Paint Table Saturday: Byzantines, tempting figures,models from the past and an art blog

So, it is another Royal Wedding today and, luckily, the Old Bat will be glued to the TV all day, enabling me to get a decent amount of painting done.  The Old Bat doesn't even like the couple; Harry is a 'dim, bush mush' and Markle is an 'American trailer trash golddigger' who is 'making the Royal Family a laughing stock'. It won't stop her watching everything, though! Mainly so she can insult guests fashion choices.

I hope to get on with my Byzantine Infantry, which I have done a bit on this week.  If I can get all the black and leather bits done this weekend I will be pleased.  I have also got the shields started and have got some transfers for them, although I am already getting stressed about how to deal with these.  I have bought some Micro Sol and some Micro Set but even with my glasses I can't read the instructions on the bottles.  The key question is: do I still need to paint them with gloss paint or gloss varnish before I put them on? Also the transfers have no hole for the boss so I have no idea how I am going to deal with that.  Stressful times ahead!  As my particular friend A says.  Isn't this supposed to be a relaxing hobby?

Why come to Israel?

To relax I am enjoying watching the Giro d'Italia at present (although possibly the accompanying regional selection of Italian wines is helping in this) , although they haven't had the best of weather. It was even cloudy in Israel.  Talking of Israel, during Eurosport's coverage we are getting the usual travel advertisements for Tel Aviv Jerusalem; two places I wouldn't dream of visiting, despite the (rather engagingly old fashioned) use of alluring girls in the commercials.  

Follow me!  Oh, alright then

Last year's advert (only people who work in TV call them commercials) had top Israeli model, Shir Elmaliach, filmed in a point of view way, leading a lucky man through carefully selected highlights of the two cities.  Linking them together as a destination is quite clever (the original advertisement won a lot of awards) given that Jerusalem is an interesting historic city and Tel-Aviv appears to be like Basingstoke on sea with added bus bombs.  It was one of those adverts that I actually used to stop fast forwarding through the advert break for, so as to better appreciate Shir's pert posterior in a variety of clingy outfits.

This year, although they have bought back Shir (sadly, largely filmed from the front - it was like when FHM did a pictorial on Jennifr Lopez and only photographed her from the front) they have teamed her with British presenter Sian Welby (no I have never heard of her either - perhaps she is on the Shopping Channel or some such).  The new advert dumps the disembodied man being led through the two cities' delights and just has the two girls taking selfies of each other and people taking selfies annoy me enormously. Instead of intimating at naughty fun in the sun for the male visitor, as in last year's advert, in this one the girls actually look like they would prefer naughty holiday fun with each other.  Using two girls is not necessarily more effective than one! Sian is quite annoying, gurning her way through the film, and is not a patch on Shir, even though the latter looks like she has patently never ridden a bike in her life as she wobbles through the scenery.  Epic fail, as my son would say. It is supposed to evoke an Instagram story, apparently,whatever that is.

It doesn't quite have the Marmite effect of another travel campaign, for Tui (originally Preußische Bergwerks-und Hütten-Aktiengesellschaft), shot in Turkey and featuring gap-toothed British model Bethany Slater.  This advert carpet bombed our screens from last October and started to drive me mad with its stupid dancing crabs and annoying, gets into your head, synthesizer riff. The simpering singer, murdering the Rufus and Chaka Khan hit Ain't nobody, makes you think the girl miming in the advert is an insipid simpering girl herself; probably called Alison who probably lives in an unfashionable part of North London somewhere and works in HR.  Sorry if you know someone called Alison but I once had a simpering, insipid girlfriend called Alison (very briefly) who lived in Belsize Park.  She didn't work in HR but was a nurse which should have been more exciting than it was.

The advert has Bethany as a rather tragic singleton whose life is transformed by flying to a Tui resort in Turkey on a Tui airliner (they probably have their own Tui tank division as well,  so at least they might be able to get you out of Turkey if there is another attempted coup), having her face painted green and dancing badly, to the extent that in the follow up advert she appears to have sex in the pool with some random man (hopefully she uses a Tui condom).  Well, that's the way it looks to me.  You too can have naughty fun on a cheap package holiday, although not as much fun as promised by Shir in Israel (I would imagine). One of my friends loves gap-toothed Bethany and watches it every time it comes on, although latterly Tui seem to be using other more normal looking people in their adverts now, disappointingly for my friend.  Maybe the concept of Bethany being a tragic singleton is just too unrealistic, given her leggy charms.

Plastic Victrix Vikings sketches

Anyway, these aren't the figures I was meant to be discussing. As is well known, I can'r resist a shiny new range of figures, so if I see thone I tend to make myself go away and calm down for a bit before ordering them.  Kickstarters are particularly bad, as I get carried away by them and end up buying stuff I don't want (like Mars Attacks).  One I saw recently was by eBor miniatures (who I get muddled up with eBob) for Seven Years War plastic French infantry,  Oh, plastic people with tricornes I thought, excitedly. Shiny!  But when I looked into them, despite the Kickstarter having launched, there is virtually no information about them and just a picture of one figure.  Given they are asking for a rather eye-watering £40,000 and have only raised about £2000 I think this one I can give a miss.  Maybe if they had started with British figures.... Likewise the new North Star and Fireforge fantasy ranges, while tempting at first, would seem pointless given the number of Games Workshop Lord of the Rings figures I have got.  If you are going to have elves and dwarves at least have them sculpted by the Perry twins. Much more interesting is the recent announcement by Victrix of plastic Vikings (first), Normans and Saxons.  The first Victrix figures I bought were their Napoleonics and I didn't like them at all but their recent ancients have been wonderful. I will definitely be getting these!

Fraxinus posted about the new Airfix Vintage Classics range, which they are bringing out shortly.  These feature many of the models from my past. Plastic models, that is, not the walking up and down on a catwalk (sorry, runway) ones I used to know when I was younger, when hanging out in Milan during Fashion Week. It was no coincidence that Lloyd's Italian brokers day was organised at the same time as Milan Fashion Week. No coincidence as I organised it, with my Italian colleague.  During one of these was the only time I literally saw grown women eating just lettuce for dinner, when I went to the birthday party of a Brazilian model and my Italian colleague entirely failed to chat up Carla Bruni. Should have aimed slightly lower down the model pecking order. Heh, heh.

The Vintage Classics line will use some of the old box art.  Models will include the Bismark, the first model ship I built (it sadly ended its life in the garden being riddled with .177 pellets from my air rifle) and the Panzer IV, which I must have made a fair number of in the past (did anyone ever make it with the tragic short barrelled cannon?). The Panzer IV was my favourite tank kit and I might just get one to put on my shelf somewhere.  I wonder whether you can get a 1/56 one?  But then it would need some Perry Afrika Korps and that wouldn't go well.  I was looking at the Airfix website recently and was amazed by the almost complete disappearance of their historic ships ranges but now, at least, some of these will return. I did build the Royal Sovereign model in the past and it sat in my mother's lounge for decades as I, amazingly, actually completed, painted and rigged it.

Under the sea

When I thought my eyesight had deteriorated too much to paint wargames figures I did think about going back to making model ships again but the question for me is where do ship modellers keep their finished models?  You can't really hang them from the ceiling like aircraft.  That said, I recall reading an AE Van Vogt short story, once, where an alien creature sat in a space craft under the sea but could not sense water, so passing ships appeared to be floating in the air above.  Could you hang your ship models at exactly the same height so that they appeared to be floating in invisible water? Like the Grand Hyatt hotel in Dubai where I used to stay, sometimes.  It would be worse than trying to get pictures to hang  at the same height, though.

That said, I did dig my model of the RMS Mauretania out of the loft after visiting the ocean liners exhibition at the V&A,  Maybe I'll take it to Cowes this year.   I never made the HMS Belfast , either. and always wanted to, although back when I made model warships you didn't have to worry about the dazzle paint scheme!  That would be a nightmare!  Usually the biggest stress with ship models is getting the waterline stripe right. At least there would be more room on my workbench, now, for a ship under construction.  These old Airfix models are very crude compared with modern ones but that is part of their charm, really, as no doubt Airfix hope.   They are promising more than the initial release of 25 models (depending on how they sell, I suppose) but some are lost forever, the original moulds having being destroyed in the Second Iraq war (they had been sold by Heller to an Iraqi firm), supposedly).

Odalisque (1873)

Given it is the Giro I should have wallpaper by an Italian artist, so here is a Turkish-style odalisque (the lowest grade of girl in the harem) by Francesco Paolo Michetti (1851-1929). The orientalist subject matter is unusual for the artist who specialised in outdoor scenes.  Michetti originated in the Abruzzo region of Italy and after studying at the Academia in Naples moved to Paris to continue his studies, exhibiting at the 1872 Paris Salon.  In 1883 he bought an old convent building, back in Abruzzo, as his studio and home and took much of his inspiration from the local people and landscape.  He also exhibited in Milan, Naples, Berlin and at the first Venice Bienalle.  For the last twenty years of his life he lived as a virtual recluse and stopped exhibiting.

Given I haven't started a new blog for ages I have decided to do one which just features art from my Paint Table Saturday wallpaper, Art Friday on my Facebook Page, as well as a number of my other blogs.  Initially I have collected (and in some cases expanded) the pieces I have posted before.   You can find it here.  Expect lots of naked ladies and the occasional military, maritime and Baltic landscape painting.

Italian music too, with Giuseppe Sinopoli's tremendous Nabucco.  It's not my favourite Verdi Opera, that is Aida, but the first act charges along at a tremendous pace and is full of fantastic melodies.   I bought my copy in the legendary Farringdon Records in Cheapside, from the legendary Tony.  I got it when it came out in 1983, having bought the DG Aida the year before.  It is excellent music to cook Spaghetti Bolognese to!

Victrix War Elephant Part 1

I have decided to have a Christmas painting project, so ordered the Victrix war elephant for my Carthaginian army.  It arrived today and I have started constructing it.  You can see how far I got on my long neglected Punic Wars blog here.

Renedra Ramshackle Barn

One thing I don't spend enough time on is scenery and in skirmish wargaming, in particular, large amounts of scenery are often a necessity.  I've got some trees, hills and now even a small river (which still needs some work) but very little in the way of buildings.  I have quite a few resin ones from Grand Manner but very few are painted.  

So when I saw this new Renedra plastic kit of a ramshackle (from the Middle English word to pillage, ransaken and hence ransack) I thought it might be a useful item for a number of periods from ACW onwards.  Immediately I thought it could form part of my vague ideas for a board for In Her Majesty's Name.  Normally I would bring it home and forget about it but my lack of good condition paintbrushes (since remedied) meant I couldn't paint any figures properly so I set to work on constructing the barn instead.

It went together quite well without it being completely easy.  The nature of the roof meant that achieving a snug fit was impossible and the small outhouse was tricky to get straight but I soon had a reasonable approximation of the one on the cover.  I decided to mount it on a base as it didn't feel that robust without one 

"Are you my mummy?"

A quick undercoat of black paint and then four or five shades of dry-brushed Humbrol number 98 brown saw it looking suitable scruffy.  I know it looks grey but however I photograph it the colours won't come out properly.

Anyway, I enjoyed painting it so much I am going to work on a building for my Darkest Africa campaign next.

Resisting Temptation 3

Well, I was contemplating four days of painting when I ran out of white paint on Thursday.  Never mind, I'm sure I would have some spare tins in my paint pile, built up from the time it looked like Humbrol were going bust and I bought ten pots of each of my favourite colours.  (Does anyone else choose their lottery numbers by the numbers of their favourite Humbrol paints?  Probably not.) But no!  None at all!  Disaster!  So off I go to Addlestone Model Centre; the nearest place I can get Humbrol paints.  Now I have been going to Addlestone Model Shop (as it used to be called) for years.  In fact, I have been going there so long that I not only remember the previous building it was in but the one before that.  I probably first went there in about 1970.

I get the impression that it mainly specialises in radio control planes and cars but they have Scalextric and Hornby, Games Workshop and lots of plastic kits including a very good selection of 20mm figures and vehicles including some of the more obscure ones.  They really do manage to pack a lot into quite a small shop.  Now I buy a lot of paints and other model supplies in there but occasionally (well, quite often) I go in there to buy a tube of model filler and end up with a 1/48th Hawker Hurricane, or some such.  I have stopped this on the whole, partly because I can no longer remember which models I have bought.  However, yesterday they had the newly reissued Airfix Dambusters Lancaster in there and I was wavering.  I have never built a Lancaster and I was very impressed when one of my fellow lawyers at college built one in the law library once (he was slightly eccentric).  It just looked so chunky!  My daughter Charlotte has actually been in the cockpit of the one from the Battle of Britain Memorial flight and so she was encouraging me like mad.  But then she is always encouraging me to buy model kits which she wants me to build for her room but I never do as I always feel I should be using hobby time to paint figures.  Still, I thought, I did have four days over Easter.  No, I resisted.  Then I saw the Tamiya 1/48th one.  "It's only £99!" says Charlotte, in little red Devil mode.  "Yes but it's two feet across!  Where will I put it?  Mummy will have a wicket!"  I resist.  Again.

Then I go around the corner and they have a model kit that is so big it won't even go on the shelves.  Forget your 1/350 Tamiya USS Enterprise, that is only 105cm long. This is Trumpeter's 1/200 Bismarck which measures in at 126cm.  That's over four feet!  And it's the Bismarck!  The first model ship I built!  "Daddy it's only £79 more than the Lancaster and you get a lot more kit for your money!" says the little Devil.  No, I am not going to buy it.  It's 1700 pieces for a start.  You would need the sort of focus that is just not my strong point.   I escape unscathed and vow not to buy another model kit until I finish my 1/48 Spitfire Mk1.  

I did buy the Airfix Model World Scale Modelling supplement though, as my model making skills are still stuck in the seventies and it really does have some useful tips in it.  I might have a look at my Spitfire again tomorrow, now I have actually located it under the pile of junk that was in the corner of my room.  I have to say that the standard of finish top plastic model kit makers achieve now is just staggeringly awesome.  I'm an OK figure painter (I would give myself 5/10 - 6/10 on a good day) but the level at which these model makers are working is just way beyond my wildest dreams; I'd be about 2/10 on that scale.  Oh, well.  I just want to have a couple of model planes hanging from my ceiling!

Today I've had my best day's painting today for months, if not years.  The family were out and I started at nine and finished at about five thirty.  It was helped a lot by the good light today.  I got on really well with my latest Darkest Africa unit (it will be finished tomorrow!), I did a bit more on some of the Foundry Argonauts and I have based and undercoated some Romans.  Speaking of which, I bought some Aventine Romans for the Marcomannic War and while looking at the selection of shield transfers by Little Big Men Studios I noticed that they had a shield for Legio II Augusta.  Grr!  If only they did those for the Warlord plastics I might overcome my distaste for their dwarfiness and actually build some units to take on my Ancient Britains.  I wanted Leg II as that was the unit commanded by Vespasian as featured in the early  (and best - I never felt the books were as good after they left Britain) Simon Scarrow novels.  On the off chance, I dropped an email to Steve at LBMS.  Would the Aventine transfers work on the Warlord shields?  He came straight back and said that they would be far too big but would I like him to re-scale them to fit?  A brief e-mail exchange followed and less than 24 hour later I had eight packs of EIR Legio II August transfers for my Warlord plastics - the only ones in the world!  Well, probably not by now as no doubt he will put them up for sale shortly.  This really was exceptional service from someone who has transformed the look of wargames figures more than anyone else.  Except now I am starting to build two Roman armies at the same time!

Anyway, tomorrow, as Scarlett O'Hara said, is another day and hopefully a day with as much painting in it!.

Ship models

I am an inveterate purchaser of plastic model kits.  This is partly because I used to build models when I was small, before I had any soldiers, and partly because it is easier to find model kits for sale on the high street than soldiers when you need an "impulse" buy. However, I never finish them (even though I quite often start them) because I always feel guilty when working on them that I should be painting soldiers instead. 

Planes hanging from Guy's ceiling

I have, therefore, decided to dispose of some of my previous impulse buys on eBay because I am running (well, actually have run) out of space in my study and the loft.  Model kits take up a lot of space so  many of them have to go.  As I mentioned in a previous post, from 1984 until about 1994 my hobby activity was entirely focussed on building Hasegawa 1/72^nd models of US Navy aircraft.  Some of these are now hanging from my son’s ceiling and this is the reason I still occasionally buy an aircraft kit: the ceiling hanging method is a good way to display them when you are short of space.

So, I regularly buy Airfix Model World (the most porno of hobby magazines) which doesn’t exactly discourage me from adding to the unbuilt pile in the loft (like a lead pile but taking up much more space).  From memory the worst offenders as regards space are the four Airfix 1/24^th planes, a Tamiya 1/32 F14, and Airfix Saturn V, Vostok and Space Shuttle kits (bought for my daughter who is, in every way, a space cadet).  There are all sorts of US Navy aircraft and1/72 WW2 planes, mainly bought for my son and his D-Day games. The worst offenders, from the point of space and numbers, however, are ship models. 

I love model ships of every type and from memory in the loft I have HMS Victory, Vasa, Hood, Repulse, King George V, Emden, German frigates, Cousteau’s Calypso, Mauretania, Titanic, RMS Queen Mary, Jeremiah O’Brien and no doubt many others I have forgotten.  For some reason I find ship kits more satisfactory than aircraft but the problem with them is, of course, that they are very difficult to display when you have no shelf space left in the house.  Hanging them from the ceiling would look bizarre, although I am reminded of an AE van Vogt story I read years ago where a creature at the bottom of the sea thought that passing ships were aircraft as it couldn’t sense the existence of water; the ships just seemed to hang in space above him.

I bought this model of the Liberty ship Jeremiah O'Brien because I went on board the original in San Francisco a few years ago (below)

HMS Repulse will definitely be going on eBay shortly although we are loathe to part with any of the others!  I should not, therefore, be contemplating buying any more model ship kits.  However there are two calling to me at present, both as a result of advertisements in Airfix Model World.

First, is the new Airfix 1/400 Titanic, a re-tooling of the old Academy kit which was the only one approved by the RMS Titanic Association.  At £49.99 it's a lot cheaper than the old Academy kit too.  I have been interested in the Titanic for years since meeting a lady, Eva Hart, who had been on it, as a little girl, when it sank.  This was when I worked at Lloyd’s of London, who used to display in their exhibition the original loss book open at the Titanic entry page.  All shipping losses were entered in this book in a quill pen (they still are), which was kept on the floor of the underwriting room. I remember, when I looked at the book, being amazed at how many large ships (more than a 1,000 tons to make the book, I think) sank around the world –around fifteen a month in the early nineties - although I believe the number is much less these days.  It’s still more than one a week, though. 

The loss book in the underwriting room at Lloyd's

The current media frenzy about Titanic is understandable given the centenary this month but a part of me feels that all these recent Titanic fans only appeared after James Cameron’s film came out so I slightly, and illogically, resent them as not being proper aficionados. It's like when everyone discovers music which you felt only a small number of people knew about (Diana Krall springs to mind).  I had a girlfriend once whose older sister remembers seeing a new but interesting group playing support at a Helen Shapiro concert.  When everyone became a Beatles fan she lost interest in them.

The other model kit I am interested in is also a large scale one (inconveniently) and has been appearing in adverts in the inside cover of Airfix Model world for some months now.  This is the USS Olympia, a cruiser launched in 1892 and the flagship of Commodore George Dewey at the battle of Manila Bay against the Spanish in 1898 after which, arguably, the United States was taken seriously as a world power for the first time.

This is another ship I have been on board as it is currently moored in Philadelphia, although it is in dire need of restoration, particularly below the waterline.  They are currently trying to get different bodies to contribute towards the extensive restoration it needs.

The United States in Philadelphia - a ship which I saw at full steam back in the sixties

Sadly, they don't seem to be too good at preserving their ships in Philadelphia; the liner the United States is rotting away just a couple of miles from the Olympia.  Let's hope the money can be raised to pay for the repairs the Olympia needs.

Inside, it is a real transitional ship with lots of splendid wood paneling and brass inside its steel hull.  It was also the ship that carried the body of the US unknown soldier back from France to Americas after the First World War.

The bow of the WW2 submarine Becuna and the USS Olympia with the battleship New Jersey on the other side of the Delaware River.

So several large distractions on the horizon if I am not careful.  Going to see the new 3D version of Titanic next week may be a bad idea, therefore!

Planes, Swedes, Portuguese, Africans and Mercedes Benz

More for Darkest Africa

Well it's been rather a lot of weeks since I posted on this blog although, to be fair, I have managed a few posts on my Darkest Africa blog.  Amazingly, I have managed to keep to one army for two months now, which must be the first time I have been so focussed since my Cynoscephalae force back in 2007.  I am now working on the last combat unit for my British colonial force; levy askaris (although I still need to do the baggage unit).  Rather than move on to the first Arab unit I may take a brief break to finish half a dozen Mexicans which are very nearly finished and have been lurking on the workbench for far too long. 

Mexicans under way

 

Since my last post, I succumbed to a box of the Warlord Games Swedish infantry although, having opened the box, I rather wish I hadn't: that is a lot of bits!  Never mind it looks like I will have to go back to Stockholm in May so that means another chance to look around the army museum (not to mention dinners with my particular friend Anna, as she tries to, yet again, persuade me that herring is food fit for human consumption as opposed to consumption by seals; which is all it is really good for).

John Jenkins tempting Portuguese

 

Talking of distracting figures, I was very taken with the new John Jenkins Portuguese conquistadors.  I bought a box load of the Foundry conquistadors a few years ago but just couldn't work up any enthusiasm for Incas or Aztecs despite doing a prize winning project on them at school (the only time I ever won a prize for anything but art).  However, I am more enthused by the thought of skirmishes with Brazilian indians and, indeed, West Africans, for which the Portuguese would be ideal.   Maybe if anyone stocks them at Salute, which is bearing down on us like the irresistible juggernaut it is, I will pick some up.

My only painted Foundry Conquistador

It was my little boy's birthday yesterday (actually he isn't little any more; he is fourteen and suddenly 5'7" tall) and having totally failed to procure the requested Blackberry (out of stock everywhere, it seems) I decided he needed something to open on the day so took myself over to Modelzone in Kingston yesterday afternoon.  That was, of course, a mistake. 

Mercedes Benz World

 

I got him two Scalextric cars including a McLaren Mercedes; one of his favourites, although Scalextric are promising a Bugatti Veyron later in the year.  I actually saw a Bugatti  on the road, in Guildford last year.  So far my sightings of these had been limited to two at Top Gear Live and one outside the Beverly Hilton.  McLaren Mercedes are far more common around here!  Now, I always always had this view, from many trips to Eastern Europe, that Mercedes are really only suitable for use as taxis in places like Bratislava.  However, I live fifteen minutes drive from something called Mercedes Benz World, which now takes up much of the old Brooklands motor circuit and Hawker airfield site. 

Inside MBW

Guy loves this place but I hadn't been there until recently when he spent some of his Christmas money on an off road driving experience there.  It is a huge place, with floors of shiny new Mercedes which you can climb all over and, more interestingly, some old cars too.  It has a shop, a cafe, a restaurant, several driving tracks and a disturbing number of very pretty girls in black Mercedes jumpsuits.  It is free to enter and is quite the most impressive example of brand loyalty-building marketing I have ever seen. 

Guy's favourite car

My favourite car

Of course, siting it in the Weybridge/Cobham/Oxshott "capital of bling" triangle doesn't hurt, where a Mercedes is what you buy your au pair girl to run around in.  There was an advert from one of the parents in Guy's school's parents association newsletter last February advertising a six month old Mercedes convertible.  "Would make an ideal Valentines gift" it said.  Quite.  Personally, I got my wife a heart shaped cucumber this year and she was lucky to get that.

Guy at the wheel

After a Mercedes lovely whisked Guy off to join his instructor and we had trekked out in the rain to the off-road circuit my wife informed me that she hadn't bothered to buy the optional £15 insurance for the session.  So I had a tense hour whilst Guy drove £58,000 worth of Mercedes around the course with me knowing that if he bashed it I'd have to pay the £1,500 excess.  Fortunately he didn't.

The ultimate car kit

I think the exhibit I liked best was the exploded Formula 1 car reduced to 2,500 components and hung on wires by a Dutch artist. Perhaps even more impressive, however, was the finish on the cappucino in the cafe; now that is branding!

Good grief!

 

Anyway, back to Modelzone.  As usual I ended up buying something I didn't need; in this case the new Airfix 1/48th DeHavilland Sea Vixen.  I'd been thinking about it since the big article about building it in Airfix Model World magazine a couple of months back.  Added to this, we saw one doing aerobatics over our house in Cowes a couple of years ago. 

Sea Vixen over Cowes

Airfix Model World really is a deadly little magazine.  Beautifully put together and full of unbelievably gorgeous painted models, there is usually something in it that makes me want to go and buy something or, perhaps, dig something out of the loft.  This month's issue has an article on the Airfix Vostok kit and I know I have one of those in the loft somewhere.  I also bought a model F-86 Sabre just on the basis of the picture on the cover of the magazine (and the kit).  Not since the days of Roy Cross have I been so easily influenced!

Now, I really don't need any more model aircraft (or ships or 1/35th tanks).  I never build them (or rather I never complete them) and the group model build I tried to do last year for the Britmodel site was an utter failure as well.  Except now I have decided to finish my Westland Whirlwind from that aborted project as a change of pace from painting Darkest Africa figures.  In particular I can contemplate doing a little in the evenings when the light is too bad for figure painting.  I also have a 1/48th Mark 1 Spitfire under way and I'm reading a book about the Hawker Hurricane which has a strong local association.

It's nice to go trav'lin...on a Lockheed Constellation

 

I have also been contemplating a Lockheed Super Constellation, largely, it has to be said, because I have recently been listening to Frank Sinatra's 1957 album, Come Fly with Me which features Constellations on the cover.  The problem is that I really want a TWA one but the current Airfix (which is the old Heller 1/72nd model) one only has Qantas and Aer Lingus markings.  I just managed to get an old Heller one on eBay with TWA markings! However, it is a bit of a problem kit to build, it seems.   I recently watched the film The Aviator which had a scene where Howard Hughes (a surprisingly good Leonardo DiCaprio) inspects his fleet of grounded Constellations following a crash.  Except I am enough of a nerd to have noticed that they were Super Constellations (as on the Sinatra cover) rather than the original Constellations they would have been at the time (it's all about the windows).

Increasingly, however my view on model kits is rather akin to that on figures.  I am tending to the view that 1/48th is the one true scale just as 28mm is for figures.  I find both 1/72nd and 15mm too small these days.  I also find it hard to get a convincing paint job on a 1/72nd kit.  I may have to bite the bullet and invest in an airbrush although the thought of all that cleaning isn't very exciting.  That said, I was also looking at the old Airfix B25 Mitchell in Modelzone but 1/72 for bombers seems more reasonable.  Although, apparently, there was a 1/48th kit of the B-25 revealed at the recent Nuremburg toy fair!  Maybe I need to actually finish a model first before I get any more.  No doubt all aircraft modellers have the equivalent of the lead pile. 

Talking of big boxes of Airfix, and prompted by a recent visit to the Imperial War Museum, Guy spent some of his birthday money on the World War 1 battle set.  This has trenches, figures and a couple of Mark 1 tanks.  The bizarre thing about it is, of course, is that it is totally historically inaccurate, as the figures are 1914 period whereas the tanks are from 1916.  It's rather like the old assault set they did with the Patton and Centurion tank attacking the German strongpoint.

Most of my time, lately, has been spent trying to sort out my book shelves.  There is no way I can display all my books, given the limited shelf space I have, so I have been going through them and packing some of them into crates to go up in the loft.  So it's goodbye all those "making of..." film books, American car books and many of my art books for a while, for example. 

Some of my early nineties planes in Guy's room

I certainly have no shelf space to display models so I may have to go for the Modelzone method and hang them from the ceiling!  I feel that I am now old enough that I don't care about this anymore!  I made quite a few model aircraft in the early nineties before I started painting soldiers again and now many of these are hanging up on Guy's ceiling.  For some reason I decided to only do US Navy carrier based planes.  I still have a half dozen or so unbuilt USN kits in the loft and an unfinished 1/32 F-14.  At least if you build them for flying mode you don't have to worry about the undercarriage!

Oh well, it's off to see the Iraqi finance minister now and then this weekend I start a two week trip to Asia so that will put paid to any painting or, indeed, Airfix kit building!