AMMO Encyclopaedia of Armour Volume 2

[Mike]

Encyclopaedia of Armour Volume 2

AMMO of Mig Jiménez

 

 

We reviewed the first volume of this series here on April Fool's day, and just to convince you finally that we weren't pulling your leg, here is Volume 2, which concentrates interiors and base colours for your armour models.  That doesn't seem particularly much to devote a whole book of 152 pages to, but you'd be surprised.  Or maybe you wouldn't if you've ever gone to town on a model.  The style, layout and paper stock are a match to the previous edition as you'd expect, and it is printed in portrait orientation in a card binding that has fold-out half width leaves that are printed with glossy examples of some fabulous armour models.  Mig himself makes an appearance in the Preamble, leaning against a softskin vehicle in a jaunty manner, and after that the book gets down to the serious business of painting and weathering models.

 

 

 

4 Materials and references for the painting stage

4.1 Tools and Materials

4.2 References

4.3 Preparation Before Painting

 

5 Painting Interiors

5.1 Cars and Truck Interiors

5.2. Painting AFV Interiors

5.3. Painting Engines

 

6 Exterior Painting

6.1 Preparation of Parts

6.2 Airbrush Painting

6.3. Priming

6.4 Preshading and Base Coat

6.5 Paint Effects With the Airbrush

6.6 Markings and Insignia

 

 

Photography and the modelling on display is exceptional as we've come to expect from the AMMO studio, and it's nice to see soft skin vehicles being discussed as well as the usual heavy metal.  Incidentally, I was amazed and impressed to see one of the examples was the pseudo WWI-era tank from the film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, which I happened to be watching on Blu-Ray with my son only this week.  It captures the look of the film prop perfectly, even down to the banana-peel barrel on the port side, which Indy ended up hanging from while the baddies tried to crush him against the side of the gully.  What an awesome model and a classic film!

 

 

Conclusion

This series, like the Aviation series is almost essential reading for any modeller that wants to progress in terms of painting and weathering, and leafing through the books leave me feeling rather amateurish, but also inspires me to raise my game on my next model.  Do however bear in mind that these examples are sometimes taken to extremes to demonstrate the techniques used more clearly, and you don't have to mimic them exactly.  Not all tanks are knackered, rusty and covered in mud, but not all tanks are pristine and squeaky clean either.  There is a whole range in between the two extremes, and they can all be correct.

 

Extremely highly recommended.

 

Review sample courtesy of

[Julien]

Are these as good as the Aircraft ones?