Daiso ¥100 shop run while waiting for Emily. 6 more scaffolds, two not-Mini diecasts, nine concrete pipes, 17 intermodal shipping container tins, and two fake beer can tins.
That brings my total to 48 intermodal containers and 12 scaffolds. I'll pick up two more of the maroon or blue ones if I see them, as that will neatly fill up the shelf cubby I have them stashed in.
Should I be concerned that the back of the diecast car packaging says "keep out of reach of children"?
Spent the last couple of days basing six packs of Foundry Street Violence minis I ordered last month. The order (which was quickly and efficiently dispatched by the Ansells) consisted of:
The minis required a bit of cleaning, which is to be expected of casts from molds as old as these. If memory serves this line started back in the late 90s and should be old enough to legally order a beer now.
Sergei's Corporation and Juno's Crew, two packs I owned years ago but have since lost or damaged enough to make a reorder prudent, are intended to form the nucleaus of an organized crime force. I definitely want some Russian mobsters and both packs should serve as the core of that force; I will have to experiment with using a pen to add tattoos to the minis's necks and hands. Italian mobsters are also something I will field, but I don't think Juno's crew has the look I want for them... more track suits and guts. I'm thinking more like the guys from The Sopranos, Juno's crew is too hip looking to be goombahs - (which is saying something for twenty-plus year old minis).
My included two packs of uniformed police officers, both six-mini packs. I plan to remove the cast on sleeve patches from each of them, as they aren't placed very well on a number of the minis. Given the 8-point caps I will likely paint these up as NYC-style cops... French blue shirts with dark navy trousers, caps and ties. I may make some water slide decals to use as patches. We will see. Twelve uniforms should be all the police I need to field at any one time, particularly if the are augmented by a couple detectives from the Lovemore packs, or SWAT minis from a future order. The Lovemore Detective Agency is, I believe intended to represent a group of P.I.s but a couple of them are very city detective looking, with what appears to be a detective shield clipped to the belt.
The B Team was picked up to go with one of a pair of 1:50 scale A Team vans I picked up years ago. I have no idea what I will do with the second van yet, but better to have two than only one. Perhaps a Punisher battle van.... hmmm. Anyway this pack is decent, but I must say the new not-A-team minis from Crooked Dice may be better... I havent ordered them yet, but the pics look excellent.
About two years ago I started to switch from washer and token bases back to sports base types. Part of the reason for this was the difficulty in mounting minis with sports tabs. Many newer minis featured much slighted ankles that made it challenging to pin on a base that could be firmly glued to the washer or token.
I found that by creating a void in the slotta base, backed by a 20mm washer glued to the underside, I could get a flush mount for minis with cast on bases. The washer adds some nice weight, and the overall height of the mini is nearly identical to the height of the mini on a token. Additionally slotta bases come in a much wider variety of shapes giving me more options for mounted and motorcycle minis. It also gives a vintage 90's feel to my tabletop that I rather like.
Went back to Daiso on Tuesday to look for more shipping containers. They hadn't restocked, but I did notice these racks intended for displaying diecast cars. They are modular, stackable, and have pin and socket connectors to attach them together end-to-end or even in L shapes.
My immediate thought was of the workers scaffolding you often come across in NYC, assembled over the sidewalk. I think if I remove the cross members on the short ends from a couple to use at street level, I can achieve the same effect by stacking and sliding these up on the sidewalk against buildings on the table top.
I only picked up six, the number of brown decked ones that Daiso had on hand. There are black decked ones as well, but I prefer the contrast, and it's that much less I need to paint. I will probably hit up another Daiso tomorrow looking for more of the brown.
Went to Daiso with my wife this morning to get some garland to redo the wreaths for the door. As we were browsing the home decor section I noticed these tins that were styled after ConEx/Shipping containers. Eyeballing them at the store I realized they were pretty damn close to 28mm. I bought four to take home and check.
Measurments put them at about 1/53, which is a little smaller than the 1/50 I would prefer, but at ¥100 for fully painted containers that I just need to seal and weather... I am more than willing to overlook the slight reduction of size. They come in two basic liveries, ONE - Ocean Network Express (in pink and light grey variants) and CTNRX "Everything you can imagine is real" (in blue, maroon, and dark green variants). The roof of each is actually the lid and is grooved to allow another one to nest on top. I imagine I might be able to make some craft foam inserts to allow them to double as miniature storage as well - probably a small gang/fireteam of four minis to each container.
So after picking my son up from school I went back and bought all of stock they had. Here they are in all their glory. Think I need more...
UPDATE: On Tuesday I was working in Kanazawa, where there happens to be another Daiso... so I bought all the containers they had as well. I am currently at 31.
Back from a makeup-brushes-for-painting-minis run at the ¥100 store... got me an "eyehole brush".
I'm still not going to paint eyes on my minis... but it's nice to see daily proof of your job security.
I have two of these Disney Planes Cabbie toys. They are a wonderful compromise on scale for table top use. Shorter wings and thicker fuselage fits in well. One of them will be a mercenary plane based on the seaplan from The Expendables, and the other will be a Vietnam-era transport.
Paint is mostly done (it still needs a red prop warning line on the fuselage), and I began applying decals - from a number of different sheets - today. I need a decent day of low humidity to clear coat and I probably will add a few warning decals still. Cockpit windows, weathering, prop magnets, and landing gear need to be finished up.
Markings and paint scheme are fictional. I decided to do a Marines C-119 painted in a manner similar to the AC-119 gunships with black lowers and "South-East Asian" camouflage upper surfaces. GreenStuff World's decal sheet had an appropriate name, "Rice Pattie [sic] Hattie", that seemed something a Marine aircrew might paint on the aircraft. The scorpion tail marking is from Gnomish Workshop and is a call out to a fictional squadron from a t-shirt I got at Target years ago.
I began disassembly and priming of one of the two train cars I picked up. I had originally seen these trains at Toys R Us in Matto about nine years ago. They are a deluxe version of a popular line of friction powered train toys that have light and sound effects. These are Hankyu 9000 series trains, a later version of the trains I used to commute when I was an exchange student in Kobe in 1997.
I didn't pick them up at the time because they were about twice the cost of the regular trains in the line. However they recently went OOP and I managed to snag two used ones on the intertubes. I wanted these because of the walk-through cab design that reminds me of the El in Chicago and NYC subway trains.
The intent is to use the bronze-base metal technique to make them look like scuzzy urban trains, then apply some blue striping and grafitti decals, before finishing off with a few washes to dirty them up more. For those not aware, the 'bronze-base' technique is a way to quickly paint tarnished metal by applying a drybrush of aluminum or gunmetal over a bronze basecoat. The peek-through of the bronze creates a rusty or grimy effect in the crevices. I tried this technique out on an Ameri-Towne building I had laying about and was very pleased with the results.
I assembled and primed this a while back, but I wasnt satisfied with the poster images supplied with the kit. The downside of speaking Japanese, is that when random text is copied and pasted to make cyberpunk graphics... it bugs me. So today I searched for a some advertising images from the Cyberpunk 2077 video game.
I resized them to the appropriate dimensions in GIMP and printed them on photo paper. The result is a much more appealing bus stop shelter.
A repaint of the gold Kaga Dai-Kanon statue I bought years ago. Verdigris'd up for use in Far Eastern settings.
This is a tenement from TT Combat. It's not a particularly detailed MDF building, but they are extremely affordable. It went together quickly and I modified the garden appartment to place the balcony away from the street. Basic paint, and then lots of washes. Added some grafitti, both decal and hand drawn.
I also built and painted a few of the Sarrissa Precision South-East Asian building I got. Its just a basic brown undercoat with lots of washes to make them look aged and weathered. Going to cut up some old towels for the thatch roofs.
Built and painted a PBR from Sarissa Precision today. Modified the roof with some hemp twine covered with crumpled paper sealed with ModPodge. Created a better feeling of canvas over metal supports.
It has some interesting proportions, probably not quite to scale but allowing minis to be placed on the deck. It is missing a forward dual-fifty turret, so I'll have to figure that out. I also changed the order of the rounds for the radar, and sanded the top-edge to make it look more accurate.
While I had the paints out I finished up the windows on two Fiat 500Fs I bought at the car museum years ago.
Some things in Japan are incomprehensibly difficult to find: string that isnt plastic; mitre boxes; nail files; old people wearing masks; wood stain that isnt actually acrylic paint...
I went to four stores to find nail files. None of the drug stores carried them. Go figure. This is the resultant haul. Auto primer for minis. Notebooks that look like passports. Combat Magazine Vietnam issue. Superglue. Spray bottles. And a cheap Moscow mule (ginger ale and vodka).
I decided to start rebasing minis I have that were on washers and tokens. With the decision to rely on 1/48 and 1/50 scale vehicles, and with the larger 32mm minis I have from Star Wars Legions and other newer mini manufacturers, it just seems more practical to base on slottas.
Washers required me to pin on a base to the feet of the mini after removing the tab, but these newer minis sometimes have very narrow ankles and drilling the feet is risky. If I keep the tabs and use slottas I can match bases by driling a void that matches the cast-on bases of other minis in the solid slotta; backed with a 20mm washer gluded to the underside, the cast-on base blends with the thickness of the plastic. Overall the mini sits no higher than it would have on a token. So slotta style it is.
Building the three brownstones/tenements I got from TTCombat. Not a fantastically clever MDF design, but the price is really good.
The Masterpiece Transformers I ordered for my birthday last month have arrived and been posed above the TV. Bumblebee and Optimus are absolutely Korean knock-offs, thus the missing Autobot insignia. I have some transfers on order to remedy the oversight.
Really like the Soundwave, especially the fact that he can store multiple cassettes in his chest, just like the cartoon. He has all the right markings, so perhaps he7s a legit version, but the price was as reasonable as the knock-offs.
Tokyo Marui makes this cartridge holder for their under-18 airsoft revolvers... combined with some steel pachinko balls, we have a very nice shotcounter for Deadlands.
I imagine a few of these, enough for each PC at least, and a pot for the spent shots. Another option might be colored marbles allowing each players ammo to be tracked individually.
These arrived today - very nicely done. U.S. Marshal for me, Deputy US Marshal for each of the kiddos.
Finally got to assembling the four items I ordered from 4Ground. I must say they are very handsome builds with nothing but assembly on my part.
No painting no weathering. I'm not sure I feel they are cost effective... but I can see the appeal.
One feature I do appreciate is the working doors. I can deal with static doors, but to have reasonably proportioned swinging doors is a nice touch.
I consider these buildings table ready... I do need to make signs - I think I might try magnetic so that I can swap out. They may get some weathering in the future but it's not a pressing matter.
On a side note, I do need to come up with a better basing plan for horses. And i need a better camera. This tablet camera is absolutely awful.
Found this place that makes custom Old West badges, and decided to order some for me and the kids. The concept is a U.S. Marshal dealing with supernatural crime in Japan during the Meiji-era when extra-territoriality was still a thing. I designed two badges: a U.S. Marshal and Deputy U.S. Marshals, the proofs arrived in my email today.
A short bit ago I came across a series of card-craft punch-out building models by a Russian company, with the unfortunate name of Umbum. Listed as "1/56" I decided to order one to see what it was like. Finished building it today.
It is a little small for 28mm... perhaps about S-Gauge - which is absolutely usable for gaming. They are very nice builds, straightforward, with detail inside and out. Registration is consistent and the artwork is rather attractive.
The only issue is the clearance on the board walk; the roof is a little low for some minis. You find this issue on the inside as well, which is cleverly accessible through swing-out walls and lift up roof sections that latch in place.
Overall I think these are great little buildings if you dont mind them being just on the small side.
