Sired's Map project - Updated- 4/16 - files available see first post

UPDATE: Added an overlay that redraws the border between sea zone 37 and 38, uniting the Andaman Sea and the Malacca Strait and causing SZ 37 to border Sumatra for the first time.

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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.

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@Dauvio:

Nice job, and nice paint schemes. I really enjoy your presentation.

I myself don’t like the Italian, and Russian color schemes. So i change their colors. For Italy is bright green because their flag has green in it. For Russia is red because of the red army. I should use your color scheme for ANZAC.

Red Russians is a great idea.

Nice work - Dare I ask how many hours you put into it? For interest’s sake.

Counting TUV, expected losses after a variety of round 1 openers, KJF and KGF both need some viability the additional russian units are necessary for an even remote possibility of KJF, assuming a 6-9 bid for the allies.

A heavily stacked axis map needed more to it going on many fronts. Kept the fun and minus the complete devastation. UK can sink Japan fleet by east indies with a sub bid and an infantry on egypt, the KJF becomes viable, at the same time, japan quickly catches up in income and can knock out india if it gets no support.

Lots of Russian players like to do ukraine, the added artillery smooths it out, Germany has plenty to counter attack no problem, nothing drastic. Taking london with tech roll LRA on round 1 non sense is out of the picture, tech players rejoice, as if LRA is germany is not devastating enough, plus even a carrier in baltic seazone and air on france… forces a huge turtle buy from uk, mitigating some of that still makes the baltic fleet thing strong just not so overwhelming. Basically all the germany strategies need some kind of drawback or investment. Like you should have to work for Africa if you want it instead of just getting it. The high risk high reward battles still there, because it comes under the assumption of an allies bid, even if you play without one there is still something for the allies to look forward to.

One of the key reasons this map is seldom played is because the allies really have nothing to look forward to for the first 3 rounds. So this just addresses that issue, it is still an axis favored map, the allies still have to make something happen, it is just they now have the tools to try to do something.

The germany destroyer may get removed, I added it to make germany 1 a bit more dynamic instead of linear. Players would also send 2 subs to sink usa transports, baltic subs to sink uk bship, go for egypt or protect bship at gibraltar, it is all the same stuff, now you can yolo attack usa and have a pretty even fight, block usa from landing africa, 2 sub sink uk dd trans and 1 dd to hit the cruiser or use dd to sink bship sub from russia, there is more decision making.

TL:DR More decision making for the axis instead of “this is the best option so I got to do this or I can risk this purchase if it does not work out oh well there will be no punishment anyway.”

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).

Thanks LHoffman,

Your appreciation is my inspiration… because I refuse to use a sheet of glass, my research has lead me to a material called styrene (google it) which is a type of plastic sheet that can be directly printed on. All indications point to this method being the last alternative to glass and although it cost around $240, it looks to be my best option. Even after flushing $300 so far in a crappy print, and installation complications, I’m happy with this new direction if it turns out the way I’ve been told it will. Basically it’s flexible plastic, so it should lie flat without air pockets getting trapped, and because it doesn’t get laminated, the colors should be slightly brighter. If it is sensitive to scratching than there is a clear film sheet by 3M I can look into, that’s where I’m at right now.

good ideas -thanks!