There Be A Dragon Here (a GW LOTR one, but not Smaug)

My eldest son is battling away trying to assemble a huge lump of GW LOTR lead for his Duke of Edinburgh modelling badge. The bid bits were put together with a good quality super-glue and a tiny bit of Blue Tack to help hold it in place as it dries (see below, not as big as Smaug, but still fairly impressive nevertheless):

My son learns the merits and patience required, filing small assemblies on big models is just as important as gluing the big bits on (see below, something to do with the head methinks):

Well he got there; he wanted something big to scare his friends RPG characters (aka PCs) in his Dungeons and Dragons adventurer (see below, assembled and ready for painting - that's what you get when you give levels to characters too quickly - they have got to earn that experience and gold pieces the hard way):

Stepping back to give you a sense of scale (see below, that is one big beast):

What colour? Red naturally!

Fantasy: A Green Dragon (Puff The Magic Dragon?)

The origin of this modelling project was a rather dodgy cheap fantasy ornament picked up in a nick-nack shop - but I saw the "potential" (see below, after an undercoat of Airfix Primer, then a Brown Vallejo Wash, then a colour undercoat of Vallejo Game Colour Dark Green to get to here - though it has to be said I did have a lot of trouble with this particular Valljo Game Colour paint as for some reason it starts to separate out in the bottle into a solid and liquid half more so than any other of the colours I use in the range!):

I added further layers of mixes Vallejo Game Colour Sick Green and Scorpion Green (I think, it was certainly a lighter green almost yellow) followed by a little Moon Yellow, with Off White added for final highlights. The "Glossy" look came from my experimentation with a Yellow Vallejo Yellow Ink glaze (see below, the Green Dragon's front with its lighter underneath is done):

The scaly back was layered but kept to a Sick Green with touch of white highlight. Again I experimented with Vallejo Black Ink and Green Ink Glazes with a modicum of success (see below, a young fat Green Dragon about to fly off in search of food):

Nobody would want to mess with my Puff the Magic Dragon, surely? Please note, adventurers in my D&D Campaign have nothing to fear as this is purely a "painting challenge" with little or no relevance to the Lost Mine of Phalindar, despite the large picture of a Green Dragon on the front of the new 5th Edition D&D Starter Pack!

The SturmTiger

A lovely little model kit from Dragon. It fitted together like a dream, the casement shell is actually metal not plastic, as were a few of its fittings. Beautifully precision made, but not cheap. Dragon will sell you an already painted version in their die-cast series.

Front: A splendid view of the 35cm (Modified KM depth charge) Rocker dispenser. Rate of Fire is not an issue, it was sufficient just one of these things "went off". Heavily armoured to be able to trundle into position and survive to get off its first shot (and probably last one needed). A very direct fire weapon. 

The Side: Notice the reloading hatch in the top of the casement and crane/winch required to manhandle the next round into the SturmTiger.

The Back: The site you probably want to see if you are interested in knocking one of these things out!

When exactly you would use it on the wargame table is another question entirely. It was a post-Stalingrad reaction to urban fighting. I believe units could have fought in Warsaw (1944), but most seemed to have surrendered to advancing US troop in 1945 on the Ruhr. Quite what the US troops made of the beast is another matter.