I’ve always had a thing for the Russian Airborne’s BMD and its derivatives. Only the Russians would pack so much firepower into such a tiny package and then toss the damn thing (while crewed!) out of an airplane.
As I’d finally made a concerted effort to sit down and learn Blender 2.8 during lockdown earlier in the year, I decided to put my rudimentary skills to use and model some sci-fi “BMD-alikes” for use with my ESU Naval Infantry from Ground Zero Games.
I envision these being paradropped out the back of a “space IL-76” dropship during a planetary invasion, so they have to be small enough to fit in the carrier vehicle (which is on my list to make), but large enough to be believable on the tabletop beside infantry on bases. I decided on a hull 30x60mm in size, which is just a tad shy of the BMD-3 at 1:100 scale.
I ended up modelling a variety of turrets, stowage bins, grenade launchers, cupolas, sights, sensors, gun barrels- you get the idea. The vast majority of my effort was expended trying many different iterations of the same item to get things so they felt just right.
I had to be conscious of the size of each detail and consider how it would print on my Mars. While it would be great to include every single rivet and bolt head, I didn’t really model too many details under ~0.7mm in size. In my opinion, they tend to disappear in the overall piece anyway and you certainly can’t see them at tabletop distance. I think I modelled enough fine details to catch a pin wash and look nice, but not so many as to be wasted effort and make things too busy.
I couldn’t decide on a direction for the commander’s cupola until I noticed a certain French tank whilst scrolling through my reference pics. The AMX-30 has a very distinct cupola, easily identifiable by its overall height and mounted searchlight. For fun I decided to model one along similar lines in open and closed varieties. Given the small connecting areas, I felt some trepidation towards the search light, MG and open hatch but the ones I’ve printed have survived without issue… So far, anyway.
In the end, I decided that my “not BMD” would be in the config shown above, with spaced armour (ERA?) on the turret and AMX-style cupola. But what about the dozens of pieces that I modelled but didn’t use?
They’ll get their chance! I plan to produce a whole series of vehicles based on my not-BMD hull, with “notchback” and “no-notch” (like the BMP) varieties. So far, I’ve got:
“Notchback” Hulls:
- Squad carrier (BTR-D)
- SPG/Mortar (2S9 Nona)
Flat, or “No-Notch” hulls:
- Light tank (Sprut)
- Heavy(ish) artillery SPG and/or MLRS
- Command vehicle
- RADAR & SAM vehicles
- AA vehicle (gun)
- Recovery vehicle