Wednesday 3 May 2017

Airfix Jungle Outpost

These date back to 1977 and although they were available for many years as far as I can work out they've been out of production for some time.  They are described as 1/76 scale but that's clearly a variable thing with something like this, but they clearly will work well with 20mm 1/72 miniatures and vehicles.  I bought mine off eBay and although I've seen them go for ridiculously large amounts, with patience I was able to pick two up at reasonable prices.  I had considered scratch building (and probably will do for some additional buildings), but these looked good. What really convinced me is seeing the work of Mark Luther and his fantastic looking Chain of Command games in the Pacific, some of which you can see here..  He has a couple of these buildings and they looked so good in his settings that I knew I had to follow suit.  Knowing Airfix and the market these were made for I knew they would be quick to put together, which is how things worked out.  A little bit of filler and sanding but overall an easy job.  I made bases out of MDF and textured the surface with coloured grout, painted and then flocked.

The core kit in progress

Finished, with a coat of grey primer and on its homemade base

Here's both of them ready for paint
Painted huts plus some additional flocking on the groundwork.





9 comments:

  1. That looks pretty nice Mark. All you need is a couple of chickens and a pot bellied pig or two rooting around at ground level and the vignette is complete!

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  2. There is a series of Military vehicles and mag being released on a fortnightly bases at newsagents here in Sydney, I picked up a plastic model of Rommel's Sd.Kfz.250 in 1:72 scale from local newsagent for $4.99,
    thought you maybe interested.

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    1. John, thanks for the heads up on that. I found a newsagent - they are not as common as they used to be, I used to have two close to me but they are both closed down now. Anyhow I've managed to pick up one of these, not a bad little model and with a fresh coat of paint and some extra detail should come up nicely. Not bad for $4.99. I see they have a few other interesting AFVs in the pipeline, although the price will go up to $14.99 by then, which still isn't too bad really.

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    2. No worries, cheers John

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  3. Hi, i remember when that kit came with a vac formed base too.

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  4. Wow... that is amazing mate. Just bought this model and was wondering any tips on how you achieved such amazing results, especially the depth you've achieved. Also as a newbie, despite my age, any websites i should check out.

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    1. Thanks, glad you like them, have you checked out the blog post here for the Sarissa Far East huts, that goes into much more detail about the painting method? Essentially it's about working in layers and slowly building up the colour to give the model some depth.

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  5. My email is theheadcleaner@live.co.uk if you do have time to respond. Thanks in advance, and inspirational work!!

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