Russian village church

I finally got round to painting this village church for Russian Civil War games.  It's a laser-cut MDF kit from Sarissa Precision.  It was one of their more challenging kits to build because oft he multiple roofs & the crucifix orb, but nothing ridiculous.  I left the roof unglued for access, & painted the interior before gluing the walls to the base.  The building is tall but not that wide, so it's actually a little tricky to place models inside.  But the only viewpoint for those inside is out the doors anyway, so it might not happen that often.

I find these MDF buildings require a couple of spray-coats of undercoat before they're ready to paint, as the material really absorbs the initial coat.  After that they take the paint well.  I used a simple colour scheme based on a few reference photos, & I'm pretty happy with the outcome, although I may add more severe weathering the the wood cladding to 'age' the building a bit more.

I went with a 'gold' theme to highlight the importance the church would have in a village, & because it'll be the centrepiece of many RCW tabletops.  Should make an inspiring focus point for the Whites defending Mother Russia from revolution, whilst the iconoclastic  Reds & Blacks will have less respect for it!

Overgrown rocks

I finished some more scatter terrain for use in Samurai or Russian Civil War games - a couple piles of overgrown rocks.  These are simple stones glued onto some laser-cut ply discs from Fenris Games, with gaps & earth added using coarse paint thickener, then drybrushed & weathered, before painting the areas that were to be dirt & plants in dark brown & khaki green respectively. I then used PVA to affix various flock mixtures & GamersGrass tufts, moss, & wildflowers.  I think the latter really bring the pieces to life.  Makes miniature basing so much easier!

I have very nearly finished painting my first buntai (band/group) for 'Ronin' now - some villainous Edo-period Yakuza.  I'm just trying to find the best way to model a few sheathed katanas to a handful of models that should be equipped with them - it's surprisingly difficult to source non-sci-fi 28mm scale katanas :-s  I'd appreciate any tips of where I might be able to order some, cheers!

My back-up plan is that I have a few leftover empty wakizashi scabbards that I might be able to Green Stuff hilts onto - but my first attempt at this was a mess.

Wooden barrels & boxes

Last week I painted some 28mm scatter terrain - 3 sets of wooden barrels & boxes.  These will be suitable both for my 'Ronin' (chanbara skirmish games) & my 'Chain of Command' Russian Civil War collection.  The pieces are a mix of resin barrels & boxes from Fenris Games, & 2-piece plastic barrels in 2 sizes manufactured by Renedra (I purchased through Perry Miniatures as part of a Samurai figures order).  Both were easy to prepare (the resin pieces merely needed a quick scrub with soapy water to remove casting residue; whilst the 2-piece plastic barrels required clipping from their sprues & gluing together.

A nice touch to the Renedra plastic barrels is that they are cast in brown plastic, so could be table ready in a basic manner very quickly.  They also look a lot like traditional Japanese barrels.  However, not all of their joins fitted perfectly during assembly.  I used basic drying brushing to paint mine in a variety of wooden hues.  I'd been trying to decide what to do for the basing for a while, reasoning that my usual 'wilderness' look of grass & moss tufts would seem a bit out of place for barrels - they would be in a street or yard, not laying in a field or wood.  Then I stumbled on a very old bag of fawny-coloured flock (from the first few years of my miniatures hobbying, nearly 2 decades ago!), & found that mixing it 3-to-2 with my dark earth flock of choice made for a pleasant 'compacted/dusty earthen street' look, as seen in many chanbara films (e.g. the Zatoichi & Sleepy Eyes of Death series).  I added a sprinkle of small dark green flock plants for variety, & the look was complete.