Customer Reviews

Modelling Panzer Crewmen of the Heer (Osprey Modelling)

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Although weell photographed and documented, I was let down by this volume in the Osprey Modelling series. Maybe if the publisher had named it "Painting Panzer Crewmen of the Heer" I wouldn't be as disappointed. To it's credit, the book does go into very good detail concerning painting Panzer crewmen, but I think that the concept of modeling goes a bit farther than just painting. Very little of this book deals with topics like figure conversions, changing facial expressions, and scratchbuilding figures. A good reference, but I think that Osprey could have done a bit better.

If you like modeling 1/35th or 1/48th scale German armor and have wanted to add figures, this book is for you. The core of the text covers painting WWII panzer crewmen in miniature using enamels and oils and only lightly touches on conversions and scupting.

The basic uniforms covered include:
Panzer Black (The most common uniform worn)
Afrika Korp (also known as Tropical uniform)
Reed Green Denim (introduced in 1942)

The focus of the work is the use of shading and hilighting techniques with enamel paints to create a realistic looking uniform in miniature. The author begins with the Panzer Black uniform which is very easy and a great place to start for a beginner. The author then moves on to Afrika Korp and Reed Green Denim uniforms which are not really much harder.

The book has further sections on painting faces, sculpting figures and weathering uniforms. The face painting section is very good but requires a commitment to the use of artists oils. Using artist oils is a little tricky and more advice there would have been nice. However, face painting with oils, once mastered, will deliver a great result. The section on sculpting is really too brief and was the least useful to me.

Overall this is a grood book for anyone struggling to start adding figures to their German armor models.

There appears to be a recent proliferation of modelling books on niche branches of the German Army from this publisher. I can understand specific modelling manuals for a type of tank, airplane and how-to procedures for modelling the different types and marks. What I can't understand is why is there a need to have niche concepts in modelling the Germanic WWII figure? There is only one mark/type (aryan, SS, waffen) that I am aware of and the various uniform details can be gleaned from numerous books on the subject.
This book covers only slight modifications, if any, of the numerous commercially available 1/35 scale resin and plastic figures with head swaps. Why a manual is required to do these simple modifications escapes me.