Pics from Colours!

[Leon]

This past weekend saw us head down for the 2nd biggest show in the UK: Colours.  This two-day event is spread over 3 floors at Newbury Racecourse, and manages to pack in a huge number of traders, display games, and competitions.

We'd moved spot this year, onto the back wall just inside the entrance, and after setting up on Friday, we arrived at 8:30am to finish off the stand.  There was a pretty hefty queue outside as the doors opened at 10am, and the place was soon buzzing with hordes of people.  The whole of Saturday was actually really good, solid sales, and lots of people coming and showing an interest in the 10mm goodies.  Sunday is always the quieter of the two days, but despite the Pendraken sales being slow, the Minibits side of things made up for it with business ticking over nicely.

I think this show must have the biggest number of Forum members at it, but not all of them came over and introduced themselves!  We had the pleasure of chatting with Mad Lemmey, SteveJ, Tiny Terrain, Eldamarelf, Kiwidave, Mart678, Paint It Pink, Si Tyler, Sunjester and Last Hussar.  I've probably forgotten someone there though, so apologies in advance!

The downside to our weekend, and something which has seemed to happen in previous years as well, has been thefts from trade stands, and unfortunately Minibits was the victim this year.  Within the first hour on the Saturday, some pilfering scrote had swiped £30 worth of Vallejo paints off the rack.  It's one of the most annoying and frustrating things to happen as a trader, and it put a real downer on my weekend.

Overall though, the weekend was a huge success for us.  The change of location was fantastic, allowing us to spread out more, and the show looked and felt a lot busier than last year.  Our thanks go to the Newbury and Reading Wargames Society for hosting the event, and we're looking forward to seeing you again next year!

So, on to the pics!  There's quite a few here, all with captions taken from the rather handy show guide!  As might be expected with it being 2012, there were a healthy smattering of Naps games, including two Borodino's!


First up is a 10mm Renaissance game, put on by Liverpool Wargames club.  The figures are naturally Pendraken!




















Lincombe Barn Wargames Society - Tusk Strikes Back:







Sheffield Wargamers - Biblical Wars:







Not sure who this was:





Skirmish Wargames - Retreat from Moscow 1812:









Pike & Shot Society - 2nd Battle of Newbury 1644:









Loughton Strike Force - The Grand Redoubt, Borodino, 1812:









Whitstable and Herne Bay Wargamers - Race to the Sea, Belgium, 1914:













Combined Ops Group - The Malta Story, 1942:





The Very British Civil Forum - AVBCW:









Abingdon Wargames Club - Indian Country, Vietnam:







Wednesday Night Warriors - Zombies:











Not sure on this one:





MAD Gamers - Avatar Combat:





South London Warlords - Western Desert:









Ancient & Modern - Agincourt, 1415:







Too Fat Lardies - Authurian Dark Ages (I had to come back to this one, as it was completely packed the first time I came by!):







Bedford Gladiators - Maloyaroslavets, 1812:







Penarth & District Wargames Society - Mexican-American War:











Not sure on this one:





Staines Wargamers - Climb Mount Niitaka:





Weymouth Levellers and Peter Pig - Patrols in the Sudan, 1884:







Planetfall?





Double Six Gamers - Eastern Front 1944 (this one featured the Forum's own Steve J, Tiny Terrain and Kiwidave among others!):







The Old Guard - Borodino, 1812:









And that's it for the pics!  There were a few more games which I didn't have chance to grab pics of, so I'll keep an eye out for other links, blogs, etc online for those.

And finally, two willing (ish) volunteers donned the pickelhaub, one familiar name, the other not so much!







This was also the first UK run-out for Crossover Miniatures, which garnered a lot of attention throughout the two days:



So, that's it for another Colours, we'll definitely be back again next year if they'll have us!  Next up on the show calendar is the Derby show, in it's new venue at the Castle Donington Exhibition Centre, so we'll look forward to seeing some of you there!

[Techno]

Great pics as usual Leon...
Some truly spectacular displays too !
Sorry to hear you suffered from some ******* low life.
Cheers - Phil.

[FierceKitty]

Sudan game looks a bit one-sided!

[Steve J]

Thanks for the pics Leon. This year I was unable to get a good look at the show, so I've been looking forward to your report. It seems there were a nice spread of games, with the AVBCW lots once again putting on an exceptional table. The Belgium 1914 and Borodino in 6mm looked very good as well.

A real shame that you suffered theft again this year. It was something we were chatting about before the game and seems to have become a regular occurrence at this show.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Gah! Knew I shouldn't have put it on!

Hope whoever it was who lifted the paints gets nailed soon, or they will keep doing it, thinking they cannot be caught!

[Nosher]

Superb Pics again Leon

Shame about the lightfingered tosspots

Couple of points of note that surprised me - the Releif of Vienna FoG (R) game with all that un-neccessary 'tut' on the tabel really spoils some magnificent figures and I am gobsmacked that the organisers allow games to be put on with unpainted miniatures...

Too much of that creeping into club nights

[General Bt Sherman]

WOW, a lot of great looking games!

[mart678]

Glad I kept out of camera view as my identity is safe
Martin

[rexhurley]

Leon with the Guard at Borodino do i detect some Pendraken 10's by any chance?

[kustenjaeger]

Greetings

From memory the Borodino game was 6mm not 10mm.

Regards

Edward

[Leon]

Gah! Knew I shouldn't have put it on!

Couple of points of note that surprised me - the Releif of Vienna FoG (R) game with all that un-neccessary 'tut' on the tabel really spoils some magnificent figures and I am gobsmacked that the organisers allow games to be put on with unpainted miniatures...

Yeah, shame about the clutter.  I noticed the unpainted figures as well, they seemed to be launching a new game/company/rules, so I thought they'd have got them all painted up.

Leon with the Guard at Borodino do i detect some Pendraken 10's by any chance?

Nope, all 6mm's, Adler's I think?

[Techno]

Gah! Knew I shouldn't have put it on!

So....Is the second one you as well ?....As a disguise, the 'tache is particularly good.

Glad I kept out of camera view as my identity is safe
Martin

No it's not Martin....  

Cheers - Phil.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Nah! I'm the fat one in number 1! 

[SV52]

Next time hitch a Doberman to the stand, but don't bring him to skelp if you're comin'. 

I would really have liked to see that Mex-American game.  When's Pendraken bringing out their ranges for that one?

[seano1815]

Looks like some really good games going on, sorry to hear some lowlife scumbag spoiled things Leon, I thought our hobby was one walk of life free from this kind of thing.