campaign release this week, a more sombre "Why we fight" photo.

My reasonable hobby goal from the last podcast (here) was to weather & complete my Panzer IV tank by 17 March, may not seam like a big job but this is the first vehicle that I will have ever weathered with oils, and pigments so its a big jump off. So, with 12 days to go here is a picture of what I have achieved so far...

​Comment (and subscribe to this post) below for updates.

The new Bolt Action Fortress Budapest Supplement is out now, I don't know anything abut this region and wasn't planning to purchase this book. 

However..., 15 min into this podcast interviewing Bryan Cook the author (and part of a team?) I have ordered. Another one to look forwrad to. :-)

Inspired to share by Brad Morrins "Cast Dice" podcast regarding chinese forces in bolt action, here is a nationalist poster i found tucked in a corner at the propaganda poster museum in Shanghai.

   It is worth noting that in Shanghai i couldnt find any museum with weapons , uniforms etc etc from the war....the nationalists have basically been expunged from history, and due to the coalition, my opinion is tackling how that worked for the war to be won caused too many headaches and questions...therefore simply not referencing that part of history started to be the norm.

   The main references i found were from the end of the struggle and the seizing of Shanghai by communist forces, in which the nationalists were referred to in every case as 'the enemy'. So much so, that i thought the pictures must have been the battle of shanghai vs the japanese at first until i rechecked the dates and detail of the pictures....

In this episode Rex and Dan discuss the recent Christmas break and the resulting all-you-can-eat wargaming fiesta. We also present the first part of our multi-part series on terrain where we begin a deep dive into the topic and look at the "basis" of wargaming tables, playing surfaces and play mats.

Show notes will be appearing at *link-to-follow-shortly* and while you are here we hope you will give us some feedback and perhaps send us photos of your best wargaming terrain build you can do that here: https://www.valhallagames.net/index.php/contact

Search and subscribe in your favorite podcast app or listen via the web player below.

British 8th army infantry paint guide, draft version in case your interested. I don't claim to be the best painter but if this helps someone you are welcome. Get it here

Squad of Tropical Fallschirmjager ( With breathmint reinforcements) stand easy on my shelf after varnishing. This is the last of the units i committed to finishing on our youtube channel on my channel update & plastic hoard vid....hooray!!

​Plus: 2 ponys and a peed mattress walked into a bar.......Oh wait. No....They got laid into the street as a barricade. (!!) I got this barricade finished also this evening also. 

   Its unfortunate the lighting was poor and the 'set up' for photo so poor, but heres another terrible shot focussing on the barricade  to see the barricade height and some more detail of horses markings etc.

 Painted Minis completed since Dec 15th, Dan;

28mm;

• 24 Italian Coastal Defense Division infantry ( Based by Rex- thank you!)
• 2x Italian heavy weapons teams
• 1x Italian Artillery piece incl. 3 crew and spotter
• 15 x German FJ in smocks
• 9 x German FJ Tropical fatigues

Terrain;

• 1x Italian Church
• 1x Stone Bridge
• 1.5 m2 of teddy bear fur hay and grass fields
• Painted ONLY; 1x medium (!) Hill ( Made by Rex)
• Painted ONLY; 1x small (!) Hill ( Made by Rex)
• 1x table worth of textured flexible rural roads
• 1 x street barricade ( ponys, mattress, crate & sandbags)

TABLE CLEARED READY FOR NEW TASKINGS!!

Dan​

Relatively easy terrain project, basically free unlimited Normandy houses & a great project for the kids. Start to get your D-Day/operation Overlord action going now.

Well done Dan Buman (and http://www.davesgames.net/)

Wanting to finally see proper pictures of the new commonwealth infantry sprue heads??!!? Here they are! close up and into detail. Hope they help some of you, as I was getting frustrated not seeing the full detail from Warlord....Enjoy!

So I purchased my first corgi die cast model in 1:50 scale. Im not going completely in that direction...just happened to see a bargain for less than the kitsets are being sold for!!  

   It needs weathering and detailing...but this pic shows it straight out of the box, and i thought that shows how good they are!

   I will do another post soon showing size comparisons to 1/56 etc. 

  Enjoy your weekend! Dan

 In a fit of rage I went out and purchased a new camera lens, new tripod, tethering cable for shooting connected to the PC and a wireless shutter release. (well… its new to me anyway)

Below are the first couple of photos out of the new lens, I'm a lot happier with these than the results with my previous gear still a long way to go in terms of skill.

It does bring about another question though, how close is too close in miniature photography, for my minis if I go too close you start to see brush marks and dust (a surprising amount of dust!) and that actually detracts from the image. Perhaps its mini dioramas that are the next step, a small squad, a building and some trees all arranged nicely.

Perfect miniature photography may be like the perfect battle report, perhaps it doesn't exist?

Hi All! As promised and thanks to the technological wizardry of Rex (!), our new battle report is up on our Valhalla Games youtube channel.

This one is based around Op. Slapstick & the advance north from the landings at the  Taranto port by the Brit paratroopers of 156 Para Bn, 1st Airborne Div....and meeting their arch adversaries 1st Fallschirmjager.

Following are some images from our recent operation slapstick game. If you haven't already check the video here

So, almost midway in January....Rex and I can BOTH honestly say we haven't been in 'Hobby Hibernation'...Rather we have only just come up for Air!!

I spent 3 weeks at Rex's place in Australia with him and his lovely family. We do admit we were lucky enough to get some real hobby time in also; both playing some games ( and taking vids of some battle reports  for our youtube channel , which are in post production now! ), and getting in some serious painting after hours too when all throughout the house, not a creature was stirring. Not even a mouse. Or a snake.

Rex had done a fantastic job of getting a new player into the game and excited, and it was a pleasure for me to meet Ash. as Rex played him in his first game, i had the job of advising Ash where required on tips for his first game. I must say- he didn't need much advising! apparently Ash plays a lot of tactical and strategy games online, and i believe chess too..it showed. He has a good mind for small unit tactics and will become a formidable opponent. He has a penchant for rolling 6s to hit too!! 

​Welcome indeed to the hobby, Ash. looking forward to playing you on my next visit and also seeing your armys progress as you build and paint it.

   I have started my new year finishing off my tropical FJ and therefore clearing my desk. Athough im still in progress there, im already looking ahead to a new army, as you can check out on our youtube channel here;

https://www.youtube.com/.......

I had a really enjoyable game of another game; Kings of War, with my nephew, Daniel. I really really enjoyed it and having both him and his dad (Rex ) explain it. You may not realise, but warhammer fantasy was a huge huge driver for me getting back into wargaming at the end of the 90's. I really missed fantasy armies ranked up majestically, and all the thought that goes into maneouver and the challenge of doing so in ranked units that Kings of war reminded me of.​

Anyways, heres looking forward to another year of getting to share this hobby with you, hopefully a chance to share it with my son and friends of mine in Ireland.

Also, i get to share the hobby and creating our content on this site, our channel and podcast with my brother, Rex. I had a moment where i was being an intolerable cranky-ass off camera in one of our filmed battle reports that was initially crap, but after apologising (for that- AND the fact it was caused by my setting of a gruelling schedule of hobby prep and recording that made this self-inflicted!) it was a timely reminder of all the stuff in our podcast episode one of why i play wargames. That went on to be one of the most memorable games we've ever played...and we got it on camera for you to enjoy one day soon. hope we captured and bottled that feeling for you.

Happy new hobby year!

Painted Minis completed  since Dec 15th, Dan;

28mm;

• 24 Italian Coastal Defense Division infantry ( Based by Rex- thank you!)
• 2x Italian heavy weapons teams 
• 1x Italian Artillery piece incl. 3 crew and spotter

Terrain;

• 1x Italian Church
• 1x Stone Bridge
• 1.5 m2 of teddy bear fur hay and grass fields
• Painted ONLY;  1x medium (!) Hill ( Made by Rex)
• Painted ONLY; 1x small (!) Hill  ( Made by Rex)
• 1x table worth of textured flexible rural roads
  

Friday Photo - anti-mine training

Merry Christmas 2018. Fight hard, roll high, have fun

​One wonders what paint scheme lies under this one, and what stories it might tell....

Taken at Omaka Aviation Museum, Blenheim, New Zealand. More photos and potential youtube vid to follow at a later date.