Cyanight's Customizations

@The-Captain
I used 3mm thumb nuts drilled out to fit 3mm acrylic rods. I used a number of 3d printed jigs for cutting the rods, assembly of the stands and gluing the magnets. If I remember later I’ll attached some pictures of the jigs/stands

Part 4: Starting the ships, adding decals to the tanks, skin tones on the soldiers

Today spent some time adding paint to the sprayed ships, including painting the water jettisons on the subs black (this was very tricky and ended up looking a little sloppy). Advice for painting the jettisons: toothpicks are not small enough! If you do use toothpicks, you’ll have to dab a dot of black for each tiny jettison.

The battleships were a bit easier, and painting the decks, bridge, and smoke stacks were all done in silver. I plan on adding the final grey coat last after the deck and stacks/bridge dry. I experimented with how to add the national emblem, and will probably opt for a white background with a red dot on the bow of the ship. In the future I may do that with the rear end of the ship.

I painted the tranny smoke stacks silver and added a white background for the emblem on the destroyers. All in all, the Japanese navy is coming along nicely.

The armor is pretty much done. I added a white flag to the front side of the armor and will be adding the red dots later. For the aircraft, I’ll be adding a red band around the rear part of the plane. I was debating between sky blue and red and may alternate just for some variety.

The soldiers got some skin! And I just want to say that adding the paint alone brings out the contours of their facial features in an excellent manner on their own. I may add a touch of black to certain areas of the face but that will be a last step. The next step will be panting their uniforms, rifles, and helmets.

After all this is done, I will be spray painting the japanese bombers white, the aircraft carrier black, and then will add the details to those. The Japanese are about 55% done all in all and I’m pleased with the results so far even if they do look a bit amateurish. Stay tuned.

IMG_6405.JPG IMG_6404.JPG IMG_6403.JPG IMG_6402.JPG

@cyanight:

Everyone has their own unique way of painting the pieces.  No matter how we paint the pieces they must still be playable within the game.

And the nice difference between game sculpts and real military equipment is that sculpts are rarely lost or damaged in combat.  If that wasn’t the case, people might actually hesitate to risk sending their painted sculpts into battle on the game map, given the large amount of time they’ve spent on customizing them.  :-)

Regarding prices, here are some quotes that I got from two different Southern California print shops  (I had posted this also on the thread entitled Ambilzi & Grasshopper’s 1940 Global Map)

The first print shop provided the following estimates (note the $52 set up fee):

SET UP:  $52.05 ( digital color file set up, latex printer set up)

48" x 105" vinyl $142.63  print digital color 4/0 on white smooth vinyl (15oz)

48" x 105" canvas  $300.13  print digital color 4/0 on canvas

48" x 105" versa fabric  $273.88  print digital color 4/0 on versa fabric

53" x 116" vinyl  $174.63 print digital color 4/0 on white smooth vinyl (15oz)

53" x 116" canvas $368.13  print digital color 4/0 on canvas

53" x 116" versa fabric $335.88 please note: print cannot be any larger, printing on a 54" rolld

A second set of quotes from a different Southern California printing company for printing on vinyl (the type of material used for advertising banners):

48"x105" ,  white 64" Roland EcoSol Banner, solvent 6 color Roland 4sf  $230.80

53"x116",    white 64" Roland EcoSol Banner, solvent 6 color Roland 4sf  $258.78

56"x122.5",  white 64" Roland EcoSol Banner, solvent 6 color Roland 4sf  $277.42

(I might check on the AliBaba website to see what I can find for printing services in China.  Also, I’m checking on the possibility of printing on upholstery vinyl and marine vinyl).

Hello everyone,

I have been getting some requests for the air base & naval base icons I used for my custom map, so here they are…

@Intrepid:

/how’s that for my 3rd and 4th posts ever, haha! Been a member of this forum since 2007, but I’m the ultimate lurker (mostly because I know I’m too easily tempted to get long-winded!)

You have exercised an extreme amount of restraint posting 4 times in almost 10 years. Glad you chimed in here.

Wow!  Such cool pieces! (Been awhile Paul)  And there’s others I’ve yet to see that are posted -

@robbie358:

Hello all.  I thought I would solicit your thoughts on which types of pieces in any version of A&A scream for painting the most.

IMHO, the most confusing piece on the board in the original Pacific and Pacific 1940 is the USA fighter in China.  Having to differentiate between a Chinese fighter that looks American and any USA fighters in that zone seems like a headache waiting to happen.

Otherwise, I would say the pro-Axis and pro-Allies neutrals in Europe 1940 need attention.  The fact is that upon being attacked, you’re supposed to pick any random country to donate an infantry to that territory.  If the attacker doesn’t win, the infantry stay there but cannot be moved.  Seems like confusion might set in eventually.

Your thoughts?

HBG has British infantry for sale. I bought 25 and painted them white to use for neutral armies.