Building model tanks

@franklin_cain

Nice! Next you can make Lego Axis and Allies (if someone made a board, it will be insanely big as it’ll take a lot of pieces to accurately spell the territories).

November Update: Pictured below are some of the new designs and things in the shop, including four new colors and four new units:

Colors:

China Lime Green UK Light Tan/Beige Dutch Bright Orange French Blue

Units:

LCVP “Higgins” boats M3 Stuart Light Tanks GMC “Jimmy” CCKW 2 1/2 Ton trucks Kriegsmarine Type IX U-boats

IMG_7373.JPG

These and most of my other prints are $0.60 per model or less! Come check them out, and let me know if you have more ideas below.

As always, A&A forum members can use coupon code AADOTORG21 for 10% off your order for the rest of 2021: www.etsy.com/shop/NathanDetr0itDesigns?coupon=AADOTORG21

@DMcLaren Hey thanks! Only with that version. Anniversary got the same treatment (kept it completely original) and currently tapping away at 1914. But I know what you mean. Once the bug bites…

@folewnik as a small time scale modeler, I very much admire your work. You have exceptional attention to detail so I thank you very much for this compliment.

@Ghoster Thanks! And that’s awesome! I think you’ll really enjoy the experience. I’ve been asked this several times now so I’ll just post it here and on YouTube:

Russia - TS-62 NATO Brown
UK - TS-46 Light Sand
USA - TS-28 Olive Drab 2
Germany - TS-6 Matte Black
Australia - TS-66 IJN Gray
Italy - AS-22 Dark Earth

the rest were bottle paints shot from an airbrush:
France - XF-18 (tamiya)
China - Interior Green mixed with some yellow
Japan - Model Master’s Italian Red mixed with Rust from the same company

Per @Midnight_Reaper’s request, I’m working on a USS Atlanta and an IJN Agano for Light Cruisers. The Atlanta has existing open-source examples; the Agano I’ll have to rebuild from bits and photos (all current models are pay-only).

@CWO:

Just as a general suggestion: if you’re going to the trouble of carving the map out of wood, it might be a good idea to limit the actual woodwork to the most basic elements (country shapes and names), without carving into the wood the kinds of details (like IPC values) that might potentially be subject to adjustment under house rules or other types of setup changes.

Right, definitely don’t want to carve the lettering and numbers. My original plan was to do an iron on ink transfer before I poly the whole thing, but now I’ll look at options for changeable IPC Values. Thanks!

Here’s a comparative picture I took of five A&A minis and their A&A boardgame counterparts: three tanks (Sherman, Panther, Tiger) and two battleships (Bismarck, Yamato).

Minis vs Boardgame.jpg

This may sound like an improbable source, but another idea would be for you to go to some local dollar stores and look around.  Back when I was making myself a dice tower, I discovered that some dollar store chains sell (among all the miscellaneous stuff they have in stock) some plain unpainted rectangular wooden trays of various sizes, made of very thin wood.  Their designs could not be simpler – a bottom and four sides glued together, all made of flat wooden pieces – and they’re cheap in both price and appearance, but they’re about the right size for what you have in mind and they would probably look quite nice if you applied some dark wood stain to them.  And because they’re so inexpensive, picking up as many as you need for your table would be very affordable.  It would also be easy to customize them by, for example, subdividing the larger models into sections by cutting some balsa wood sticks (or other types of woods) to suitable sizes and gluing them inside the trays before you stain them.

Awesome!  Ready-for-the-desert scheme, sweet.