East German infantry stands, etc.

Well, as promised, my first East German infantry platoon stand is finished:

If anyone tells you the gem about 3mm infantry being the easiest scale to paint, loudly call him a varlet and a knave and soundly thrash him from your presence. As you can see, I make no attempt at details. Mono-color uniform, boots, weapon, helmet, and a dot of flesh for a face. That's it. Yet, they are SO tiny that even my 20/0 detail brushes are too big. Paint slops everywhere and I'm forced to tidy up paint messes with a toothpick!! Mrs. HistoryPhD says swearing is the rule and not the exception when I paint, but that I was in rare form tonight. Thank God I don't need hundreds of these damned things!

I also finished off my Italian AB40 armored cars for North Africa. Two platoons worth:

I think they came out quite well, given that they are the only 3mm Italian armored cars made and not the type I actually need. I'll have to make at least one command stand too.

That finishes off this weekend. More on New Year's Day!!

I'm not happy with my Italian armored cars!

I got a shipment from Picoarmor this week and among the things I received were some Italian AB40 armored cars. 

That's them filed and primed. As you can see, they're actually quite good representations of AB40's. 

However....as my readers will know, I'm trying to represent the Italian Army that invaded Egypt in 1940. AB40's were about the least used of all Italian armored cars, because only 24 were made before the production lines were converted to making AB41's. What I need are models of the two armored cars the Italians did use in fairly large numbers in the desert in 1940, the Fiat 611:

And the Lancia IZM:

However, O8 doesn't make them, so I have no choice but to grit my teeth and use the AB40's. Oddzial Osmy needs to make some other choices in Italian armored cars. Marcin, I hope you read my blog!!!