The Painting Bunkerc y

Hello everyone!

Its been a while between posts and not a lot of painting since finishing the Reaver a few weeks ago.  However I’m still here, just taking a bit of a (well deserved)breather and planning my next project, but also working on a few other things too.  Like putting together a 4hr painting tutorial for people who want to learn how to paint tanks better….. let me explain..

For the past few years now, the Australian Defence Force Wargaming Association (ADFWGA) holds their annual wargaming Championships in December each year.  This is a Tri-Service wargaming event (Army, Navy & Airforce) for current and ex Defence members to participate in, the games on offer this year are 40k, WHFB, Flames of War, and Malifaux.  Apart from determining who is the best Wargamer in the ADF and spending a weekend talking hobby, smack & general laughs, its also an opportunity for the ADFWGA and members of the community to help raise funds for Legacy.

Legacy is a charity providing services to Australian families suffering financially and socially after the incapacitation or death of a spouse or parent, during or after their defence force service.  It is a charity that is close to the hearts of many service people and their families and does a lot of good both within the Defence community and the general community at large.

To make my (The Painting Bunker’s) contribution to not only the ADF Wargaming community, but to also assist in raising funds for Legacy, I have offered to the organisers of this years event, being held in Townsville, to do a 4hr intensive tank painting tutorial for 10 participants at $40 per head with all funds raised going directly to Legacy.  When the painting tutorial event was announced on the ADFWGA Facebook page, the places were quickly snapped up which was a great relief and testament to the communities willingness to not only improve their painting skills, but raise money for a very worthy cause.

The aim of the tutorial is to provide the participants with the principals they’ll need to paint tanks effectively, some of the topics that I’ll be covering will be Air Brushing, applying camouflage patterns, weathering with oils, weathering with pigments, stencilling & decal application, amongst other things.  Basically what I’m going to be doing is taking the participants through how to turn this…

into this….

Its been an interesting journey organising this as painting for 1 (me) is pretty straight forward, try organising it for 10 people… 10 brushes, 10 sets of tweezers, 10… well, you get the picture.  Luckily for me a few local Brisbane business have helped out in providing me with what I’ll need to do the tutorials.

When I asked Nathan Jurgs, the owner of Battlestation Ipswich (technically not Brisbane :-P) if he could help out, he has very generously supplied all the Citadel paints (over 36)  that we’ll need to paint our project.  I’ve only known Nathan for a few months now, however I’ve been thoroughly impressed firstly with his business, easily the best, and I mean BEST, independently owned games business I’ve ever seen, but also with his passion for gaming and the community as a whole.  When I asked if he could help out he didn’t hesitate and was quick to support the fund raising effort for Legacy.  Go check out his Facebook page too!

The other locally owned business that has been extremely generous and eager to support is Hobbyrama in Stafford, Brisbane.  Hobbyrama is easily the largest, longest running hobby shop in Brisbane and I’ve been shopping their for well over 10 years now.  When I discussed what I was doing for Legacy and ADFWGA, they were very eager to help out, and have provided 5 very high quality gravity feed, dual action air brushes (complete kits) and a mountain of finishing products to assist with the tutorials.  They even ordered in some items from their suppliers express especially so that I could make timings for my trip upto Townsville (a two day drive from where I live).

So this is shaping up to be a great weekend, and I’m keen to not only play (I’m taking the Carcharodons in the 40k event) but also to hopefully pass on some of my skills to others so that we can raise the standard of army presentation in the community.

So, if you’ve made it this far, thanks for taking the time to read this post.  I’d like to finish up and ask you if you could make a small donation to Legacy via the ADFWGA’s donation portal, everyday hero.   It take about 2 minutes, its painless and your contribution will make a difference.  To help put what your donation will do into perspective, have a look at this…

So take a few moments to help out, and if you live in the area then please visit Battlestation & Hobbyrama and show your support to these awesome local business by giving them your custom.

So, thats it for me thanks for stopping in and keep an eye out for the soon to follow posts on all of the fun and good times that will come out of the 2012 ADFWGA Championships.

Comments welcome

John