AHPC XII: From Mike W - 28mm Arab Cultists

 This group of figures is the start of a small band of Arab Cultists that will be in some way involved with the raising of forces of the Undead in Egypt, in the late 19th and early 20th Century. Think of the films 'Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark' and 'The Mummy' - you'll get the idea!

The completed group of ten Arab cultists

I drew inspiration form Hollywood - so these are in no way meant to be historically accurate, they are just meant to look menacing and evil!

First group of four musketeers & riflemen

These figures are mostly Perry Afghan plastics, plus a couple of Wargames Atlantic Afghans to add some variation, I think that they have come out pretty well, despite the blatant transplantation of dress styles between continents - that's Hollywood for you!

A group of three more cultists

I interchanged arms and weapons between the Perry & Wargames Atlantic kits to give a good variety - you'll see various muskets, Jezails and more modern rifles in their hands as well as some with swords and even a bow man.

Five running cultists with various weapons

With the Archers I added Gripping Beast Arab arms and quiver, to a squatting Perry figure. Almost all of the figures had head swaps, utilising Gripping Beast Arab heads that were shrouded in cloth - to give a suitably mysterious appearance. One figure had a Wargames Atlantic head, which was suitably covered whilst the Archer and one other were given a open faced Arab heads. I also tried to tie the look and feel of the figures together by giving many of them a brass shield.

The remaining group of three cultists in close-up

Regarding painting the figures I undercoated all in white before painting in the flesh and washing this with sepia, allowing a heavy coat to give a darker toned skin. Their basic rode colour was Citadel 'Wazdakka Red' washed with purple ink, whilst sashes, head scarves and pants were all painted dark grey and wash with Army Painter Dark Tone to give a nice shaded & faded black appearance. 

Another view of four of the cultists

After a matt varnish, straps, sandals and weapons were painted as required and given various washes, bases had fine sand applied and dried, rocky grass tufts applied sparingly.

AHPC XII: From MIke W - 28mm Elizabethan Irish Missile men

 You may remember earlier in this challenge that I completed a number of Irish Dark Age / Elizabethan figures in an earlier post this year, with the promise of converting a few remaining figures to be musketeers. Here they are accompanied with a trio of archers.

The group of eight Irish missile men

These figures are all Gripping Beast plastics, the archers from their Dark Age set and the Musketeers from their Irish set.

Three Irish Archers, centre & left have cloaks to add to their Irishness!

With the Archers I added a couple of cloaks to the figures to make them look more Irish, additionally a couple of the heads were substituted

Three Irish Musketeers, figure on right has extensive changes to get him to old a musket!

With the musketeers I 'liberated' suitable arms and weapons from the Warlord Games ECW plastic set and then did some pretty basis conversion work to add these to the Gripping Beast figures. Some cutting away of parts of the Irish figures to receive the Warlord arms was required along with quite some filling on the shoulder joints. The use of cloaks to disguise the worst gaps helped a lot!

Two marching musketeers

All figures were undercoated white and then suitable rustic colours, largely citadel 'Bubonic Brown' were applied to give that typical Irish look, before completing basic colours with flesh, browns, greens, grey and metallics etc. Washes were applied according to base colours to add shading and some highlights were re-applied using base colours.

After a matt varnish, basing was completed in my usual manner with fine sand and electrostatic grass.

Another view of the last two musketeers

AHPC XII: From Mike W - 14 x 28mm Victrix Dark Ages Foot , Mostly Anglo-Danish Housecarls

 This is the second posting of Victrix Anglo-Dane warriors this week! The first one being the remains of last week's delayed posting! As noted above these are mostly Anglo-Dane Housecarls to fight in the centre of the line against the Normans at Hastings, as such they are all high ranking warriors with double handed axes and plenty of other weapons.

The completed batch of Dark Age figures

Two of the party will not make the final Housecarl unit, one s a 'left over' Norman I found on my workbench last week, the other is a guy armed with a spear - as I managed to break his Axe!

Just the 12 Housecarls

With this unit composed of entirely Victrix figures, they will have a distinct look and feel to them that will make them stand out from my other Anglo-Danes who are mostly Gripping Beast figures. As previously noted, I love the figures but their poses are a little more limited than those you can achieve with the Gripping Beast sets.

Close-up of the first group of four Housecarls

All figures were spray coated with silver as an undercoat before applying suitable colours to legs, arms and tunics etc. It took quite some time to add in all the straps and scabbards etc and then I went on to flesh tones before concentrating on edging the mail coats with leather borders around the arms, neck and lower hems.

Aptly to the left - the left over Norman, to the right a spear armed, high ranking warrior

I applied Nuln Oil wash to all armoured parts to pull out the detail of the chain mail and then I used sepia on flesh areas and leather belts, straps and hemming.

The second group of four Housecarls

Other coloured washes were added as appropriate before highlighting the flesh tones again and applying matt varnish. The bases were covered by a pre-prepared scatted of fine sand, electrostatic grass and 'fine vegetation matter'

Third and final group of four Housecarls in close-up

AHPC XII: From Mike W - 28mm Anglo-Danes

 This is the second delayed post from last week, 20 Anglo-Danes to fight against previously painted Norman adversaries, of these 10 are the double handed axe armed Housecarls.

All 20 of the completed Anglo-Danes

To be added to these - hopefully later this week will be 20 more figures, mostly additional Housecarls to form the basis of the Anglo-Dane elites at Hastings for my 1066 Project.

10 Housecarls - plus one! All these figures are Victrix

These figures were based and then primed with silver paint, prior to a dark wash to help pick out the figures' details- ready for later painting.

Close up on 6 of the Housecarls, third from left is standing sharpening his axe

Most of these figures are high status individuals so I have tried to reflect this in their dress and the use of cloaks and furs to help them stand out. Many of the figures are Victrix and as such have a distinctive feel to them when compared to the Gripping beast figures I have for the rest of the Anglo-Dane Army.

Another for Victrix Housecarls. I broke the axe shaft for the guy on the right
so now he is relegated to using a hand axe and demoted from the Housecarl gang!

After the application of colours suitable for their varied clothing, a number of different coloured washes were applied to add shading and again pick out detail.

5 Wargames Factory (now Warlord Games) figures 'upgraded using spare Victrix parts
- heads, weapons etc 

Matt Varnish was applied before basing in my usual manner.

Final four figures, a Victrix Earl on left, three more 'upgraded' Wargames Factory figures,
slinger on right and clubman second right

AHPC XII: From MIke W - Warhammer Lizrdmen

 The first of my delayed post from last week is a continuation of the Lizardmen mini project, this time I am presenting 30 x Skinks Archers formed into two units of 15 figures.

The completed units of Skinks, each 15 strong

I decided on two units to give a additional variety in the colours of the models in the various units in the army, to date all have been a variant of Yellowish and Green or green and blue. I have done one Skink unit as a dark green and the second as a yellowish hue, if I get together enough figures for a third Skink unit these will be blue.

Unit #1, yellowish Skinks

Unlike their bigger brethren these little guys do not have armoured scales and so I have kept them mono-tone but with a red 'fin' on the back of all their heads to give then some unity.

Unit #21, green Skinks

The figures were given either a dark green or light ochre base and then washed with either blue ink (green figures) or Mid Brown Wash (light Ochre figures), light blue Loincloths, leather straps, quivers and arrows were coloured appropriately and the bows were painted brown.

Close-up of the first unit,

I diverged form the black ebony weaponry of their large colleagues as the logic was that he bow would need to be made of a different wood as some flexibility was required when pulling the bow - where as clubs, axes and spears etc were all naturally more rigid in construction.

And close-up of the second unit

Bases were again finished with fine sand and electrostatic grass.

AHPC XII: From Grahame H - 15mm Australian Vietnam

Haven’t posted much this year as other things keep getting in the way. Anyhow I have managed to get a few things done. I have finished my Australian Army for Vietnam, which consists of two battalions of infantry and supporting units for the Rapid Fire Rules, but the basing allows them to be used for any rule set really.

I have pictured the two battalions in their barracks (box) but only taken proper pictures of one battalion as they are much the same. I have also had a go at making some jungle.

The jungle. 

Found how to make these on the Storm of Steel U tube channel if any one is interested. It was a bit hard putting these into “6” cubes but gave it a go. So there was about 4 and a bit so I have said 80 pts. 

Australian Infantry. 

All are 15mm made by Battlefront except for the HMG and dog teams that are Peter Pig. Each infantry battalion consists of 48 figures. There is also a Brigade HQish of 7 figures consisting of a CO, FOO and a medic.

The First Battalion 

The Battalion consist of 5 companies of riflemen. 3 Australian and 2 New Zealand.  Each company consists of 6 figures. The picture shows three companies and the CO stand. 

The next photo shows the Support Company consisting of a mortar, HMG, dog handler and AT team. The Dog Handler is from Peter Pig US Vietnam collection with a head swap. 

Finally the Brigade HQ 

The last few figures are a rifle squad for the Bn  HQs and a flamethrower team. I have painted 4 APCs to provide some transport/support. Only three are photographed as the 4th awaits basing so I will show that one later. Again the APCs are Battlefront with a bit of kit basing on one and some stowage added. 

From left to right. A normal M113, a M113 with gun shield add and finally with a T50 turret. I decided to paint one of each type. The Australian didn’t have too many APCs in Vietnam.

To complete the collection are four Centurions tanks, again from Battlefront. Probably too many but I had them so they were painted. 

AHPC XII: From Grahame H - 15mm US Armour and Artillery Vietnam

Just adding to my Vietnam collection. The infantry and marine infantry were painted before the challenge so now just adding some support units. These are again for Rapid Fire, but could be used with any rule systems.

First Support for the Marines. This is a “Battalion Landing Team” and consists of a tank Platoon = 1 x M48 Tank, a Antitank Platoon = 1 x Ontos and a Amtrack Platoon of 2 x LVTP5s (Peter Pig - I had four so they all got painted). It is also supposed to have a 105mm gun but I have added that to a Battery that is shown below.

The M48 (Battlefront)

The Ontos (3d printed by Butler Miniatures)

Someone asked me about what I thought of the 3D printed miniatures from Butler. They have got a lot better, but they still have the printer lines. I don’t tend to dry brush or wash my vehicles so they line don’t really show, but if you did I would suspect they would show more. However, they make models you can’t really get elsewhere so sometimes there isn’t a choice.

The 2 x Amtrack Platoons (Made by Peter Pig)

Next up is the Artillery Batteries each gun has a crew of four and I have added a command group and FOO to each battery.

The 105mm Battery (Battlefront)

Then the Big Guns 155mm Battery

Some more armour support next with a HQ unit and 2 squadrons of M48 Tanks (Battlefront)

And finally, I decided to start painting the Armour Cavalry so 3 Sheridan Tanks (Battlefront)

AHPC XII: From Grahame H - 15mm Aztecs (Essex)

I was going to be disciplined this year and just paint one army, the Aztecs. Then I thought Naaaah, and painted some Vietnam stuff instead. However, I did paint some Aztecs. All are 15mm and are Essex figures.

First I painted three units of Common troops with a few “suit wearer”. Each units is 24 figs strong. 

Some Archers (2 figures)

Some Skirmishers (9 figures)

Finally some Jaguar Knights (24 figures)