Somewhere in Imphal 1944

[tomthounaojam]

Greetings Guys,

 

Ever since I completed the Tamiya 1 Ho Ni 1/35 (really nice kit) self-propelled artillery I didn't know what to do with figures which came with the kit, at that time I was really bad at figure painting. However, during this lockdown with some free time, I tried my luck, and here it is. I said somewhere in Imphal cause in 1944 they would be doing the same thing here perhaps a Banzai charge, there were many battles fought here. The soil would be almost accurate as it is from mum's garden and the soil is from the hill hehe bit of cheating. I poured some water and made it look like a muddy road which was at the time hardly had concrete roads. I painted the figures using a local brand it cost about 30p but does the job, you just need to do some bit of mixing colors as they are generic paints and not meant for modeling. So here it is, my simple Battle of Imphal diorama, I ordered some British kit and I will replace their faces with Chindit ones and will make a complete diorama of this with Bren carrier at the other end with some foliage and trees. Thank you for watching Cheers.

Edited May 8, 2021 by tomthounaojam

[sanfrandragon]

This looks great!  I know nothing of Japanese armour so your SP gun is interesting and you’ve done a nice job on the figures with what sounds like limited resources.  The mud is very convincing!

[stevehnz]

Really nice Tom. I'm not sure the 1 Ho Ni ever got close to Imphal but as a dio it works really well so what the heck, the way you've posed the troops & the muddy base are very convincing. I like it. 👍

Steve.

[tomthounaojam]

4 hours ago, sanfrandragon said:

This looks great!  I know nothing of Japanese armour so your SP gun is interesting and you’ve done a nice job on the figures with what sounds like limited resources.  The mud is very convincing!

Thank you Mate, Japanese subjects are bit esoteric imho, however, they look nice once built. Yeah, limited access here.

2 hours ago, stevehnz said:

Really nice Tom. I'm not sure the 1 Ho Ni ever got close to Imphal but as a dio it works really well so what the heck, the way you've posed the troops & the muddy base are very convincing. I like it. 👍

Steve.

Thanks Steve, am not gonna add the Ho Ni once I done with the diorama, I have a Type-95 which was used here just that it got stuck somewhere and am not able to get it once i get and all the kit and figure gonna do a proper diorama, this was an add on to the figures otherwise it look too blank. Cheers

[Ernst]

Highly interesting diorama of an often neglected subject. I like the wet mud, it instantly reminded me of the series "the pacific". Great camo on the 1 Ho Ni, the (midouri iro?) green looks beautiful, I like that colour. What brand did you use? I tried vallejo's in the past but I could't work with it, maybe I got a wrong batch.

Cheers,

Ernst.

[tomthounaojam]

17 hours ago, Ernst said:

Highly interesting diorama of an often neglected subject. I like the wet mud, it instantly reminded me of the series "the pacific". Great camo on the 1 Ho Ni, the (midouri iro?) green looks beautiful, I like that colour. What brand did you use? I tried vallejo's in the past but I could't work with it, maybe I got a wrong batch.

Cheers,

Ernst.

Thanks Mate, do you mean green as it on the SPG or as on the figures?

[Ernst]

Hi Mate, thanks for the quick response. I mean the green on the SPG. I like these green tones with a bluish hue in it. Now you've mentioned, what colour did you use on the figures. There's a nice contrast between the helmets and the uniforms and perhaps the helmets themselves too since the one on the last figure appears to have a different shade. I've just recently started figure painting  so this is all new to me.

Cheers,

Ernst.

[tomthounaojam]

9 hours ago, Ernst said:

Hi Mate, thanks for the quick response. I mean the green on the SPG. I like these green tones with a bluish hue in it. Now you've mentioned, what colour did you use on the figures. There's a nice contrast between the helmets and the uniforms and perhaps the helmets themselves too since the one on the last figure appears to have a different shade. I've just recently started figure painting  so this is all new to me.

Cheers,

Ernst.

The SPG I painted using Tamiya. The hull was red+black and for green which is IJA green, however, whatever color I tried to add little other paint hence there is a variant in the paint. I have added some WIP of the SPG.
Regarding the Figure the last one was painted few years ago hence it look different and it was Vallejo, however, the other four figures is using local paint called fabrica acrylic which is the good, the bad and ugly yeah ugly some doesn't work at all and choke yr airbrush. But those which work it is a money saver.
 

 

[Ernst]

Thanks for the WIP photo's, I highly appreciate that 👍. I also like your rendition of the Kare Kusa Iro  (vallejo calles it "parched grass") and the way it works with the other colours. Kudos for supporting local paint brands and mixing them yourself, that's a great teacher. With true acrylics there is indeed some variation, I couldn't work with vallejo's midouri green. Even with a 3mm nozzle and needle it refused to be sprayed properly.

Once again, thank you very much, I've got 4 free days ahead of me so finally some long awaited modelling time.

Cheers,

Ernst.

[tomthounaojam]

8 hours ago, Ernst said:

Thanks for the WIP photo's, I highly appreciate that 👍. I also like your rendition of the Kare Kusa Iro  (vallejo calles it "parched grass") and the way it works with the other colours. Kudos for supporting local paint brands and mixing them yourself, that's a great teacher. With true acrylics there is indeed some variation, I couldn't work with vallejo's midouri green. Even with a 3mm nozzle and needle it refused to be sprayed properly.

Once again, thank you very much, I've got 4 free days ahead of me so finally some long awaited modelling time.

Cheers,

Ernst.

Thanks Mate, learned some Japanese words, not so familiar their naming nomenclature, Honestly when I paint I don't even look at the paint instruction as sometime can get wrong I most of the time spend on google and books and try to eye ball the colors. Yes, the international brand are quite good or rather way better than one am using now but with pandemic one has to use what is available I would say it is OK for figure painting but spraying like you said it is another story and need bit of trial and errors. Wow!!! four days that is lot of modelling time, hope to see some works from you, Cheers Mate