We took a break last week to get ready for the Scale Model Show but this week we're back for another Flames of War Friday and this week it's time to start preparing for another great event, FlamesCon 2013.

Flamescon is Battlefront Miniatures annual wargaming and boardgame convention and this year is being held in Auckland on the 26th & 27th October. For veteran players there's the 2 day Late-War Grand Tournament, as well single day tournaments for the early, mid and late war and Vietnam periods too.

If, like myself, you're just getting started with Flames of War there are also a host of events catering for new players, including an Open Fire Tournament being held on the Saturday. It's also a great opportunity to check out heaps of new and exciting board-games, such as Spartacus, Dust Tactics and the first opportunity to play the soon to be released Firefly Board Game!

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It may be the 13th but thats not unlucky as its still a Flames of War Friday. The Shermans from the Open Fire Starter Set were finished to a table-top standard in an earlier post but this week its time to finish them off by adding some weathering.

There multiple different ways to apply weathering to scale models and gaming miniatures, from stippling paint using a stiff brush to applying pigments and weathering liquids. With an abundance of weathering supplies in our Hobby Jungle I was spoiled for choice. In the end I elected to use some enamel weathering liquids from AK Interactive and a few colours from the Vallejo Pigments range.

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In this week's Flames of War Friday it's time to start painting some German armour: The Stug Gs from the Open Fire Boxed Set.

Now it can be tricky painting German tanks because the camouflage schemes used by the Wehrmacht and SS changed considerably over the course of the war. Also as Flames of War armies are divided into early, mid and late war you also need to think about what colour scheme fits each period.

Now you could sit down and research to find the correct scheme and then the paint colours which match. The easy way is to grab either the German War Colours 1937–1944 or 1945 German War Colours paint sets from AK Interactive. AK have done the hard work for you and made 2 great 6 colour acrylic paint sets which accurately match the historic German camouflage patterns and are suitable for both brush and airbrush application.

As Stug Gs can be fielded in both the mid and late war periods I choose the 1937–1944 paint set and used the reference guide to choose the colours used during the early 1943 to late 1944 period.

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The Germans are back in this weeks Flames of War Friday with part 2 of our German Infantry painting guide.

In last week's blog I set out the colour scheme which we are using and painted the base coats of the infantry models and all the detailed equipment. Now its time to paint the camouflage and add the shading and highlights which make the details stand out.

German Camouflage

Some of the infantry are wearing camouflage smocks or have covered helmets and these need to be painted slightly differently.

During the base colour stage paint the camouflage covers and smocks green grey. Then use German Camo. medium brown and a detail brush to paint small angular patterns.

Finally paint a smaller number of green areas with Luftwaffe Camo green.

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Welcome back to another Flames of War Friday. This week its time to pick the paint brush back up and start painting some German infantry.

The Open Fire Starter Set includes a full Grenadier Kompanie, made up of a Command HQ and two grenadier platoons. It's quite a lot of models and they are packed full of detail so be prepared for them to take a bit longer than the US paratroopers we painted a few weeks ago.

I'm going to be using the following paint scheme using the colors from the Vallejo Model Colour range.

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Welcome back to another issue of Flames of War Fridays . Now that we've been working on the miniatures from the Open Fire starter set for a while its time to start planning how to expand our forces with some additional units.

The Quick Start Guide gives a good starting point for a potential army for both the Allies, British Armoured Squadron, and Germans, Grenadierkompa­nie. Flames of War forces are selected from a company diagram, which are quite straightforward once you get the hang of them. Just remember that Flames of War is divided into 3 periods; Early War, Mid War, and Late War; and that the models in Open fire are for Late War armies.

Each different company diagram has some compulsory units, typically an HQ and 2 combat platoons, which are shown in black boxes. They also include a number of optional platoons, which are shown in grey boxes, and this means that there are multiple different armies which you can field just using the companies in the quick start guide.

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Its been a few weeks in the making but this week in Flames of War Fridays D'Day has arrived and the Allies have landed! Using the methods outlined in previous weeks I've got the US Parachute Infantry Platoon and Shermans from the Open Fire Starter Set ready for the table-top.

First up is the Mighty Ape debut of the Sherman Firefly, pictured to the right. Open Fire includes two of these up-gunned Shermans, which the British & Commonwealth forces used from late 1944 onwards. Armed with 17 pdr guns the Sherman Fireflies are the most powerful tank available to Allied FOW players.

The Parachute Infantry Platoon is packed full of characterful models and breaks down into a HQ Squad with officer, medic and radio operator, three Infantry Squads each including a machine-gun team, and a heavy weapons squad including a mortar and bazooka team.

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Welcome back to another Flames of War Friday.

I've been hard at work this week working my way through the Allied forces from the Open Fire Starter Set and its time to start basing them.

Step One: Glue to Base
Firstly you'll need to make sure that you're gluing the correct figures to the correct bases and in the right combinations; Battlefront have produced a wonderful assembly guide to help us out. Then simply glue each figure to one of the round slots on the base using either a super glue or plastic glue.

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For this week's Flames of War Friday I've been working on the US Parachute Rifle Platoon from the Open Fire Starter Set.

Firstly I made sure I had all the tools and paints which I was going to need. As far as tools go you'll want a good set of clippers and hobby knife to clip the models off the sprue and tidy up the small mold lines. I'd also recommend grabbing some popsicle sticks to glue batches of 4–5 men to. This makes it easier to paint the small infantry models as your fingers won't get in the way.

I also recommend at least 2 different sized brushes, a medium sized brush for doing base coats and a fine detail brush for the smaller detail work, I used the Army Painter Insane Detail Brush.

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The weekend is in sight so that means its time for Flames of War Friday.

This week I've busted out my airbrush and got stuck into painting up the Shermans from the Open Fire set. For painting the Allied forces I'm using the Vallejo Range. The key colours which you'll need are Russian Green, Green Grey, Black, Chocolate Brown, Light Brown, and Gunmetal, which are available in both the Model Colour and Model Air ranges. These colours will also be used a lot when it comes to painting the infantry.

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