Odemars/Orion 1:72 Volkssturm Figures 2/2

Here is the rest of my painted Volkssturm figures. I had to finish the last three figures but now I'm a little proud that I painted my first 2 complete sets. Or at least I painted all poses of booth sets. The only thing missing are detailed bases. I was trying how they looked on usual 1 Euro cent coins, but almost the half of them will not fit on it because they are too big.I like most the poses but the armament is some kind of strange. Some figures have a Panzerfaust which is reasonable because it was a cheap weapon which needed not much training to use. But why the heck does the guy with the beard (1st post) carry an Panzerschreck, which was a weapon that needed much more training than the Volkssturm got.
I think that there are too much automatic weapons and the figures personal equipment of them is too good because most Volkssturm units were poorly equipped. More informations about that can be found in the link at the end of this post. Last but not least, here is the comparison between the Volkssturm figures by Orion, Pegasus and Odemars. Compared with the Pegasus figures the figures of Odemars and Orion look like cheap toysoldiers but somehow I like them more than the figures of Pegasus which are very detailed.Basic informations about the Volkssturm can be found in the Wikipedia (German / English) and on the homepage of the "Lexikon der Wehrmacht" homepage following this link.

A Cheap Book About WW2 Armour

Before I will continue the presentation of my painted Volkssturm figures I would like to present an interesting book. I got it last week from ebay and it was cheap, approximately 5 Euros including postage. It contains a lot of pictures (700+) of tanks and some useful informations. Maybe it is not the best book about WW2 tanks, but I think, that the price relationship is good.

A lot of tanks are showed, the main focus is on german tanks, allied and soviet tanks are shown too. The language is German but I think that most of the informations should be able to be translated simply, like for example with babelfish that I also partly use for this blog.


Its a cheap book for beginners, some of the drawings seem like they are based on photos. In my opinion it is a simple but good source for beginners, because it contains many suggestions to painting of models .You can find it at Amazon, sometimes at the German section of ebay and at other book traders.

Jean Restain "Panzer und Kettenfahrzeuge des zweiten Weltkriegs"
ISBN 3828953301

Odemars/Orion 1:72 Volkssturm Figures 1/2

Part one of my Volkssturm Figures made by the russian producers Orion and Odemars. The two lying figures are from the set "No refuge" from B.U.M. and got some weapons and equipment from Preiser.More informations will follow soon with the second part.

Hasegawa 1:72 SDKfz. 7/2 with 37mm Flak 36

This SDKfz. 7/2 with 37mm flak 36 is the fifth kit I finished after I started building models last year. I have a dozen unbuild kits on my desk but I wanted to start with the easier ones. Before that I finished a Panzer II, a Panzer III, a Tiger 2 and a SDkfz. 11 with an 88 Flak.
The kit is built straight from the box, the only things I did were that I drilled the barrel and built some kind of ammo mounting plate. The most figures are Hasgawa, the gunner is some Preiser figure and the figure with the AT mine belongs to ESCI. All was painted with acrylic colors from Citadel, Vallejo and Tamiya.

There a minor things to change. While watching the pictures I mentioned that I forgot to attch the steering wheel and to drybrush the front wheels. Decals and dirt will come in the future, I still have to improve my modelling skills.

Giant 1:72 German Infantry

These figures came with an ebay lot. I had never see figures like them before and had no information about the manufacturer of them. The bases are printed with "Giant" and "Hong Kong". Seems like a first hint.
Their armament consists of German WW2 weapons like MP40, MG34, Panzerschreck and Stielhandgranate. Maybe these guys should be German infantry from world war 2.





I did not know anything about the Giant corporation. Google did. I found this interesting article at the Hät homepage and some other smaller sources which gave me a some information.

This is what I found out: They appear as "World War 2 German infantry" in 10 different poses and were manufactured by the Giant corporation. They are downsized copies of old Marx figures, a picture of it can be found on this homepage. They were made between 1960 and 1970 (found an ebay auction that said 1969) in Hong Kong.




To the conclusion a comparison with figures of other manufacturers:

First row (1:72):
Pegasus Volkssturm, Giant, Esci Paratrooper, Giant, Revell Pioneer, Giant

Second row (1:76):
Matchbox Infantry, Giant, Airfix Afrikakorps, Giant, Matchbox Afrikakorps, Giant, Airfix Infantry