Matt varnish

I was having trouble with matt varnishes going all dusty white a while back. I tried using gw and vallejo varnishes and both gave me the same results. After airbrushing the varnish on, white dusty specks would appear after the varnish dried up. Maybe its because i used an airbrush to spray it on. It can't be the product because i bought both quite recently.

Anyway, my good friend Jeff suggested another product. Share and share alike :)

These are the 2 products.

1. Daler-Rowney soluble varnish matt
I got this at Arts Friend at Gardens for around RM25-30. Sorry guys, i forgot the actual price.
It is an acrylic resin based varnish. The liquid is quite thick and needs to be diluted for our use.

That's why we need product no.2

2. Ace Hardware mineral spirits odorless paint thinner.
Again i apologise for not remembering the actual price but it shouldn't be more that RM30.
You should be able to get this at any Ace Hardware store. I got mine at Midvalley.
We'll use this to thin the varnish down. Its odorless so it won't stink up your hobby area. But do work in a well aired area for safety reasons :)

Because the varnish is quite thick, you don't need to use a lot. I use a ratio of 1:3 varnish:thinner and it's worked beautifully for me.

The color after diluting. Its ready for airbrushing now. I've always used an airbrush to varnish my models.

But for the sake of my friends, i tried using a brush to see if it would produce the same results.

Before varnishing.
After varnishing. The one on the left and in front was done using a brush and the other using an airbrush. As you can see, they produced similar results. Fuhhhh :)
I can't quite show the level of mattness (is this even a word?) in this picture but I am very happy with the results. I would swear by them :)
Next time, i'll buy the gloss or semi-gloss and see how it works.

2 lessons from this methinks.

1. Share and share alike. If you're having a problem just tell your friends, they could hook you up with a solution.

2. Go outside the standard hobby range of products. You never know what gems you can uncover. This varnish should last me for avery long time. Not bad for a RM50 investment :)

Thanks for sharing Jeff ;)
No going back for me.

Machine gun platoon update

Started work on the machine gun platoon last Sunday. They would've been done except that i think just 2 models on the normal base leaves it looking rather empty.

There isn't much reference on the net that i've managed to find and even the FoW site has just one clear pic. So i decided to paint an extra figure for all the teams.

Should get these guys done by this Saturday.

1 week for 1 platoon...just going with the flow :)

Easy Company 2nd platoon completed

Completed 2nd platoon today. Changed my style of painting from single bases to doing the whole platoon at one go. Through trial and error, i believe i've got down my process and painting these models are becoming a bit quicker. Which is good because i still have a lot to paint to finish this army :)
I've continued with using different colors to differentiate each platoons. 2nd got blue.
And this is what i've managed to paint so far. Co HQ with 3 bazooka teams, 1st platoon, 2nd platoon and field artillery battery. Not bad huh :)
And all of them fits snugly into these trays which i will share in the next post. I'm sure you guys can guess where it comes from. Suffice to say, they're AWESOME!!! Must buy for FoW players/hobbyists.
Next up is the machine gun platoon.

As always, i appreciate all comments and suggestions.

Thanks for reading guys :)

Parachute Field Artillery Battery Completed

Completed the command, staff and observer teams. Now this platoon is done and ready to lay down some hurt to support the infantry platoon before their assaults.

I'm really enjoying painting these guys :) And to keep with my color recognition system, i painted dark purple dots to mark them. It's not too visible from the picture but they're there.

Up next is 2nd platoon. But a neat project just got whispered to me during work and it's sounding really interesting hehe. Let's how fickle i am....


Must paint 2nd platoon....must paint second platoon....don't look at those marines.....don't...paint 2nd platoon....huh!!! where did that come from..... ;)

Cheers guys :)

Parachute Field Artillery Battery

These guys took a full solid week to finish. 16 models and 4 guns. I have really over estimated my schedule to finish my para company hahahah. Don't we all :)




Unfortunately, i haven't completed the command,staff and observer teams....sighh....9 more soldiers to complete my artillery platoon.

Currahee!!!! :)

Easy Company 1st platoon ready for war

Finally got these guys done :) I'll admit that when i started this project i thought it would be easy and quick. Quite the opposite...

What you see here is the basic strength of a US para platoon. 1 platoon command, 1 bazooka team, 1 mortar team and 6 infantry teams. 32 small soldiers in total. Of course they're not as big or detailed as your average marine figure but those figure do stack up....

I had this idea of painting lines at the back of the bases to differentiate between platoons and independent teams but settled on using dots as these are easier to paint. So red is my Company HQ, yellow for 2iC and khaki are 1st platoon. Maybe blue for 2nd. This way when my troops are on the table i can easily identify where each platoon is and give necessary orders to destroy the enemy :)

Group pic of all completed teams. HQ, 2iC and 3 bazooka teams, 1st platoon and platoon command for 2nd platoon.

I'm tired of painting infantry teams for time being so went with these guys. Am sure you can guess what will go in the middle...

Goodnite and currahee!!!

101st progress

Completed the 1st platoon HQ and 1st squad. Progress has been slow this week but progress is still progress they say :)

So this is what i've done so far.

Company HQ consisting of Co commander and 2ic supported by 3 bazooka teams. 1st platoon ; platoon command and 2 rifle/mg team= 1 squad. I painted an extra command team which will be 2nd platoon's.

The followings pics are esp for 4eyedmonster, a fellow hobbyist and blogger i met for the first time over the weekend :)
You can check his blog here http://foureyed-monster.blogspot.com/

I use a small computer fan to dry paints faster when i need to. It uses a usb connecter and i plug it in to my laptop.


I like to paint my Fow individually bluetacked on whatever i can find as opposed to using the icecream stick method. Although i still do batch production painting in small squads. The good thing about batch painting is you feel a sense of achievement seeing the models completed. Squad by squad until its all done :)


And this is my ultra sophisticated photo studio hehe. A3 size paper and Ikea table lamp.

Have a good holiday everyone :)