Slowly creeping forward...

Hello guys,

In past few weeks, I came to a conclusion that sculpting my own Slovenian soldiers would take too long - assuming I could even keep the motivation going for so long! This doesn't mean I wouldn't want to have some miniatures representing them, however. I've looked through my options and decided to convert Empress US infantry to represent Slovenes. Converting instead of sculpting should let me build a sizeable force much faster once I get the guns duplicated and as I only have to swap the weapons, they will hopefully still look superb once painted. I'm a bit reluctant to think I'd have to cut those lovely miniatures, but I hope the end result will be worth it.

Miniatures would need weapons swapped (obviously), and vests are all wrong, but helmet's shape seems fitting. I plan to add some more straps to the helmets (to stuck foliage in), fill the tiny holes in the helmet covers and perhaps add a pouch or two to the vests - but other wise keep them as they are. I am trying to find the right balance between the right looking equipment and keeping my sanity.

Below are some random pics I snatch from the internet to give you an idea of what I'm after.

Patrol in Afghanistan (our troops are all over the world, but in low numbers). They got custom vests (government issued are not particularly admired :P) and wear old pattern desert camo. Mind the translator!

The one below is from training with 8x8 Svarun (Patria AMV, huge problems with those because of high-ranking officials corruption):

And some other random photos of the old camo:

 There's alos one with new camo. It's a variant of multicam, Slocam. This is the first photo I've seen so far that is actually using the helmet cover in the same pattern.

 And below are the Empress miniatures I got so far. I actually haven't yet bought a normal fire team as I'd like to buy them in a bundle, but not before I have those ready. From left to right are two British helicopter pilots (to become Slovene pilots or even an APC crewmen); EOD disposal team. I don't really need the suit, but it's by far my favorite miniature. So cool.  I'll probably do some filing on his helmet to make it more similar to what we're using, but might as well keep it as it is. And then there's support team with a sniper, AT4 and M240 machine gun. The idea is to use 4 guys with rifles and make a fire team of them. I'll keep M240 as it is, but I had some ideas of cutting off the barrel and swapping it for a normal one. We use FN MAG which is essentially the same MG, but without protection sleeve above the barrel. I will not be using this sniper, as I plan to buy a pack with another one, but I could use a fireteam - can never have too many of those.

 Below is a close up on M240. So what bothers me is that perforated metal sheet thingie above the first half of the barrel. I am not sure it bothers me enough to make it worth ruining the machine gun, though.

 Light anti tank weapon we're using is RGW90. Below is my sculpt compared to AT4. It needs some redoing, as they should be the same size. I think their AT4 is tad too short, but mine is still too long. I'll probably shorten it a bit and then attach it to one some of the soldiers.

 Below is a bad photo of my sniper. I think I am making it too large now, so I have to rethink it a bit. It certainly needs to be polished, I'm not at all happy with the magazine.

 Lastly, a comparison between Empress US soldier and my sculpts, based on EBob armature (with EBob Chinese head blutacked). After I've decided to use Empress miniatures for basis of my conversions, I had 4 half done bodies left over. I will be using them for something, so they don't go to waste.
This one will be a translator. I wanted to make him look chilled out, with arms tucked in his armour, but it didn't quite want to work that way, so I had to adjust a bit. I'll give him an AK eventually. He is a bit bulky, but shouldn't be too bad.

And to show I was really working on thing in the past week, here are Warlord games USMC converted to Evergreen army fire team and two to insurgents' support. I also built WW2 Germans, but those are straight from the box so I didn't take any photos.

Evergreen seems to be an underdeveloped country (Evergreen Fields in my zombie games is a paradise island resort, so shouldn't be poor!). Their soldiers are still using old steel helmets (sort of like India and Pakistan). They were supplied by US, hence the M16s. One guy in  the team is armed with an LMG - Yugoslav M53, based on good old M42. Germans are (were until lately?) still using them, so they have to be good :D. Lastly, inspired by Brummie suggestion, I've decided to give bombardier an M79 grenade launcher. I would prefer something modern, but the idea with using shotgun was really so fantastic I just went with it. As you can see, he is just reloading his weapon for another shot.

To end with today's post, insurgents WIP:

As usual, thanks for looking!

Mathyoo