Basal Cleavage

I have more or less caught up on my backlog of figure painting.

This included:

recent purchases of Heroics & Ros officer strips and PzB38 & Boyes team purchases (which may actually be used as MG34 or Bren teams once I sit down & have a look at what I have got);

much needed 25mm & 47mm allied AT guns & crews;

platoons of B.E.F. & French/Belgian infantry I never got round to painting from my previous wargaming existence back in the early 80's, which had been languishing in the loft in tobacco tins in their original packaging;

repainting of gun crews painted up as Afrika Korps & 8th Army.

(I had always been quite happy to use heavy weapons sans crews irrespective of the ground footprint of said hardware. Perils of solo wargaming, I suppose. Also I did (& probably still do) have way too many AFVs for the amount of infantry I can field. Standard proceedure on both counts for most wargamers, I suspect).

There was also a smorgasbord of sundry vehicles that had tickled my fancy which I could not resist from Heroics, Scotia & Ian Armstrong.

In order to visualise the overall effect of my painting standard it was neccesary to flock some bases. I found it a bit too distracting having unpainted plasticard or tiddlywinks from the ankles down, so I gave some of the groups a coat of Humbrol 150 on the bases & dunked them in Javis Light Meadow Green.

Some of Nikolas' French Infantry

Taking my cue from Lloydian Aspects, I will be customizing the bases somewhat so that the appearance of the base will tell the gamer which platoon each foot group belongs to. Simplified, the appearance of the base will denote the parent unit, as opposed to having any coloured markings or symbology on the base. Aside from unit identification purposes I expect I will be installing the odd random sprig of lichen or budget permitting, a rock.

As regards AFVs, these will display markings in keeping with, but not totally authentic to, the real thing.