First step in a new project

 In the 2023 final post I had anticipated my intention to start working on the pile of 1/72 Napoleonic troops I have had sitting for ages.

Most if it comes from the generosity of our friend Fele', who gave us all his old Esci 1/72 soldiers, WWII, Napoleonics, etc

Last year I worked to finish my Ancient 1/72 stuff and did a bit of colonial, this year I focused on Napoleonics, I had a big bunch of French line infantry, so I decided to start with that to have a strong starting base for the project.

The plan is to use these models for One hour wargames, a cool system that, albeit simple, is very satisfactory to play.

With the first lot of guys I got 4 regiments of French line infantry and 2 of Italian allied troops, just not to have to paint over 100 models in the same colour scheme.

As usual I used the Army Painter Quick Shade, to have the models finished quickly and very well protected from the wear of the battlefield.

Here is the result:

French line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

French line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

French line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

French line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

French line infantry brigade. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

Italian line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

Italian line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

Italian line infantry regiment. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

The two brigades lined up for battle

IlVJ completes another progect, a massive one

 This is a long awaited post, twelve years to be exact.

IlVJ started painting a few Napoleonic models that someone didn't like and gave to him in 2012, never one to shy away from a challenge, he put together and painted a unit of Bavarian line infantry from Hat Industries in 28mm.

At the time, in the club IlVJ was running, the West Tokyo Wargamers, people were getting in Black Powder with Napoleonics in 28mm and, as it always goes, someone would offer some models because they didn't like the faction, because it was an impulse buy, or some other reason.

With the idea of not getting too deep in the period, IlVJ decided to avoid buying anything and just use whatever model was available and instead of building an army, he would have one or two units to play in multi player games.

Rescuing other player's abandoned figures, receiving few gifts and buying literally a handful of figures, just over a decade later, he has almost 500 painted models to show off.

Here are the pictures of the last three units he completed and final shot of the whole collection).

The whole collection, it is hard to see any detail from here, but a group shot is always a good way to visualize the size of the completed priject.

The third unit of Italian line infantry, allied to the French. 28mm, Perry Miniatures with officer from Front Rank, painted by IlVJ

Légion Piédmontaise, Piedmonese legion, 28mm, Victrix, converted and painted by IlVJ

 

Batllion du Neufchatel, Neufchatel batallion, swiss unit in French service. 28mm, Warlord Games, painted by IlVJ

The end of the year has come

 Hello everyone, here we are again, the last post of the year with the tallying up of what I painted in 2023.

It has been a very productive year, mostly due to the fact that I decided to work on a lot of 1/72 models that, since I use the Quick Shade from Army Painter, get done very quickly.

Let's get on with the count:

Things that I painted for myself:

- 28mm fantasy RPG infantry models: 4

- 28mm fantasy RPG large creatures: 2

- 28mm fantasy RPG mounted models: 2

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer infantry models: 73

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer mounted models: 8

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer large creatures: 5

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer war machines: 1

- 28mm historical infantry models: 63

- 28mm historical mounted models: 25

- 28mm historical chariot: 1

- 28mm Sci-fi Warhammer 40,000/Warzone infantry models: 31

- 28mm Sci-fi Warhammer 40,000/Warzone large creatures: 2

- 28mm Sci-fi RPG infantry models: 10

- 28mm Sci-fi RPG vehicles and robots: 4

- no scale Sci-fi starships and star fighters: 16

- 1/285 Battletech mechs: 13

- 1/285 Battletech vehicles: 2

- 1/72 historical infantry models: 293

- 1/72 historical mounted models: 44

- 1/72 WWII infantry models: 63

- 1/35 WWII infantry models: 2

- various scales terrain pieces: 10

This adds up to a total of 674 models, again, big numbers thanks to a very simple painting method, but I am very satisfied.

For other people I painted the following models:

- 28mm fantasy RPG infantry models: 11

- 28mm fantasy RPG large creatures: 6

- 28mm fantasy RPG small creatures: 9

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer infantry models: 21

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer mounted models: 4

- 28mm fantasy Warhammer large creatures: 7

- 28mm fantasy Warmachines/Hordes infantry models: 6

- 28mm fantasy Warmachines/Hordes: 6

- 28mm historical infantry models: 4

- 28mm WWII infantry models: 57

- 28mm WWII vehicles: 3

- 15mm WWII vehicles: 22

- 15mm WWII guns: 4

- 32mm Star Wars legion infantry models: 4

- 32mm Star Wars legion vehicles: 3

- various scale terrain pieces: 27

This adds up to a total of 194 models, which, added to my personal total is a grand total of 868 models painted in 2023, my absolute record, which I will probably struggle to even match in 2024, but I will definitely try.

Finally, I will leave you with a teaser of things to come, I will start working on some 1/72 napoleonics in 2024, wish me luck.

French Polish lancer. 1/72, Esci, painted by Ginzio

Back from Japan/Di ritorno dal Giappone

 I've been back from my trip to Japan for a few days, but with jet-lag, being stranded in Vancouver for a day due to bad weather and going back to work the following day I couldn't really think of posting on the blog.

Similarly to last time I was over there (3 years ago) I will make a little post showing the gaming, modelling or related activities that we had during the two weeks.

This time around, as the trip was much shorter, we had less chance to indulge in our favorite pastimes, but we still managed a decent amount.

Here are, in non chronological order, the activities we had:

Sono tornato dal Giappone da qualche giorno, ma tra fuso orario, ritardi aerei e l'esser tornato a lavorare il giorno dopo essere atterrato, non ho neanche pensato di fare un post sul blog fino adesso.

Come dopo il mio precedente viaggio (3 anni fa) ho deciso di fare un post per raccontare le attivita' ludiche, modellistiche e adiacenti a cui ci siamo dedicati nelle due settimane in cui sono stato dal VJ.

Questa volta il viaggio e' stato molto piu' corto del precedente, quindi abbiamo potuto dedicarci meno ai nostri passatempi preferiti, ma siamo comunque soddisfatti del risultato.

Di seguito un po' di foto in ordine non necessariamente cronologico: 

We had a couple of games of One Hour Wargames, it is actually a very interesting system that plays very well and has a huge amount of brilliant scenarios that can also be used with other systems. Strongly suggested

Abbiamo giuocato un paio di volte a One Hour Wargames, un sistema molto interessante che si gioca molto facilmente e cha ha una tonnellata di scenari molto ben fatti che si possono anche usare per altri regolamenti. Fortemente consigliato

We visited the war memorial museum at the Yasukuni-Jinja temple in Tokyo, a very interesting collection gathering stuff from Samurai armours to guns, fighter planes, tanks, a locomotive, etc

Abbiamo visitato il museo ai caduti al tempio Yasukuni-Jinja di Tokyo, una collezione molto interessante che va dalle armature da Samurai, ai caccia della seconda guerra mondiale, un carrarmato, una locomotiva, ecc.

And we played some boardgames, Zombies, always a lot of fun and Highlander from River Horse Games, of which I painted 4 figures and IlVJ will paint the remaining 3 (better pictures will be posted when they are complete)

Overall it was great to go visit IlVJ and his family, we had not met in 3 years, due to Covid and other reasons, I hope we will be able to meet again in Italy this summer.

E siamo anche riusciti a giocare a qualche gioco in scatola, Zombies, sempre divertente e Highlander della River Horse Games, del quale io ho dipinto 4 miniature e IlVJ dipingera' le 3 rimanente (foto decenti saranno postate a tempo debito)

Nel complesso e' stato fantastico andare a trovare mio fratello e famiglia, tra Covid e cose varie, non ci vedevamo da 3 anni, speriamo di poter ripetere quest'estate in Italia.