Afrikakorps Raiding force - Hollywood-style (Update: 13.07.17: Me109 finished)

[NurgleHH]

Wow, great paintings. Love the windows and the nearly photorealistic paintings.

[Carrakon]

Recently I started working on some opposition for my lads. Given their immense coolness, the LRDG was a must, of course. Since Warlord Games gave  me a voucher, I decided to test their vehicle offering, despite not being a fan of 1:56 as a scale, but there's no alternative in the bigger scales at even halfway reasonable cost, so... 

So without further ado, here's the vehicles (Crew, along with Artizan Brits is still on the painting table):

Obviously for colours, it is a must to use one of the LRDG's fantastically perverse schemes - I opted for the disgusting combination of pink and light blue 

Truck 1




Truck 2




Jeep




Casting of the trucks was brilliant with almost no cleaning necessary, the Jeep was considerably more rough, but all in all worth the money. Only problem is that at 1/56, the Jeep looks comically small imho (less of an issue with bigger kit like the trucks).

Hope you guys like 'em!

[FramFramson]

The next is a converted Gaz-A, which looked suitable similar to the predecessor of the well-known Fiat 508 CM. I just modernized the spoked wheels, moved the spare tire to the front and added some stowage:

If you don't mind, what's the size/scale of the Gaz A and where did you come upon it? Been trying to find a 1:56 A or similar for ages.

[Captain Blood]

Love it. Fabulous 
The camo scheme is positively psychedelic - brilliant!

[Carrakon]

If you don't mind, what's the size/scale of the Gaz A and where did you come upon it? Been trying to find a 1:56 A or similar for ages.

It's 1:43. Got it for 2 bucks at a local Woolworth. I think it's part of a series which was sold with some Russian magazine. Don't know where you could get a 1:56 one, as using that scale with the LRDG was an emergency measure - I think it's too small and that especially shows with smaller cars.

[Corso]

Great stuff, nice to see Italians.

I would really like Perry do some plastic italians. I would jump in ww2 straight away!

[Chico]

Great looking bits, good job

[Carrakon]

Here's some new progress to show:
First is the rest of the LRDG, that is the crew for the vehicles:





Also I finished the Artizan LRDG on foot - wonderful models:


Detail of the patterned headdresses:


I also finished a little side project: Feldgendarmerie (military police) for use as checkpoints and a VW Kommandeurwagen:


Now the real thing was basically a Schwimmwagen with Beetle body, but in tune with the Hollywood theme, I used the opportunity to 'get it wrong' and just use a regular beetle - of course with a way too modern body, as evidenced by the rear window


I also made some progress on the tank front. I was reluctant to do a Vismod with post-war tanks as that was the time when - compared to the Panzer III or IV - tanks started to get huge. I toyed with the idea of using a smaller scale tank but that didn't really sit well with me either. I then found some inspiration to get me back on track, namely the 1985 movie "Battle for Moscow", which has vismodded T-55's as Panzer Ivs:



That got me back on track, as it dawned on me that I'm not really modelling a Pz IV, but rather a different tank which was modified to stand in for one - hence the bigger size being a non-issue. I then remembered the old East-German toy T-54  in 1/50 scale I had lying around for ages and started working. Here's a WIP shot of the progress so far:


I just added the casemate structure to the hull and scratchbuild the turret. I upscaled the turret to be roughly comparable in size to the original turret (scale of the turret should now be at about 1:40). I'm not sure whether I'll keep that turret or whether I'll build a 1/50 version and use that, so input would be appreciated.

[wolfkarl]

I love this thread, you're doing some cool stuff. Your LRDG need a Michael Caine and Nigel Davenport figure, in German uniforms of coarse, to give it the "Play Dirty" feel. A couple of Arab scouts also.

[Poiter50]

Not the same actors but Perry do Ice Cold in Alex as a set. There are some Arab figures armed with .303 SMLE rifles as well. Edit - Just found them, Artizan WW1 range.

I love this thread, you're doing some cool stuff. Your LRDG need a Michael Caine and Nigel Davenport figure, in German uniforms of coarse, to give it the "Play Dirty" feel. A couple of Arab scouts also.

[Ultravanillasmurf]

Sloppy Jalopy do a 1/56 scale FV423, which in real life doubles as a number of World (and Weird) War 2 vehicles in films.

[Chico]

Cracking stuff mate.

[3 fingers]

Love the paint jobs on the vehicles.

[Carrakon]

And here I was withholding information about what's on my painting table at the moment
Of course I realized the need for Arabs for use as either native scouts or - in the spirit of 1960's Hollywood - Indian-equivalents in funny and exotic clothing
The Artizan Arab Revolt minis are really nice and great fun to paint - I'm confident that I'll be able to post pictures this or next week.

As for Allies in German uniforms, the problem is imho that on the table they'd obviously be indistinguishable from actual Germans (So why bother?). Of course combining plastics accordingly (i.e. Germans with allied weapons/heads) would be a possibility, but I don't see the Perry plastics fitting into my Artizan lot (both size and stilistic issues). Maybe Warlord's Blitzkrieg Germans would be a suitable basis as the jackboots can easily be painted as tropical canvas boots as I did with the Feldgendarmes above...
Then again with the uniforms of the various armies in the desert looking very much alike (especially due to use of captured stocks) I might be overthinking the problem - I'm thinking of the opening scene in play dirty (I think it was) here, where the uniform change is achieved simply by changing the cap and switching the radio station.

I'm of course grateful for any suggestions which would lead to the disguised lads to be recognizable as both not really German AND clad as Germans.

Sloppy Jalopy do a 1/56 scale FV423, which in real life doubles as a number of World (and Weird) War 2 vehicles in films.

The only example I know of that vehicle is the StuG posted earlier in this thread and I gotta say that vismod is just too good to work for this project, as it would imho just look like I did a scratchbuild and couldn't be bothered to do it right. I'm by far more comfortable with the route of copying the more lackluster attempts found in some movies, where the quality of the conversion is far away from a good job and instead dangerously close to the "why did you guys even bother?!"-territory

So basically what could have been a light-hearted project turned into one where I'm doing about as much research into bad movie-vehicles as I would have otherwise invested into actual history research in order to 'get it right'. Kind of an anti-rivet-counter project for a different kind of rivet-counting

[Ultravanillasmurf]

There is also a Panzer 3 (in five and six wheel versions). You can order a 305mm to the foot version for about £38K if you want (?).

I see your point though. I have one of them, and it is going to be hard work to get it to look like a FV432.