Welcome to the Painting Challenge. Here you will find the fabulous, fevered work of miniature painters from around the world. While participants come from every every possible demographic, they have three things in common: they love miniatures, they enjoy a supportive community, and they want to set themselves against the Challenge.
This site features the current year's event along with the archives of past Painting Challenges.
Enjoy your visit and remember to come back soon.
Another challenge is drawing to an untimely close and once again I come up short a few points. While I had a good start I rapidly lost steam and only were able to pick up speed again those last few days. I'm pretty certain that a lot of you know the feeling only too well. But the ride was a lot of fun and once again I enjoyed myself immensely. I wasn't as active on here as I'd have liked, but I enjoyed watching the daily stream of gorgeously painted miniatures.
First off for my last entry this year is a 20mm 3D printed Sherman Firefly by Arvernes Miniatures. Having painted two regular 75mm Shermans for my Canadians previously I felt the urgent need to add a Firefly for that little bit of extra punch. The stowage is mostly from AB Figures as is the tank commander.
This is then followed by a Squad of 20mm Fallschirmjäger, also from AB Figures. They're a mix of regular Heer figures, mainly with Zeltbahn, and Fallschirmjäger with head swaps as I was aiming for a very late war feel. So these should be more suitable for those battles following the German defeat in Normandy. A time when the Fallschirmjäger were a mere shadow of their former strength. I don't like the hype that surrounds some of the supposedly 'elite' German units and having this hodge podge of grizzled veterans and raw recruits is just my thing.
For points we have one 20mm tank clocking in at 15 points, a half figure tank commander for 2 points and 12 Fallschirmjäger of which two are prone figures for another 44 points. All this should give me 71 65 points.
A huge thank you for goes out to my good friends Sarah, Curt and Greg as well as all the other minions.
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Nick I am confident I speak for all Challenge participants when I tell you it has been an absolute treat to have you along for the ride once again. Your brushwork sets the bar, as ever, and combined with top-shelf photography, your entries are a real treat for all of us. I think many Challengers will relates to the ebbs and flows of interest and momentum when it comes to painting all of these miniatures - and many of us will come up short in the face of our targets (certainly I will!).
But what a treat is has been! And you close out with some absolutely stunning brushwork. Nothing makes me bonkers like camouflage patterns of late WW2 German units, and you have made it look stupendous here, and the blend of the zeltbahns and sky-blue uniforms, of the veterans the rookies, it is all just spot-on and makes we want to get back to painting some WW2 myself!
But my favourite here is the Firefly! When it comes to WW2 tanks, I'm always struck by how dreary so many of the western allied designs were. Even the ones with cool names were disappointing to see. But NOT the Firefly! One of the best silhouettes of the war (and only improved once the IDF started cracking out I-Shermans later on) and you've done it absolute justice here. Even the weird colour pattern at the bottom of the barrel - excellent!
As for your points, the magical spreadsheet tells me this is all worth 65 points - so I'm going to listen to the spreadsheet. Great Challenge Nick, it has been a treat to "minion" your work!
Two different projects gaining additions this week, and both of these are projects I have already played games with and hope to play more in the future! Let's start with Old Wild West or how you want to call it. This fellowship of nine are Great Escape Games multipart plastic gunfighters from Gunfighters and Gunfighters II boxes - the first one contains the gentlemen and the second one the ladies. I shared these boxes with a friend and painted one lady on last challenge, hence the odd number. What a Cowboy is the ruleset I have and have played with, so I went with varied weapons to have all kinds of different options available. I have painted some several Old West minis in the past, now I should have quite a large selection - barring the mounted options.
I used mainly quite dull, earthly colours and drybrushed everything in the end to get a dusted appearance, but tried to add some bright colours here and there - the scarf, undershirt or something. So you see lots of different browns here, lots of Reikland Flesh Shade everywhere, but still not exactly Sergio Leone dust levels. :)
Playing around with some other environment than the dungeon (see below), I decided to use Last Chance Saloon for my Gunfighters, and it is quite ok. I just need something colourful for the background.
I painted some SU-76s for the Soviet Army for Bagration and since I'm in the process of painting the both sides, it felt only fair to give something for Germans as well. I guess the Russians have quantity and Germans have the quality, here are two Hornisses, also known as Nashorns, and officially as Sd.Kfz. 164. These are part metal part resin figures, a bit painful to assemble thus, but they look quite nice when ready. They are tank hunters, rather cheap and manouvarable solution to break Allied tanks. Open topped with a highly effective Pak 43 gun, similar gun was used later in Tiger IIs and Jagdpanthers. And of course as anti tank gun as itself. Hornisse first saw action at the battle of Kursk and remained in the service until end of the war.
I have used Averland Sunset as the yellow colour, then some green DIY store green added with blister foam to create the camouflage and finally some XV-88 (nice connection to the gun "8.8cm Pak 43" this vehicle carries) to finalize to overall look. AA gun was painted black, same as the wheels. Tracks are some greyish colour I had. Reikland Flesh Shade is used here, too, some touch ups and identification info. Glued on MDF base with some green sawdust and tufts to tie them nicely to Eastern Front in summer 1944. My philosophy with late war Germans is, that anything goes. I mean, there are of course rules to follow, but as long as playing Flames of War type of games, which are not strictly historical battles, rather generic encounters of what-ifs, German forces are happy to field what ever they have available. Retreating units from the front line, reinforcements from the reserve, you take what you have to fight for the Motherland. So these two Hornisses should have no trouble finding a home in my army.
The crew was painted separately, because that was easier and I could then claim full points of them. Khaki jacket and caps with dark brown and bright green camouflage pattern, grey pants and black boots. And that famous Reikland Flesh Shade pretty much everywhere.
Nine 28mm gunfighters for 45 points and a "28mm Old West Squirrel!"
Two 15mm vehicles for a total of 16 points and then 4 and 2 halfs of crewmembers for 10 points, 26 in total and a "15mm WW2 German Squirrel." It's amazing how they plan these "Squirrel in a box" products!
Total for this post is 71 points and 2 squirrels, no skulls or stompy robots, but something for Lady Sarah, if that is still a thing. :) And three cardboard boxes are now empty and ready to be recycled.
Fellowship of Nine on the balcony
P.S.While I was taking photos of these, my 10 year old son was bored, because screen time was all used up and he then spent some time chatting with his mother and I overheard this kind of question:
- What is that "Desert song" that is always played in the movies, when they are in the desert?
I'm quite sure he means Youtube videos and such like, since he doesn't watch movies, they are too long and boring. My wife was a bit puzzled about this "Desert song", but our son insisted that it is a real thing and told her to search for it. She thought a while and then played this song from Youtube and that actually was the "Desert song!" So now you know, too! :)
P.P.S. I did write the text about "Sergio Leone dust levels" before this conversation!
There's nothing better to get the vreative juices going then playing the game that needs painted miniatures and while those Eastern front tanks are awesome, for me it's the Wild West figures taht are the star of this post, more so because of the very recognisable story about your son and his questions... it's no different at this end of the line mate.
Starting off with the "correct" Mogami Class Cruisers two and a half of them.
The Mogami class was the last of Japans prewar Heavy cruisers. Originally built with Fifteen 6.1-Inch guns(leading to the USN designing the Brooklyn class) they were upgraded to have ten 8-Inch guns (as was the IJN's plan all along.
They had reasonable armor and were fast 37 knots combatants.
As with all Japanese Cruisers they carried a heavy torpedo armament: 12 mounted in 4 triple tube launchers.
As previously explained I got two Mogami carriers so I converted one into a sinking ship maker to add some color to the table. A good wargamer doesn't let anything go to waist.
Four Porter Class Destroyers I named theses for the four that were built in the Four Rivers Shipyard where my grandfather worked during the Second World War.
The Porter Class was the US response to the Japanese Fubuki class. They had a similar armament Six 5 inch guns on three turrets and a heavy torpedo(8 in two launches)armament.
The US intended to use them as squadron leaders but by World War II they simply served as destroyers along with the rest.
Four Mahan Class Destroyers(1934) the class of destroyers that followed the Porter Class. Smaller by 500 tons but only one gun lighter in armament.
They also carried 12 torpedoes and twice as many depth charges as the Porters. With all that you're probably thinking I am about to comment on them being too much power in too little ship but actually they managed not to do that. In part this was due to new lighter engineering plant allow the tonnage to be used in other ways.
They were stable and capable designs... or would have if technology has stayed still. These ships suffered as nothing could be added (Radar, improved AA guns etc) unless something else was taken away. So war progressed they shed a five inch mount, torpedo tubes etc.
Four Sims Class Destroyers were a later design (1937) slightly larger than but initially with an armament identical to the Mahan class.
The extra weight and size went to engines with a top speed 38.5 knots
By 1941 they had shed a five inch mount for a pair of 40mm guns and added K guns for additional ASW capabilities. The USN would learn (eventually, See the Fletcher class) that it's a good idea to leave space (and weight) for future developments.
So we have 12 US destroyers, 2 Japanese cruisers and a sinking Japanese cruiser. That should come out to 30 points.
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Sylvain: I'm very biased about your tiny ships because I adore small scales. You did a fine paint job on these and I like your transparent bases. Your cruisers, even sinking, are worth 3 points each for a total of 33 points. I'm sure your games will be fun and furious. Fabuleux!
I have been busy painting during this challenge and while not making models, my weekly offering has been sidetracked because I chose to do this years THREE BONUS THEMES. I have now completed the three bonus themes and posted them.
First - Empire - Hungarians 1848 1/72 Hat figures.
Second - Toy Story - Duke of Berwicks Irish Regiment (wild geese) from the back cover of "Charge or how to play wargames" These were Strelets 1/72 Austrians (from War of the Spanish Succession) figures
Third - Rebels - Tumbling Dice 1/72 ECW Scots Covenanters - Colonel de Bois Regiment of Foot
I had not realised that they get corralled away from the weekly posting. Anyway here is my next offering to the Tuesday Terrors which just happens to be more Sinews of War in the shape of another 3 trucks. Somewhere in deepest Fauxterre.......
This time they are 1/72 plastics from the Plastic Soldier Company. The CMP truck was according to the box blurb a chevrolet manufactured mostly in Canada for British Empire forces.
Now which way do we go??
The canvas covers, drivers and wooden bodywork got a sepia wash finish but otherwise the paints were used straight out the pot. Yet on this occasion instead of using my usual Vallejo paint selection out of the blue I dug out some of my old citadel paints - still going strong (these are pre 2012 era). And I do think the Knarloc Green is very suitable for these trucks.
Points wise I think I get 3 vehicles at 15 points each = 45 points in total and like all my submissions so far I think I can claim some squirrels as the earlier trucks were corgi toys models at 1/60 scale?
Well thats it for now - not sure what might appear next!
Sorry about the confusion on the Theme Rounds John, but yes they have their set days, own tab and are officiated by the Snow Lord. I've left your photos for the next two rounds as teasers, and you are appealing to my old school heart on both counts.
I always like to see transport on table, and that's a great looking trio of soft targets that should be very useful. I confirm the 45 points, but you'll have to taker the squirrel count up with the Squirrels Finder General. I've tagged the post so that he can find it more easily.
Weekend without much special activities and flu is almost gone, so good time to paint some minis. For the second post today, I present a team of T-70 Soviet tanks for Flames of War. Minis itself are from Plastic Soldier Company.
These are meant for Operation Bagration, that's why bright green bases and tanks are plain green, only some identification numbers in the turrets. So far I have understood, that there were no clear system for numbering tanks, I guess it causes some confusion to enemy, when even the own side doesn't know the meaning of all the numbers... In the background you can see some explosions, they came in the Opel Blitz truck set from Warlord Games, which I decided to do now.
I painted the exhaust systems orange to show rusted they are. Tracks are a mixture of browns and greys. And now I realize the mistake I made while quickly finishing these - I didn't apply any brown mud to the hulls... Well, maybe they were just unloaded from train and sent forward...
And the view usually seen by the controlling player. I guess better be quick, because these light tanks tend to blow up rather quickly when encountering German defenders. As you can see, I have based my tanks, this way I can glue a magnetic sheet to the bottom of the base and this helps with transfer and storage. Models itself are rather sturdy, so the bases are not necessary for protecting them, I think.
There are 5 of these 15mm tanks here, so 8 points a piece. Then two half minis on the turrets, giving 2 extra points for total of 42.
Keeping up my tradition to post something every week, here's a small entry of two German halftracks. I was on holiday for a week and these were almost ready a week ago, just final touches today.
These are older models, part resin, part metal. Sd Kfz 250/7 (8cm) painted in rather late war scheme to match the rest of my collection. I have worked mainly on Operation Bagration, but this particular model doesn't appear in the army lists. May be I use them as objectives or something like that. I might add some identification later, if I figure out what to do with them.
My rushed finish shows quite ugly, the Reikland Fleshshade was pooled in several places.
There is a mortar and a machine gun on each.
Group shot with some earlier works
Two 15mm vehicles and 4 crew members, but only painted the upper part of them, so only 1 point each, 20 points in total.
You may have been rushed in the painting of these half tracks, but I think they look 'the business'!
The colours look great and work well with your earlier models.
If there is one thing I know about gamers, is that painted models will always be found a use ... it may be later rather than sooner, but these half tracks will find their way to a game table!
Curt frequently tells me that he's unearthed minis from years ago and has just the right idea/plan now ... hahah ...
