[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourg¶

I started to paint the US Army miniatures. With the Brits and Germans I used techniques I usually use on 28mm miniatures, and it took forever, including, especially with the Germans, painting burn out. For the US guys I plan to use a much quicker approach - base colour and black oil wash.

The miniatures are now drying, having had a gloss varnish coat applied, tomorrow I will see if the simple wash will satisfy me.

Colours used:

  • 70.846 Mahogany Brown (boots, pistol holsters, helmet straps, knife scabbards)
  • 70.873 US Field Drab (trousers)
  • 70.988 Khaki (jacket)
  • 70.821 German C. Beige WWII (anklets)
  • 70.886 Green Grey [50%] + 70.820 Offwhite [50%] (webbing, backpacks)
  • 70.818 Red Leather (rifles, spades)
  • 71.073 MM Gun Metal Metalizer [70%] + 70.521 Metal Medium [30%] (rifles, spades, canteen top)
  • 70.815 Basic Skintone (skin)
  • 70.887 Brown Violet (helmets)
  • 70.975 Military Green (grenades, binoculars, radios)

[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourg¶

Prime night! I primed the latest reinforcements to the US Army by airbrushing Vallejo surface primer black 28.012, now the whole force is ready to be painted.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourg¶

As the last things left to be painted were mortar ammo crates and shells.

I was not able to find any dedicated mortar shells for the Wehrmacht mortars, so I settled for the pack '14. Medium mortars+ ammo boxes' from Peter Pig's AK47/Weapons range. When I ordered them I asked for packs consisting only of the ammo crates but no mortars. Friendly as they are, Peter Pig complied :-)


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourgh¶

Finally, the miniatures are all done, all washes and highglights applied. All the new miniatures I prepared for painting (see previous posts) got me motivated again to finish this rather long journey.

Here are some close ups (mobile quality close ups only...):

Here are the squads in formation. I do not know what I was thinking when planning the force, but I ended up with one squad more than I would need... The group of models above the ones in black bases (spare command models) are the additional machine gunners which allow me to equip each squad with two MG42, thus making them Grenadiers.

All the models I painted glued to wood strips (support weapons and the Big Men), have been cut from the wood strips and glued on their washers. Then I applied a mix of my base brown and floor screed, a kind of self-leveling plaster of paris. On top of that I sprinkled sand.

Unfortunately I ran out of the brown colour...

Next up is drybrushing the bases, painting some individual sand grains as rocks and adding static grass. But first I need a resupply of the brown.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourg¶

The reinforcements are at the same stage as the previous models.

They currently have their gloss varnish coat drying. After that, the whole bunch will have washes applied.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourgh¶

This week I managed to get in some painting time on 3 of 5 evenings as well as some hours today. The result of this is that only the webbing, rifle straps and helmets are missing.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourgh¶

Some progress on the Wehrmacht: The models got a basecoat with black with "VA74602 Vallejo Primer Black Acrylic-Polyurethane" applied through my Airbrush, followed by German Fieldgrey WWII. I then drybrushed the models in lightened up Fieldgrey.

Next I painted the Zeltbahnen, both the rolled up and worn as a poncho types.

Reinforcements top left area.

Reinforcements basecoated in Fieldgrey.

Highlighted Fieldgrey and Zeltbahnen painted.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourg¶

The US Army models got basecoated in black with "VA74602 Vallejo Primer Black Acrylic-Polyurethane" applied through my Airbrush.

The bare metal models I de-flashed and (temporarily based) two days later, being part of the reinforcements I orderd from Peter Pig.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourgh¶

I removed the flash from the German reinforcements and based them.

The top two rows of the unpainted models are MG42 gunners. One is needed for the last squad, the others are in case I want to use the models as Panzer Grenadiere, where each squad had two machine gunners instead of one as with the Grenadiere.

The next two rows are additional riflemen, but these are all armed with the G43 instead of the more ubiquitous Kar98k, to get some variety.

The models glued to the wood sticks are additional crew for the mortars and tripod mounted machinge guns, to get the crew up to the number of models suggested by the rules.


[15mm IABSM]¶
South of Cherbourgh¶

All the models got their helmets painted in 70.995 German Grey.

I then sorted out some models, painted the helmets in 74.604 Dunkelgelb and then added random shapes in green and brown (splotches, lines, etc.) to create some "Normandy Helmets". I let the grey on the underside of the helmet as some sort of blacklining and also let it shine through the dunkelgelb here and there.

I then sorted out all the models which had greenery on their helmet, and painted it in 70.967 Olive Green. This is quite a harsh green, but a more subdued tone would not be discernible, especially from the Normandy Helmets.

Finally, the officer models got painted:

Now all the models are drying, after I sprayed them with gloss varnish. This is on the one hand to protect the paint job done so far, on the other hand the varnish will help the flowing of the washes.