Who you gonna call?

 Crooked Dice' Paranormal Exterminators cried out for paint AND a ride!

So I acquired this Dinky Toys ambulance and converted it to the famous Ecto-1.

Now who you gonna call?

Trenton 1776: winter table

In order to play the Battle of Trenton I decided many moons ago to build me a winter table. Failing to complete it before Christmas I present it to you now. At least it's still winter here.

Top of the table runs Assunpink Creek, left top is the orchard and right center the town of Trenton. The Continental attack will in any case arrive from the top right and perhaps from other directions as well, depending on what I do with the scenario. 

I wanted to emphasize snow and cold so smoking chimneys were mandatory. They are made of stuff used to fill hamster's cages with.

Here the -now extinct-  New England Giant Cougar passes by. She is still in her winter coat; a perfect camouflage colour. If she lays still you can easily mistake her for a hill....

Unaware of war approaching, this 1/72 scaled citizen of New England transports his goods.

The morning patrol returning to Trenton.

A patrol of mounted Jaegers.

Jaegers guarding Assunpink Creek bridge.

Oberst Rall and a British acquintance of his on their morning ride.

The snowy fields East of Trenton.

The reverend preparing the sermon, seeking inspiration in the morning sun.

 Street views

Another shot of the morning patrol, looking past the Grenadiers Von Rall.

Some aerial pictures.

The terrain is made from two paper "snow" blankets sold around Christmas, glued together with PVA glue and painted with acrylics. Houses are either scratch built of papercraft houses, mainly from this site that hosts historical buildings from Illinois.

Fences are scratch built, walls are resin from some unknown manufacturer and the bare trees are bought on Ebay or at a Christmas sale (the snowy firs).

Sci-Fi wargaming in 1/72: more aliens added

Because 1/72 or (not entirely accurate) 20mm scale is The One Scale for people my age and to give some opposition to the tide of beautiful 15mm and 28mm sized stuff here is an overview of my 20mm Sci-Fi wargaming stuff, mostly made for Stargrunt II and its worthy successor Tomorrow's war. As you will find it is an eclectic mix of 1/72 figures and kits, large 15mm stuff and random toys. Not all is pictured here but I refer to my other blogposts of Tomorrow's War especially. 

The 1/72 figure shown for scale with the vehicles is a Dark Dream Studio SF figure. 

Critical Mass Heavy Arc Fleet Grav tanks

Critical Mass Merc grav APCs

A Void grav tank destroyer. 

Critical Mass heavy Merc tank

Revell Leopard IIs and a Critical Mass Heavy Merc tank

Khurasan APCs

Revell APCs (2 Fuchses and a Marder)

A scratchbuilt APC from Aliens (cardboard and bits)

Dark Dream Studio 1/72 combat walkers

Dark Dream Studio 1/72 hunter/killers

Various scratchbuilt artillery pieces (AT gun, Missile platform and AA gun)

Some toys of unknown brand or type

RH Miniatures Colonial Marines 

Alien drones

Dark Dream Studios 1/72 SF troopers

RH Miniatures Imperial troopers

Aliens for TW: comparative shots of a Khurasan Felid (small alien), a Caesar Delta Force trooper (above), a RH Miniatures battle armoured trooper (below) and a GW Tau (big alien) 

Millin' around in 10mm Pike & Shotte

I always say there's no real Pike & Shotte wargame without a windmill stuck somewhere in a corner of the table. Dunno why, maybe it's because I'm Dutch, but in battles with pikes, big boots and wide-brimmed feathered hats there should be a windmill in the background. And I did not have one yet, so I decided to make one. 

The sails gave me the most food for thought. 10mm is a small scale and I really liked the squared structure of the sails to be there, as they are so iconic for a windmill. But how to make such a fine structure that would still be able to hold up against the rigors of gaming? 

Then I came upon the solution of a strip of flyscreen stuck to a narrow strip of plasticard (below) which turned out to be perfect! 

I decided to make the base and body of the mill from foamboard, which is easy, light and strong.

The top of the structure is a simple house-shaped box. Details would be added later through timbering. The roof was made from simple cardboard from the backing of a notepad.

The base is a square-footed pyramid. Slivers of wood (cut from coffee stirrers and such) were glued to the base to resemble timbering. The base was glued upon an old credit card.

The upper structure is mainly timber. Slivers of cut coffee stirrer were glued to the foamboard box....

...and cut to shape with clippers. 

I decided on a thatched roof made from a cheap towel (see below) glued on top of the cardboard roof and then the upper structure was glued (using a hot glue gun) to the base.

The same glue gun was used to attach the sails to a pin, which was then stuck into the upper structure. 

 And now the windmill starts to look like one. There is a door in the back with a stairs leading down.

Here are some 10mm Pendraken figures shown for scale.















And below there's the windmill painted. Sprayed black, highlighted dark brown, grey and light tan with some flock added to the base and the roof in some places.

And some bases painted in recent weeks shown for good measure. Cuirassier and Croat command bases....

...and a heavy gun