From SylvainR - Ten Shades of Gray: the Royal Navy (182 points)

Five years ago, I bought some miniatures on kijiji (sounds suspiciously familiar). This time, it was a bunch of ships, mostly big battleships, from 1905 to 1945, from all warring nations, in 1:1200 and 1:2400 scales. I already painted the German, the French, as well as some British. Over the following few years, I bought for the Royal Navy some destroyers, cruisers and carriers. Finally, today, what I collected for the Brits is finally painted. It's not the whole Royal Navy, but it will do for a while :-).

For this project, I used 10 different shades of grey, all from Tamiya: J.N.Grey, Medium Grey, Light Grey, Neutral Grey, Dark Grey, Light Sea Grey, Dark Sea Grey, Sky Grey,  Light Blue, Medium Blue (which are truly grey tinted blue).

Here are some of the units assembled and primed at the beginning of the Challenge. I was expecting a package from GHQ at that time which arrived later. By mistake, I've ordered six packs of C-class cruisers, not realizing that they come two per packs. Oh well, I guess 12 is better than 6. Some miniatures in the lot are from CinC. I definitely prefer GHQ for their sturdier guns and their crisper details, even if exaggerated, as they are easier to highlight.

Here are the units today. There are 5 submarines, 15 destroyers, 27 cruisers (light and heavy), 12 battleships and battlecruisers and 5 aircraft carriers.  In addition, I built a core for the Royal Canadian Navy, comprising 5 ships (upper left of the picture, with the red tags). Two more will be added later for the "Nautical" Theme bonus. Most of the ships are depicted in camouflage pattern. However, as a rule, I would simplify the palette to 3 colors because, at this scale, a fourth color really makes no difference. Capital ships usually have unique designs. I kept my i-pad close to the painting station for quick reference.

Last time I submitted ships to the Challenge, destroyers and smaller were scored 2 points each while cruiser and bigger were given 3 points. So this whole batch is worth 182 points.

To give an idea of the size of a ship at 1:2400 scale, here is a close-up of the HMCS Saskatoon, a Flower class corvette.

And here is the same ship with my wedding ring for size comparison. I took these pictures with my i-pad instead of the "super" Canon camera and they turn out much better.

Another fun project completed. This new batch of ships should generate lots of interesting scenarios. I wanted to prepare a naval campaign for the invasion of Norway and now I have all the military units involved.

This is my last submission until February 28 (Nautical Theme), as I now have completed all but one of the projects I have prepared for this Challenge and as I will be going East to visit my family.


P.S. Sophie is not done her project yet, but we'll be working together on it next week.

Let me just say, Sylvain, that it's great to see you continue projects not related to sci-fi. Are there any other navies out there to paint? Maybe you should get started on them? Looking forward to your Nautical theme entry - will it be your 28mm Napoleonic Russians on a barge? :)

Great work on these little big ships Sylvain.  Ten shades of grey? Oh man - I can't imagine.  The detail and research demanded for these nautical collections is intimidating, and I have a healthy respect for folks like you (and your group in Regina) who can pull all the background together with the paint skills for excellent nautical games.  The invasion of Norway will make for some great gaming I'm sure! Congratulations on finishing another large project.

Last year's scoring sounds right to me - this armada will net you another 182 points for your impressive total.  Great job, and we look forward to more from you and from Sophie!