Close Assault 1944

by "ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
Published 02/27/2017 at 10:35

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STARS: 6

Last May, my family attended a WWII re-enactment titled Close Assault 1944 at Camp Mabry in Austin (I finally got around to editing the photos). Before the re-enactment, the soldiers of both sides described and demonstrated the various small arms used by the two combatants. In the mock battle that followed, members of the 36th Infantry Division of the Texas National Guard carried out a combined arms assault on a German position. Of course, the Americans won. I spent a long time talking to the “German” tank destroyer commander. I asked him if the Germans ever got to win. He smiled wryly and said, no, they never do.

On a whim, I thought I’d fool around with making some of the images B&W. Aside from simply making them gray scale, I also fiddled with blurring, contrast, adding noise. I’m not satisfied with the results. They still look like digital pictures. These will require more work, but it’s a start.

Replies (17)

"fintail" (fintail)
02/27/2017 at 10:45, STARS: 1

I like the lettering on the cloth top of the Jeep - I can think of a few cars in my area that should carry the same warning.

"RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht" (ramblininexile)
02/27/2017 at 10:47, STARS: 0

Is that third picture an original MG34 or a very well-done prop? Also, I had to look up the Jagdpanzer for an ID - I need to learn them better, since I *am* a fan of casemate tanks.

"crowmolly" (crowmolly)
02/27/2017 at 10:53, STARS: 2

Hetzer’s gonna Hetz!

And that G41 is really cool, and kind of rare to see.

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
02/27/2017 at 10:59, STARS: 0

Original, AFAIK. I’m pretty sure it’s the one firing from the German position, and the one they demonstrated.

"RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht" (ramblininexile)
02/27/2017 at 11:00, STARS: 0

I’m glad to hear it’s still in the well-loved (and working!) care of some mad bastard. I wonder if he had to swap recoil springs to cycle firing blanks?

"Snuze: Needs another Swede" (markg)
02/27/2017 at 11:02, STARS: 0

This is really awesome, thanks for sharing! I think your photos look great, even some of the black and white ones, though I think you’re right in that they still look a little too digital. Need to be more grainy, I think. But I love the poses, the expressions. I always thought WWII re-enacting would be awesome to get involved in. Maybe once my life settles down a little bit, it’s something I’ll pursue.

It’s also timely that you post this, I actually had my old WWII era Enfield out at the range last night. It’s an Australian Lithgow and was used as a training rifle at Duntoon Royal Military Academy and she’s a great shooter. I let one of the kids I coach take a crack at it. She’s like 5'0 and maybe 100lbs, and that .303 absolutely rocked her, but she loved it.

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
02/27/2017 at 11:09, STARS: 0

My pleasure. I’m glad you like the shots. I have very little experience with small arms, let alone those of WWII vintage, though I have had the opportunity to examine some. I was always taken by how heavy the Garand is, and how extremely heavy the BAR is. I can’t imagine humping either one of them for long periods of time.

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
02/27/2017 at 11:10, STARS: 0

No idea at all. That question shows a level of knowledge about such things that far outstrips my own.

"EL_ULY" (uly)
02/27/2017 at 11:17, STARS: 1

COOOOOOOL!

"Dave the car guy , still here" (a3dave)
02/27/2017 at 11:17, STARS: 2

Not sure where they ended up but a gunbroker in Philadephia MS once had several rare shotgun prototype conversions of either MG34 ro MG42. He purchased them at a european military gear auction in the early 80s. They could hardly be fired because they climbed so bad and even with double shoulder pads would bruise you. I think IIRC the Jackson MS police ended up buying one for some weird reason. I saw one of 3 back then, but have never seen any pictures of them on the web since. For a military collector it would be cool to find one but they were so brutal to use I’d think it would just be a display piece.

"RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht" (ramblininexile)
02/27/2017 at 11:20, STARS: 0

Any kind of blowback machine gun (which the MG34 is a kind of) requires a certain minimum recoil to cycle the action - a mechanical impetus on the cartridge. Blanks don’t work for that, usually, and you can’t fire a blank with a heavier wad all the time for more kick because the wad could seriously injure someone with enough mass despite not being a bullet. The solution is often to swap the recoil spring for a lighter one. The problem there is that firing real ammo would then possibly damage the mechanism without a swap back.

In the pic, he’s got what appears to be real 7.62 Mauser loaded into it, but it’s very likely a prop ammo belt without even real primers in the cases.

With a gas-operated fully automatic weapon like an M16 or AK47, prop use can get trickier, because even with a recoil spring swap there has to be enough gas pressure to operate. That means often that there has to be a choke block in the barrel and modification to the gas system. With the block in the barrel (which some blowback rigs have for safety anyway), the firing of real ammo would lodge rounds in the barrel and damage it - which isn’t to say that a welded block isn’t damage in the first place...

Prop work is an interesting field.

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
02/27/2017 at 11:24, STARS: 0

Well, I can tell you that they had a rough time getting it to fire during the pre-attack demo. Not sure exactly why, but they had to take it away, then brought it out again at the very end of the demo, when it finally fired.

"RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht" (ramblininexile)
02/27/2017 at 11:35, STARS: 1

A lot of excess friction from not staying oiled, trace rust, blank fouling, and cosmolene? Maybe. Old machine guns don’t tend to be all that tight, but like with any piece of old machinery things *can* get sticky...

"Jobjoris" (Jobjoris)
02/27/2017 at 12:49, STARS: 0

Seems like a great event, even if the Germans always lose.

Aside from simply making them gray scale, I also fiddled with blurring, contrast, adding noise.

Add grain and a bit of sepia!

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
02/27/2017 at 12:55, STARS: 1

I like that. I fiddled with grain, but didn’t like the results. Yours is in the right direction, but maybe just a bit too much grain. I’ve got more experimenting to do. Thanks. A little vignetting might help, too. How did you add the sepia?

"Snuze: Needs another Swede" (markg)
02/27/2017 at 12:56, STARS: 0

I have a collection of WWI-WWII era small arms including a few Enfields, 2 Garands, a 1903, a Mosin, a Mauser, several Swiss K rifles, and several handguns of the era. Without exception they are all massive and all kick like a mule. I have no idea how my grandfather humped a 1903 Springfield through the South Pacific, and every shot is like a Mike Tyson punch to the shoulder.

But it was a very interesting time in small arms development and you can see some drastic changes from the beginning to the end of the war. When the war started everyone was fighting with WWI weapons and cartridges designed to lob volleys between trenches many hundreds of yards apart. But the use of aircraft, tanks, and trucks ushered in a new era of mobile warfare and rendered the weapons obsolete. I think one of the biggest impacts was by the US with the M1 Garand. The sustainable rate of fire by an 8 shot semi-automatic was incredible compared to the 5 shot bolt actions everyone else was using. But we only got it half right, because we were still using the .30-06 cartridge, which was again meant to lob shots up to 1,000 yards away, when most combat was taking place inside 300 yards. But by the end of the war you see the proliferation of submachine guns, especially cheap and easy to manufacture ones like the US M3 “Greasegun” and the German MP4x series. More importantly, though, was the shift to intermediate cartridges like the .30 US Carbine and the 7.92x33 Kurtz. These were optimized for those shorter 300 yard engagements, and their smaller size allowed troops to carry more ammunition per pound of weight carried, and could be used in smaller, lighter rifles. They also had less recoil and were more controllable, paving the way for modern select fire assault rifles that give the average infantryman the firepower of a light machinegun.

"Jobjoris" (Jobjoris)
02/27/2017 at 13:44, STARS: 0

There already was a bit of a vignette, I never use that too much. This one is with a bit less grain, more vignette.

The sepia I just add with my default color-sync tool on my MacBook. The others are from a free tool in Google’s Nik collection.