LHoffman's Painted Sculpts For Your Consideration

@sgtwiltan:

Lucas, Marine units used more disruptive camo due to the closer combat distances of the pacific jungle theater. You could use a lighter brown rather than black to differentiate the units from Army ones. Leave a bit of black on the edges of the stripes to accentuate them.

I might try doing that. Actually, I flirted briefly with outlining the stripes (in a lighter green) but abandoned the idea after it didn’t show much promise. Your solution sounds more promising.

I will try it if Paul is okay with the difference between the tanks and other Marine units.

@Tall:

––Lucas,…if you would please post that pic of the U.S.M.C. bulldozer in the camo scheme and one of the “Flamethrower” Shermans you painted. For some reason I can’t d/l it onto my tablet. Anyway, you can see that the green is almost as dark as the camo color and it isn’t as distinct as I’d hoped for and looks very close to the Army scheme. Do the two of you agree?

“Tall Paul”

I agree the colors are so close as to be hard to distinguish from any distance. I can try to rectify this in a couple ways. One, may be to not even use a wash, or if I do, to apply it only in the recessed areas. I feel as though any wash, brown or black, will seep into the paint and darken it. I could make the pieces look very much like the Sherman bulldozer picture here, but I would basically apply no wash and lighten up the stripe color. I was under the impression you wanted something more akin to Allwork’s “dark camo” batch, in which the OD Green is dark and the dark green is even darker, almost black.

Do you like Wil’s idea of brown stripes outlined in black? Or would you rather I just lighten up the scheme as it is?

@Tall:

Lucas,

––I think that it would look better if the overall scheme was lighter, thus making the green camo stripes more obvious.
----I would be glad to pay for a TWO prototypes, one using a tan or light brown wash,…and one WITHOUT a wash of any kind to find the best solution. This would be simpler and IMHO better than a brown outlining of the camo stripes. I don’t want to overburden you with highly complex schemes more than necessary as we have a LOT of work yet to be accomplished and I really enjoy your paint jobs. Thanks again.

“Tall Paul”

No problem. It should be simpler to keep the scheme lighter than to make it darker as I have been. If I need to do an extra prototype (when we get to that stage) I can experiment on one of my OOB pieces… no need to pay for extras.

@sgtwiltan:

You could also differentiate the US army Tanks with “invasion” stripes around the turret since I have not seen pics of Marine tanks having them.

As in the white/black aircraft invasion stripes?  Ultimately that would be Paul’s decision; I paint as he requests. But a good thought regardless.

@Tall:

Lucas,

––I guess I must confess to being ‘human’ and ask if you have a progress report on the German Luftwaffe you’ve been working on? You do such great work,….I just thought I’d ask. We’ve got a new thread just for all of the German aircraft and armored units that are in the works. Keep up the good work, buddy.

Go “WarMachine Team”  :-D

“Tall Paul”

Being human is the best excuse to ask questions…

Progress has been slow of late, for many reasons that personally frustrate me, but I can send you some updated pictures if you would like. I will have all aircraft complete and ready for shipment by Saturday the 20th, if not sooner. Given the time I have each week that I can work on them and the remainder of the work left, I will make sure they are complete by this date. You deserve them sooner, for all your patience, but if you can wait until the 20th of this month, they will be ready for battle.

@Tall:

––BTW, is there any chance you might be able to attend HBG’s Gaming Convention next year? It would really be great to meet and play an A&A game with you and Wil using these detailed/painted painted units. It would mark their FIRST TIME being used in a game.

“Tall Paul”

Paul,

I truly appreciate working for such an understanding and helpful individual as yourself. It has been and will continue to be fun and an honor to do this for you. I will try to post some pics.

As for the convention, I cannot say at the moment. What month/day is it supposed to be? I believe I saw that it was in Tulsa, right? I would love to be there… we’ll see what the wife thinks about a road trip out West.

Paul,

We had no internet when I got home last night so I was not able to post the pictures. However, we have it now and I am uploading them as I write this. After supper, I will post them. Look for them later this evening.

Since internet at home sucks, I was only able to upload 2/3 of my pictures today. The rest will be up tomorrow morning.

These are mostly profile pictures so Paul can determine how the numbering schemes look. Due to space/color issues, I had to make some modifications from the original intent. However, I can say these modifications will make the planes look more true to their historical representations.

This scheme is what many would consider the prototypical Luftwaffe camo. Which is why Paul chose it. This is a large batch (8 of each aircraft below) with (4) planes of each type in the colorless scheme, (2) in red and (2) in yellow. The Ju-52 transports all have white markings for recognition purposes. There will also be swastika decals on the tails of most planes, however, since I am still working on them and handle the tails a lot in the process, I have not yet put them on. They will probably be the last thing done.

While they are very nearly done, they are not final products. And I always seem to want for better lighting.

Here is No. 1:

HBG Ju-488   -   designation H+1 (for Heavy Bomber)

As you may or may not be able to see, there is a molding issue to be dealt with here. Right where the red ‘H’ is, there is also a sizable divot from the plastic mold which distorts decals placed on it. I may be able to fix this issue with an extremely small amount of contour putty, but I am unsure of the result and have never attempted that before.

No. 2   HBG Me-262   -   designation J+3 (for Jet Fighter)

Again, not finished. Needs some touch up. I had to use the black numbers over the yellow stripe because white numbers would have been virtually invisible.

No. 3   HBG Ju-52   -   designation T+2 (for Transport Aircraft)

Paul’s preference was that the transports be easily identifiable by the white markings.

Again, not final product. Paint needs touch up work before the shipment.

No. 4   HBG Do-17 Medium Bomber - designation not assigned

This was one that we forgot about Paul. I assume we will give designation ‘M’ for Medium Bomber, but I wanted to check with you first. We should have enough decals (red and yellow) for this designation, but I will have to check tomorrow when I have access to my materials again.

As with some others, this still needs canopy work.