Plastic Fantastic Part 2: Star Wars W.I.P

Unusually fast turn around on these fantastic plastic minis - mainly because I couldn't resist having a go to see how they would turn out - have to say, in spite of my rather rushed paint jobs, the detail on these is very crisp, the Snowspeeders in particular being really well defined. They are still a work-in-progress, but the photos should give some idea of how good they are....

I found out that they are from amongst the playing pieces that come with the Star Wars Risk:

http://boardgamegeek.com/image/159625/risk-star-wars-original-trilogy-edition

There are also some larger scale figures, including a rather good Rancor, as well as some nifty-looking mini Death Stars - looks as if I might be trawling Ebay again some time soon!

You'll notice that I haven't yet decided on a basing scheme for the AT-STs - obviously torn between the earth of Endor or the classic Hoth ice and snow - given that these don't actually yet fit into any existing 6mm armies project, I guess I could do either - certainly the 'speeders are not exactly canon - I just went a bit wild with the orange!

Hope to have these finished soon, and then it's back to more mainstream, metallic minis - I promise!

Plastic Fantastic Part 1: Star Wars

I was inspired by a post a while ago over at TMP talking about the possibilities of using plastic Lego Bionicle model parts as a relatively cheap source of ready-made starships, and have since been haunting E (vil) -Bay looking for just such items, only to find that there is quite a range of tePlmpting bits and bobs on there that end up, well....tempting me to buy them.....

The result is that I now have a large and varied haul of plastic items that should be fun to play around with, utilising them as the basis for various scratch-build projects, principally the aforementioned starships, but also for Sci-Fi terrain pieces.

I'll be showcasing these finds in a series of posts here, but thought I'd kick the things off with a look at some rather cool Star Wars playing pieces in plastic that I think are a good fit for 6mm minis. Not entirely sure where these are originally from, perhaps pieces from a Star Wars themed set of Risk or other boardgame?

In any event, these Snowspeeders and AT-STs scale pretty well alongside the 6mm troops from GZG we see below:

Similarly, and perhaps more appropriately, next to Irregular Miniatures' 6mm 'not' Jawas NSF11:

Then for a comparison scale, seen here next to two other 'chicken walker' contenders, a piece from Micro Machines, (closer to 10mm perhaps?) and then the 2mm IKSF28 two-legged walker by Irregular:

Can't wait to have a go at painting these up - not that I actually had a 6mm Star Wars related project on the go, but you know how it is..... :-)

I should be pushing ahead with the 2mm Sci-Fi stuff, including a large number of the 2mm infantry bases seen in the next photo, but I think I'll forgive myself a small diversion in the meantime!

The original, inspirational TMP discussions can be found here:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=250447

and here:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=272030

Stay tuned for some more 'Plastic Fantastic' to come soon....

Flag-less Block Frenzy at Irregular Miniatures!

Just a quick 'heads up' to all you 2mm fanatics out there, Irregular Miniatures have just announced that they are stocking new flag-less versions of all their classic Horse and Musket Era infantry blocks, codes BG1 through 34, that will be available alongside the existing range.

This is excellent news for all those who like to depict large-scale formations, and have in the past had to resort to file and clippers to hack away at the pre-cast flags - now you can paint them up in groups and multiples to your heart's desire - only downside is that I now have to re-think and re-write all my future OOB requirement lists to factor in the new blocks.....oh well!

Head on over and take a look at: http://www.irregularminiatures.co.uk/

Tootle-oo!