Once again, Archer Fine Transfers is out with another awesome product which will be helpful to the diorama builders. This particular sample is the U.S. Victory Posters set. It consists of twenty Victory Posters of the WWII era which include posters like the “I Want You” poster to the “Victory Garden” poster, and even some posters that the younger crowd has probably never seen. Some are serious and some have a mild comedic effect about them. They definitely reflect the mood of the times. These posters can even be used in the interiors of models as pin-ups.

The set is in 1/35 scale and is made with waterproof inks. This becomes very important because the major difference between this product and the usual transfers that need to be burnished is that these posters will have to be cut out and glued on. Mildly diluted white glue is enough to make them stick to almost anything, and after drying a coat of clear paint or varnish should hold them down indefinitely.

This kit from Master Box features an assortment of weapons used by Commonwealth troops during the Second World War. This is a welcome addition to the 1/35th arsenal, since some of these weapons are rarely, if ever, offered in this scale. The box contains one sprue of 40 gray plastic parts wrapped in a really large plastic bag. 15 weapons and 6 helmets are included.

The weapons consist of 2 Enfield Mk. III rifles (1 w/bayonet), 2 Enfield No.4 rifles (1 w/bayonet), and 5 Sten submachine guns of various types. Also, there are one each of an Enfield Mk. 2 revolver, Boys anti-tank rifle, Bren gun, Vickers Mk.1 machine gun, Lewis gun, and PIAT anti-tank weapon.

This is a five-figure set of a World War II Soviet tank crew. The first figure is an officer who is sitting and smoking a cigarette He is wearing a blue jacket and khaki pants, but does not have any headgear. The second figure looks like a commander, since he fits into the commander’s hatch of the Trumpeter KV-85 that I am also reviewing. There are two options for his left arm. One is extended with his hand resting on the turret top, while the second one is crossed in front of him and is resting on the split hatch.

The third figure appears to be a loader or gunner, since he sits perfectly on this open hatch. The box art show him with a pistol and a cross-chest belt, but that is not on the actual figure. The next figure is the driver, who is posed as actively driving the tank with both hands on the control sticks. The fifth figure is a crewman who is holding his helmet and has a foot propped up on something in a casual pose.

One of my 2012 New Year’s resolutions was to build and paint a figure to go with each of my 1/35th scale armor models, thus providing a scale reference with which the casual viewer could judge the actual size of the armor model. So, when IPMS/USA offered up this set of Japanese tank crewmen for review, I jumped at the opportunity to build my first plastic figures. However, I chickened out on actually trying to paint the figures, fearing that my very first painting job would do the figures a disservice. Instead I built the figures straight from the box, primed them in a light gray primer, and then gave them a wash of dark brown oil paint to pick out the details.

MiniArt has released a huge number of diorama and scenic kits, all designed with the scratchbuilder and kitbasher in mind. This kit is a simple unreinforced brick workshop, suitable for almost any era or location in the world that has used this type of construction technique. I have kitbashed this into a two-story custom building and changed the scale of the model closer to 1:48 (a.k.a., O Scale or 28mm for Wargaming).

This kit consists of 140 parts – vacuformed styrene brick and roof components molded in metallic grey, and the usual high quality injection-molded styrene accessory sprues molded in light grey. All vacuformed kits have flash that needs removed.