Wheres Wally? (or Waldo if you are in the States)

So... its been a while. 

A little over 5 months in fact!

In truth, I never stopped painting and in fact I've finally finished working on a big painting and modelling project that I had underway a little over a month into my blackout but I do have to admit that I think I was suffering from some sort of snow blindness where painting was concerned which slowed me down considerably towards the end of the year and through January.

...oh yeah and that's not to even mention that Christmas happened, during which I cancelled all holidays, worked through Christmas neck deep in heavy engineering works, literally turned my apartment upside down in order to fix problems that were springing up all over the place and having closed down a film and mixed media company almost a year ago decided that it was finally time to convert my office into a dyed in the wool Man Cave!!!

My 'work in progress' for the Obrona Narodowa '39 Intelligence Briefing I've been slaving over

Whilst all of this was going on, luckily I still found the time to polish off an entire Flames of War Polish Obrona Narodowa (National Defence) army for Flames of War, added a platoon of Korpus Ochrony Pogranicza (Border Protection Corps), as well as adding a few bits to my nascent Zulu army AND finish translating my first Polish military book on the 'National Defence' to help write an FOW vIII Intelligence Briefing which is now almost done... and just to add the cherry to the cream on the cake I've also just finished the first 28mm miniature that I've painted in over 15 years )and boy oh boy do I have some lost ground to make up on), completed ALL of the Slovak infantry I have planned for my FOW Slovak army and started painting my first Spanish Civil War 15mm Carlist Requetes for Spain in Flames as well! 

Well... blog posts and photos to follow... by the bucket!

So... its half way through May and I am now finally in a position to start posting again and I thought I would get the ball rolling by offering a few WIP's on the Intelligence Briefing and show you all what my Man Cave looks like now that all of the editing systems and camera systems have been retired and melted down for glue! (yeah OK, that was a bit dramatic... it was actually all sold off!).. and where it is I now spend my days slaving away!

The man cave in all of its glory!

I decided in December that I wanted to take down my giant double 30" cinema display Apple editing system that I was no longer using and replace it with some space to paint toy soldiers in. A very sensible choice I believe! So in place of my giant all space consuming technological financial black hole I decided that just a little bit of deskspace wouldn't be enough... so I emptied my entire office... which quickly spread to the rest of the apartment! Proof positive I think that I'm a bit OCD!

Anyway just a bit of deskspace wouldn't cut it so I decided I wanted some desktop organisers and after looking around for a suitable fit I ended up finding Hobby Zone, a boutique Polish company that were doing exactly what I was looking for. Not the cheapest in the world to be sure BUT they were well made and rugged and should be able to carry the weight of my ham fisted mishandling in the years to come!

Hobbyzone.pl

I replaced my old and functional Spirit Air airbrush with a new MIG Aircobra and a Harder & Steenbeck (Infinity) CR Plus because Ive decided its time my skills with the airbrush developed past the point of throwing buckets of paint onto models! I followed through on this with a new compressor and a worktop spray booth as well.

Airbrush Spray Booth, Compressor and gear with Vacuum Pump on the bottom

In the plastic container below the spray booth I have been able to store my vacuum pump which I uses for casting. Actually I bought this solely so I could cast up all of the stuff that I sculpted for use with my Black Brigade army but now I've got a hard on for other projects as well... My Slovaks will need a few bits and pieces and when I eventually reach my Dutch 1940's army they will need some stuff as well :D

Where the airbrushes are concerned my old and sturdy Spirit Air was good enough for the level of detail that I required but I decided that unless I start pushing my envelope I'll never be any better with the airbrush as a tool than I am now... and that really isn't very good to be honest.

So I palmed off my Spirit Air and Aztek compressor on one of my best friends in return for a fine bottle of Welsh Whiskey (Yup! That's right!!!) and instead bought a new compressor and two new airbrushes.

MIG Aircobra in the rear and the Harder & Steenbeck Infinity CR to the front!

...and of course there were the continual little bits and pieces that one buys to improve ones working conditions such as a bookstand and two new desktop lamps with daylight bulbs!... and actually the second one was a ball ache that took a looooooooooong time to arrive which is partly the reason that I didnt post last month when everything else was ready!

Bookstand on the right with the two new lamps taking centre stage with their daylight bulbs...

... Looks like I have plenty of paints lined up there on their racks doesn't it? Well in fact I have room for less than 1/3 of my paints with the remainder staying in the tool box under the desk. I basically chose all of the main ones that I use for racks just for convenience.

One good thing though is that with all of the drawers that I now have I was able to store almost all equipment that I use in them with the main stuff in the drawers in front of my painting space.

...and of course over in the corner of the room I store all of my solvents and effects fluids & pastes for handy access :D

Funky bottles... and stuff...

and between them both is where I store all of my brushes, superglues, pens, pencils..blah blah blah...

Windsor & Newton Series 7 brushes.... with all of the others as well...

BUT no man cave would be complete without ones coat of arms hanging on the wall! Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you; The Lions of Gwynedd!

The Lions of Gwynedd in all of their glory!

... and whilst we are the subject of all things Welsh, I like to have my poster of mythological Wales' 'Mabinogion' up on the wall next to my book case because its firstly nice to look at and secondly its a reminder of all of the 'Tales for Small Children' that we have! :D

Mabinogion - Tales for Small Children

... mind you, saying that, there is also a certain satisfaction with having a new bookcase in my office dedicated to military history and wargaming as well to top up on all other tales.

Books... BOOKS!!!!

Most of my normal, English language books are elsewhere in the house. For my own private pleasure I keep all of my wargaming books, my Classical and Archaic era books and of course anything Polish... well, I call it pleasure, others may call it torture but horses and courses and all that.

Now, for the last couple of years I have been forced to 'make do' with whatever I had in order to get the job done but as money eased off a bit recently I decided that it was time to replace a few of my tools or else buy some things that would just make my life easier.

When I started painting my Slovaks a massive cock up was conducted under my watch requiring a complete strip down and I wasn't keen on the time it would take to do it by hand so I decided to buy an ultrasonic cleaner. I got a VGT-1000 and I have to say I was REALLY pleased with the results!

VGT-1000 Ultrasonic Cleaner

The other item I decided it was long overdue for replacement was my dremel. For the last God knows how many years I had been using a cheap piece of yellow plastic that I couldn't control the speed on or even turn on and off without using the plug... I decided on taking the plunge and buying a Dremel 4000 with a workstation that turns it into a Pillar Drill as well.

Dremel 4000 with the Workstation 220 to the left

and of course where would a wargamer/blogger/modeller be without an ability to photograph all of his latest efforts?

Well, seeing as I have surrendered my usual painting location to 'she who must be obeyed' I decided I needed an alternate way of doing what I needed, so I decided to purchase a portable and collapsible studio. I already have one of course but it really is an awful piece of crap so I decided to go for broke and buy a Foldio 3 kit with turntable and extra lights.

The complete Foldio 3 kit with Halo Bars and 360 Smart Turntable

... of course nothing worthwhile comes trouble free and true to form the geeks in the Foldio lab decided that the UK would never be a good enough market to provide any version with UK plugs so I had to buy the US version and Step Down Converters to modify the UK power supply to the drip fed US supply.

However when you see the photos on the forthcoming blogs you will see that it was worth the money!

... that pretty much covers all of the tools... I guess its just about storage now:

This is where the majority of my stuff is stored at the moment and I have room for one more filing cabinet and one stack of plastic boxes side by side for expansion. At the moment I still have the majority of the end cabinet free with only three drawers being occupied. There are also plenty of the small drawers available for 6mm and 10mm Austrian and French Napoleonics and my nascent Zulu War army.

The plastic boxes are a Godsend however. At the moment they are crammed with boxes of figures from a couple of other game systems such as Prodos' AVP and Flintloque and Slaughterloo armies and such like. Ill be cramming a new pile with scenery and Photo-etching equipment at some point soon as well... just one more ridiculous project to suck up my time in the near future... but oh the possibilities!

FIX BAYONETS!!!!!!