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Working with a bloke who served in a Chieftain during the Cold War and he mentioned they always went on exercise a round or two light because the ammo store was nice and cool and kept the food fresh! Great stuff on the crew and the outsides of the tank are looking brilliant!

Thats cool, I may have to model that some day, an interior with a kitchen!

Thanks for the kind comments too Llama

Wow that crewman is almost frightening realistic looking. Great job, this is looking amazing .

You said you were layering filters on - could you explain what exactly filters do and why you apply them? I've seen them mentioned a lot but I've never really known what they're for and how they help. Cheers!

Gundam-Mecha wrote:

#2 looks like he just farted in the tank... #1 looks like he just noticed.

Seriously, though, these are all very nice models. Are these 28mm scale? I have about a hundred 28mm Soviets from Bolt Action minis I'm yet to work with...

Nah, they're larger scale ones - I remember I looked at the site he got them from when I was looking for altenative heads for my imperial guard.

This blog is staggeringly awesome, from the level of detail involved to the excellent paintjob/weathering techniques used. Keep it up!

Can you explain exactly what ratio of Bicarb/white paint/PVA you use to make the snow please?

No trouble mate its exceedingly easy to be nice about such a great model!

Thanks for all the kind comments guys, and apologies for not being able to reply over the weekend, I was in Milan Italy.

Chopper - A filter is basically a very heavily diluted wash, it has the consistency of tinted thinner mixed usually from oil or enamel paint and turpentine or artists thinner. The ratio is usually 95% carrier to paint and retains a high transparency. The idea with a filter is use it to subtly change the colour and qualities of a surface colour very gradually. Filter coats are usually built up in layers of three to five upwards, and each layer is left to dry for two hours in between. Since a filter aims to change the base colour and add chromatic richness it is only applied to the large or exposed surface areas and not applied into details such as weld seams, panel lines, or rivets. Washes are best used for picking out details.

You can buy filters that are ready mixed to use out of the bottle such as the excellent sets from Sin Industries (a subsidiary company of Mig Productions, like citadel colour and citadel miniatures), or alternatively you can mix your own. It's important to remember that the brush should not be too heavily loaded, first wipe it on a piece of kitchen towel to remove the excess. It's important that the filter coat is light, and controlled and a lightly loaded brush helps with this. go over the area that needs to be "filtered" once (no more than twice) with a large soft brush and then leave to dry for two hours. I'll post later on some comparison shots of a surface without a filter and one with filters and nothing else, as well as a brief tutorial. As they build up in layers the effect becomes much more noticeable and helps to break up the monotony of a strong base colour.

Arctik -These are 1:35 scale with works out around 32mm I think and sadly not 28mm. If you want heads for GW sized figures you could try 1:48 scale sets as theyare much closer in size to heroic scale. Hornet are well known for their head sets and the quality of sculpting is great, they are all resin sets also which adds to the detail.

Oshunai - As for the snow mix it depends on the effect i want, heavy snow, fresh snow, melting or wet snow. Usually though I'd say somewhere in the region of three parts bicarbonate, 1 part PVA, 1 part white acrylic. I then add a little water as I'm stirring the mix, the consistency should be wet enough to be able to apply by brush but still retain a thickness to hold in place. You can always add more bicarb into the mix when you make it to thicken it up if you want. For melting snow add more water to give it runny texture, once it's dry you can also give it a coat with some gloss varnish by brush to give it a shiny look. For heavy or fresh snow more bicarb than water and PVA, you can also sprinkle bicarb powder over the surface directly while it is still wet to add further texture.

Llama - Cheers!

Gundam-Mecha wrote:Thanks for all the kind comments guys, and apologies for not being able to reply over the weekend, I was in Milan Italy.

Chopper - A filter is basically a very heavily diluted wash, it has the consistency of tinted thinner mixed usually from oil or enamel paint and turpentine or artists thinner. The ratio is usually 95% carrier to paint and retains a high transparency. The idea with a filter is use it to subtly change the colour and qualities of a surface colour very gradually. Filter coats are usually built up in layers of three to five upwards, and each layer is left to dry for two hours in between. Since a filter aims to change the base colour and add chromatic richness it is only applied to the large or exposed surface areas and not applied into details such as weld seams, panel lines, or rivets. Washes are best used for picking out details.

You can buy filters that are ready mixed to use out of the bottle such as the excellent sets from Sin Industries (a subsidiary company of Mig Productions, like citadel colour and citadel miniatures), or alternatively you can mix your own. It's important to remember that the brush should not be too heavily loaded, first wipe it on a piece of kitchen towel to remove the excess. It's important that the filter coat is light, and controlled and a lightly loaded brush helps with this. go over the area that needs to be "filtered" once (no more than twice) with a large soft brush and then leave to dry for two hours. I'll post later on some comparison shots of a surface without a filter and one with filters and nothing else, as well as a brief tutorial. As they build up in layers the effect becomes much more noticeable and helps to break up the monotony of a strong base colour.

Ah awesome, cheers for that. I actually ordered the complete mig set over the weekend in anticipation for doing my tanks - looks like a made a good choice. Am I right in thinking that they are effectively a tinted varnish (ie a wash that colours rather than runs into cracks and creases)? Would they be useable on things like leather jackets which would need a sheen to them?

Gundam-Mecha wrote:

Oshunai - As for the snow mix it depends on the effect i want, heavy snow, fresh snow, melting or wet snow. Usually though I'd say somewhere in the region of three parts bicarbonate, 1 part PVA, 1 part white acrylic. I then add a little water as I'm stirring the mix, the consistency should be wet enough to be able to apply by brush but still retain a thickness to hold in place. You can always add more bicarb into the mix when you make it to thicken it up if you want. For melting snow add more water to give it runny texture, once it's dry you can also give it a coat with some gloss varnish by brush to give it a shiny look. For heavy or fresh snow more bicarb than water and PVA, you can also sprinkle bicarb powder over the surface directly while it is still wet to add further texture.

You sir are a wonderful human being. Thanks for that, just solved a load of problems I was having.

Wow GM, the face on that crew member is amazing! Almost creepily lifelike. Mind explaining what you did there?

get to the chopper! wrote:
Ah awesome, cheers for that. I actually ordered the complete mig set over the weekend in anticipation for doing my tanks - looks like a made a good choice. Am I right in thinking that they are effectively a tinted varnish (ie a wash that colours rather than runs into cracks and creases)? Would they be useable on things like leather jackets which would need a sheen to them?

Exactly, thats the idea, glazes of colour to change the base shade, although they are matt and won't dry shiny. You can use filters on figures also, you can also use them as a light wash to pick out details as well if you only want something subtle. However the main use is for changing the characteristics of the base coat. If you want to add shine to a leather jacket for example your best bet is a gloss varnish applied by brush directly over your painted surface of high lights and shadows etc.

Oshunai - no worries happy to help anytime. It's not an exact science really. The best way is to just play around with some mixes and see what you like best. As with everything in modelling do whats best for you personally as a modeler.

Shellfish - thanks! The skin tones and faces are my first attempt at painting faces with oils instead of acrylics. I've found it rather a hard lesson and it's certainly been a challenge but I'm really glad I took the leap to try another technique. I've got a lot to learn on this but I hope with practice I can improve things. The hardest thing about painting with oils is the long dry times inbetween coats or during blending. 1-2 hours from base coats to blended highlights etc. You also have to be real real subtle. A tiny dot of white is enough to highlight a whole cheek, and once blended will work really well. Too much though and your figure ends up looking like a snowman! Also with oils they are very translucent when wet, you won't really see the highlight effect till it drys, so it really is a leap of faith following the tips in guides and hoping that the effect will be what you want in a few hours time. If you try to over compensate to make it immediately visable while wet the results will dry very heavily. I think this is the biggest difference between blending with acrylics. Pretty much how an acrylic looks on the brush and immediately on the surface when wet is how it will look dry. With oil blending its another story, you really have to be restrained. For a good guide on painting faces with oils you should check out Mark Bannerman's excellent Osprey book "Modelling Panzer crewmen of the Heer" it has some fantastic step by step photos.

Time for a quick update.

The scenic base with blending and oil washes and filters:



Snow effects:

The reference inspiration



The actual dio







As you can see in the last image I built a small campfire of burning embers that the figures will be sitting and standing around, much like in the photo.

T-55 interior, still a lot to do here and very much a WIP:

Looks awesome man, great job. I love that tree on the base - how did you make it?

Thanks Chopper.

The tree is made up of various cuttings of a small evergreen tree that my parents had in their garden. These were soaked in Glycerin to preserve them and then glued together and attached to the base. To add the snow I used the hairspray technique and then sprinkled bi carbonate of soda directly onto the tree.

Ah thats a great idea - I may do that myself, cheers.

Yeah sounds like a cool idea, might be useful in making terrain. Thanks for the tip.

The diorama itself is coming along well, can't wait to see it all put together. Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the feedback guys!

Actually I'm not too pleased with the interior, I had very a specific idea in mind when I was doing this and was following lots of reference photos from the Osprey T-55 guide, in the end though the finished result didn't really come out how I had hoped.

I also found weathering the interior very tricky as theres so much small photo etch that really is very delicate. I had to hold back a bit on the graphite weathering because I was worried that the parts would break off. Another issue was the fluff and lint that I found had gathered in corners and stuck to things during the oil washes and filters... plucking all that out with a pair of tweezers was a pain too especially on the deleicate photo etch parts.

So I guess I have a love hate relationship with this interior, I'm not entirely satisfied with it, so it's interesting to hear what others think.

Particularly I'm not very happy with the engine, I think I will work on that some more tonight.


On a positive note I've been painting the Motor Rifle Troops and they are coming along well. Although I still need to finish off the Tank Crew. I plan to weather the tank some more with the snow and mud effects

I know what you mean about the interior. TBH when I saw it I though it was only half finished. It kind of looks like its missing something. Maybe its in a stage where its too weathered to look like a nice new tank, but not weathered enough to look like a beaten up old one.

In terms of graphite weathering, how do you personally do it GM? Do you rub some on your finger and then rub it on; do you rub straight from the stick; or do you use some sort of tool to get rubbed on with more detail?

Finally had some time to do some work on the diorama and work is progressing nicely. You will have to forgive the terrible photos. The lighting in my apartment is pretty bad and it doesn't do the models and justice at all! I'll try to get some daytime shots of the finished article.

The Motor Rifle Infantry are now done and finished:













Here's a rough layout of the scene as it currently stands:







The wheels of industry grind on, but I'm confident of finishing the project off before my end of November deadline.

Bloody hell! Your infantry look incredible!

Just noticed this thread, I was reading in some aprehension because the uniforms were initially very wrong for what you wanted. This was fixed but you were threatening to do thick snow, nice that you did thin snow.

its been a rollercoaster read of nooooo, but it came out 100% in the end/so far.

Thick snow true Russian winter would have been bad not for the uniforms (though gloves are noticably missing) but for the poses. they are too relaxed and 'open' for deep cold.

The tank commanders jacket open is not a problem, it can actually get hot in tanks

My one remaining niggle is about the seated infantryman, he is sitting on a bare log which is not a good idea. You need to make it look like he had brushed the log first, sitting on snow gives you a wet seat, lying on snow is not so bad but sitting is a lot of pressure from a hot part of the body, the soldier will get damp and cold wet is a thousand times worse than cold dry. Most winter troops without modern equipment, and even with, learn to sit on something.

Thus the log needs to look like he has swept his hands over the seat.

Also think about footprints.


Normally i wouldnt be anything like this picky, but its a sign of where I think you are at with your modelling.