Whats on the work bench? – Page 7

Work bench update. Mary Rose and Billmen

This weeks blog is just a progress report on this weeks modelling. I am somewhat consumed by my War of the Roses army but progress is slower than expected, partly because the model of the Mary Rose that I am working on has been a pleasurable diversion from ‘grinding out’ more billmen!

Mary Rose – washed with Strong Tone

As you can see from the picture above, I have used similar techniques to paint the ship as I would one of my figures. I gave the hull a couple of light washes with Army painter Strong tone ink. Once this had dried, I gave the ‘deck’ ( it’s actually a representation of the rope grid that was there to prevent boarders – in the event it is thought that this prevented the crew from escaping when the ship capsized.) a dry brush with Vallejo Old wood, lightened with Iraqui Sand. I also gave the rest of the hull a very light dry drush with the same mix. It was then a case of carefully picking the guns out with matt black.

Mary Rose – Decals added

The next stage was to add the decals. Well, what a fiddly job. It took about three hours in a couple of sessions to get these on. I used the Vallejo Decal Medium and Decal fix to help with this job. There was a reason to do this job over a couple of nights – I was very concerned to make sure that one side of the ship had dried thoroughly before handling it. The decals are so small it would have been easy to unseat them whilst they were drying.

Sails – dry brushed

In between fixing the decals, I went to work on the sails. I dry brushed them with a mix of Army Painter Skeleton bone mixed with white, gradually increasing the white until I was happy with the effect. I then gave the sails a wash of Army Painter soft tone ink mixed 50:50 with the Army Painter mixing medium. The mixing medium helps to dilute the colour and helps the ink to flow over the larger surfaces of the sails. Unlike when thinned with water, it doesn’t pull away from the edges.

Sails – Spars painted

I’ve then painted the spars with Vallejo new wood and it was back to the hull. When fixing the decals I realised that parts of the hull should have been painted white. This would have been easier to do before applying the decals but as I said in a previous blog, I had tended to ignore the instructions and just did my own thing! This particularly applied to the paint scheme. I have broadly followed the picture but where it has suited me, I have used ‘artistic interpretation’ to emphasise details or just to get a nice finish.

Mary Rose – hull about finished.

So with the hull and sails about done, the next stages will involve fixing the sails to the hull, painting the stand and adding the rigging. However, I was happy to pause there as the Billmen on my work bench were glowering at me and demanding that I get back to finishing them!

Bill men ready for basing.

As you can see, I’ve nearly completed another unit, with another 12 underway. My army is approaching completion. To celebrate, I bought a Perry Miniatures Artillery piece…

Artillery!

Once the Bill men are complete, I’ll add this to my army and I am nearly done!

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Almost all of the paints, miniatures, bases, basing materials and anything that you are likely to need for your hobby are available POST FREE from my shop here:

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Perry’s WOTR plastic range are here:

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Happy Modelling!

A bit of Flitting does you good!

It doesn’t take much to distract me sometimes. In this case, whilst on an ‘enforced’ shopping trip at Lidl, I spotted that they were selling some Airfix ship kits for just £4.99. A bargain! But could that price be an excuse for me adding another kit to my stash? Well, one of the kits was the Mary Rose and as I am interested in the War of the Roses at the moment, the Mary Rose was close enough to the period to justify my interest – and it would look nice in the display cabinet. So the Mary Rose kit, along with the ‘Victory’ (‘might as well pick it up – it could work with Black Seas… and a tenner for two kits…you cant go wrong.!’) were added to the trolley.

The Mary Rose under construction

Despite the more pressing nature of finishing my WOTR army, I decided to break away and build the Mary Rose kit. I quite enjoyed the change from making Perry’s WOTR bow and bill men and it looks as though Airfix really have upped their game. The kit went together beautifully with the minimum and sanding and no filling. In fact, I became a bit over confident and did the usual bloke thing of straying from the instructions. As a result I missed out a couple of pieces but no matter, nobody will notice…

Mary Rose under coated

Once assembled, I sprayed the main hull with a Leather brown primer and the sails in Skeleton bone.

Mary Rose Sails

I then painted the decking or the deck covering with Vallejo ‘Old Wood’ and then painted the masts with Vallejo New wood. I should point out at this stage, that I had done no research regarding colour scheme, or for that matter, anything else. My only reference was the box art and the painting instructions supplied with the kit. I just fancied building a kit for a change! Incidentally, the kit does include paints, glue and a nice brush, so it’s a lovely little starter kit.

Mary Rose with decking painted.

It was at this point that I realised that I had a play test of ‘Never mind the Bill Hooks’ looming and I needed to finish off a couple of extra Archer units. So the Mary Rose was pushed to one side and it was back to the Archers!

More arrows please!

In fact I have completed two more units, making 4 Archer units for my army now.

Yet another bowman unit ready for battle!

The ‘red faction’ of my retinue!

So with a photo shoot of my army due, I’d better get on with the Billmen units. I will get back to the Mary Rose, it was fun to just to do something a little bit different during the Christmas break that didn’t require too much thought. But, I will finish the Mary Rose before I start another project – honest…..

Bill men on the work bench.

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Almost all of the paints, miniatures, bases, basing materials and anything that you are likely to need for your hobby are available POST FREE from my shop here:

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Perry’s WOTR plastic range are here:

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Happy Modelling!

Good year – Bad Year?

As we approach the end of 2019, it’s a good time to reflect on the year and what has been achieved or not. No doubt, there will be plenty in the ‘official’ reviews of the year to keep us entertained, one way or another. Whilst the big things in life often define the year, it’s worth reflecting on the smaller things. My hobby is a case in point. I look back at the models that I have built and painted, the games that I have played and the places that I have visited and by and large, it’s been a very satisfying year.

Life sometimes throws rocks! My attempt at Iron Gates Scenery Trebuchet.

The headlines are that I have added 258 painted figures to my collection; played at least 40 wargames in 8 or 9 different genres; rediscovered my love of board games; participated in two demo games and attended 8 or so wargames shows; and visited at least 6 historical sites. Add to that, the reading and research that I have done and the great company that I have enjoyed, and it’s fair to say that I have had a good year, thoroughly immersed in my hobby. So whilst there have been some ups and downs in both my personal and business life, my hobby has kept me grounded and given me something to look forward to when may be other things were going tit’s up, so to speak.

I wont bore you with everything that I have painted but here’s a few pictures of my favourite projects.

An Officer observes the launch

One of my favourite Vignettes that I built was the Rocket troop from Warlord Games – the horse holder is a conversion.

One of our Demo games – Combat at Foz D’arouce.

We used the superb table built by Pete Harris in two Demo games. Above is the version played at the Bingham Napoleonic Day, below, the game played at the Warlord Games day.

I used my Portuguese for this battle – including my newly painted Portuguese Artillery

Much of the year has been spent working on my War of the Roses Army and play testing Andy Callan’s rules set, ‘Nevermind the Billhooks’.

Six Mounted men at arms -the rules set the we use has units of 8 cavalry.

Six Mounted men at arms -the rules set that we use has units of 8 cavalry.

I very much enjoyed this project as I felt I didn’t have to be too precise with colour schemes but could use my imagination.

One Unit of FootKnights – I have four in the army!

One unit of Pikemen ( Crossbow men in the background)

The unit of Pikemen ( Crossbow men in the background) that were completed this year.

I still managed to add to My Napoleonic Army and finished the Highlander battalions that were at Waterloo.

The Black watch completes my Highland contingent at Waterloo.

I rediscovered my enjoyment of board games and found that the modern board games such as ‘Ticket to Ride’ and ‘Settlers of Catan’ were just as enjoyable to play as the classics. However, it was a classic that provided a fun evening for my friends, who had never played Space Crusade!

Space Orks – coming to get you!

When it came to gaming, Black Powder remained a firm favourite although as a pleasant change from Napoleonics, our gaming group has been working through the American Civil war, courtesy of Andy’s ACW army.

Pour it on Boys!

Perhaps the one time when I did over indulge in wargaming was a whole weekend playing back to back games. A fantastic weekend in a superb setting with great company, the highlight being a massive Zulu game!

All is lost! The Zulus have broken through!

As the year closes, I am busily painting away in what ever spare time that I have. My focus is on finishing my War Of The Roses Army but as ever there is plenty to distract me. Whilst I don’t think that I will ever finish my Napoleonics, I will keep adding units as the whim takes me.

The next unit of archers on the workbench

So to close for now, I would like to hope that anyone else in this funny little hobby has as much enjoyment as I do. I wish you all a happy and productive New Year!

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Should you wish to see more details of the projects above, just click into my blog using the link at the top of the page or just explore a section using the category headers down the side bar. You can also follow my activities in the hobby by ‘liking’ the Arcane Scenery facebook page. As well as updates on my various projects, you will find information and news of new releases and products as well as our ‘On this day in History’ feature.

If you need help in completing a project of your own we have a massive range of stock in the Arcane Scenery shop. Almost all of the paints, miniatures, bases, basing materials and anything that you are likely to need for your hobby are currently available POST FREE from my shop here:

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Happy Modelling!

Nevermind the Billhooks!

Pikemen in the process of being based

Last week I said that I would detail how I painted the unit of Pikemen for my army – However, things have moved on! I have been somewhat diverted from my usual painting by the exciting news that Andy Callan’s rules set for the War of the Roses, ‘Nevermind the Billhooks’ is due to be published in the New Year. I’m afraid that I cant reveal further details at this point. I have been asked to produce a simple step by step guide to painting some figures to help to illustrate the Rules set and so this project has taken over the work bench.

English Archers Ready!

I’m by no means a ‘pro painter’ – my focus tends to be on painting units that I will use on the wargames table. The idea isn’t so much as to show people how to paint to a competition standard, just to give some ideas as to how easy it is to muster a retinue to play the game with some reasonably painted figures.

Billmen underway

This has meant that I have had to give a bit more thought and planning my normal painting routine to show the step by step process. The result is to have partly painted figures to do this, so that they can be photographed for the article. As you can see, I decided to show three different figures and how to produce a basic paint job on each to get them ‘table ready’. This meant building four of each figure in near as possible identical poses and working out a step by step painting plan.

Armoured Billmen

I won’t describe that process here – you will have to wait for the article! However, once these figures are photographed – assuming that they are accepted – I can then move on and complete the final units for my War of The Roses Army. Just to finish, Here is a couple pictures of the Army so far, as usual taken on my i-phone. One day, I must take some nice photos with a proper camera!

Harry Hotspurs Army!

Another view of the Retinue

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Almost all of the paints, miniatures, bases, basing materials and anything that you are likely to need for your hobby are available POST FREE from my shop here:

ARCANE SCENERY

Perry’s WOTR plastic range are here:

PERRY MINIATURES

Happy Modelling!

Pikemen and the Caribbean.

The mixed up title of the blog gives some indication of where my focus is….focus being rather inappropriate for my mind set! That said, quite a good weeks painting for me! I actually finished the unit of Pikemen that were on the work bench and also completed four figures for my Caribbean collection. Believe it or not, there is a tenuous connection between these two projects. First of all a look at the Caribbean figures. They are a relatively new pack issued by Trent Miniatures ‘Revolting Slaves arms blanche CAR04’.

CAR04 painting in progress

To paint them. once the figures were cleaned up, I primed them with army painter Leather Brown spray and started my usual block paint and quick shade method. The flesh was Vallejo Chocolate Brown and the clothing a mixture of Whites, Light browns and greys. One figure, who looks a bit like he could be a leader was given a blue coat.

Car04 block painted

I based (copied…) the colour scheme on the figures used on the web store picture. These figures were painted by the talented Dave Woodward. I very much admire his style of painting and his choice of colours and it was seeing these painted figures in the ‘flesh’ that made me grab a pack!

Car04 painted and ready for basing

Once I had finished the block painting, I painted the figures with Army painter Dark Tone quick shade. You could get similar results with the Dark tone ink but I like the tougher finish of the quick shade. I leave the quick shade to dry for at least 24hours and then paint the figures with a matt varnish. I then repaint some of the lighter colours, particularly the white to give a strong high light. It’s then on to basing, using my usual method of coating the base – in this case 25mm round MDF bases – with Vallejo Dark earth texture paste and simply plonking the figures into the paste. I draw some of the paste up around the figure to blend in the metal base and add some small ballast. The paste is strong enough to hold the figures in place, there is no need to glue them.

CAR04 ready to start the revolution!

Once the texture paste is dry, I use emulsion paint to paint and blend everything in, dry brushing this base coat to bring out the detail. Finally using PVA glue, I add the scatter and then some Gamers Grass tufts to finish everything off. They are now ready for the table.

Pike Block completed

So what is the tenuous connection to War Of the Roses pike men? Well, apart from the fact that I was using similar colours whilst painting and basing my Pike men, I have been enthused by the success of the rules set that Andy Callan has developed for our War of the Roses games. This success has made me dig out my embryonic ‘Conflict in The Caribbean’ rules set and following on from last weeks musings about what my next project will be after the War of the Roses army is complete, I am now resolved to get on and complete the Caribbean Rules set. My next play test should be this Friday. If all goes well, I hope to get the rules published in the new year. So, watch this space!

The plan is that in next weeks blog, I’ll detail how I painted the pike men but hopefully by then I will be onto the next unit. If you would like to see what I am up to I do post updates on the Arcane Scenery Facebook page. Just click like to see these in your Facebook feed.

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The Commercial Bit

We carry the full range of Trent Miniatures. You can find the Caribbean Range here:

WARS IN THE CARIBBEAN

Happy Modelling!

What’s on the Workbench – WOTR and Napoleonics

Lets start with what’s off the work bench! I’ve finally finished the battalion of Black Watch Highlanders that I started back in September. It’s taken nearly two months to get these finished and based, although my usual painting routine has been interrupted by a holiday and other domestic events. I have had to do some decorating, although I’m sure that this qualifies as mental cruelty. Some how, gloss painting doors and emulsioning the walls and ceiling of the bathroom doesn’t have the same appeal as painting model soldiers! That said, I have been dragging my heels with this project, so it was good to get them based and in the cabinet ready for the next Napoleonic wargame. Of course I have been working on other projects – WOTR Crossbowmen and the new DeeZee cavemen, so I cant really blame the decorating for the slow turnaround of the Highlanders!

The Black watch completes my Highland contingent at Waterloo.

I will now get back to my growing WOTR army. I have just about enough figures to game using our current big skirmish/small battle rules set, ‘Nevermind the Bill Hooks’. However, I do intend to build the Army to give me a bit more flexibility and the possibility of having enough figures for two players. I have now defined exactly what I need to complete this project. My WOTR army will consist of:

One unit of 12 Archers.

4 units of 12 Archers of which two are finished.

One Unit of War of the Roses Billmen.

4 units of 12 Billmen of which only one is complete.

One Unit of FootKnights

3 Units of 12 Foot knights – all completed – actually it’s unlikely they will ever all be on the table with the army and for the time being, I’m using one of these units as Billmen.

One unit of Pikemen (Crossbow men in the background)

2 units of Pikemen to form a Pike block – one unit completed, the other underway.

Six Mounted men at arms -the rules set that we use has units of 8 cavalry.

1 Unit of 12 mounted men at arms – Completed

1 Unit of 12 Light cavalry – yet to be purchased

The above will be deployed in units of 8’s and as with the Foot knights, I probably will have too many cavalry but will have options!

Unit of Hand gunners

1 unit of 6 hand gunners – completed

Unit of Crossbowmen

2 units of 6 Crossbowmen – Completed

one unit of Skirmishing Archers

1 unit of 6 skirmishing archers – completed

2 Artillery pieces – yet to be purchased.

Once this list is complete, my WOTR project will be more or less complete, although I suspect I will add a few character figures along with some baggage pieces and of course, some scenery. So this gives me about 84 or so figures to paint, plus the artillery.

Pikemen on the painting board

The pikemen are already on the painting table and in order to complete the unit, I’ve had to put a few men at arms with spears and command figures in the block to make up the numbers. It will just about pass though and should look good enough on the table.

So the plan is to complete this army for the end of the year, so that I can start the New Year with a fresh project. Quite what that will be I have yet to decide. I have a Napoleonic Caribbean force to get finished and I have a few Indian wars/AWI models in the lead pile. Perhaps I might finally get on with painting a few tanks for WW2…..

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

We carry the full range of Perry’s Plastic sets and supply them post free to most worldwide locations at the time of writing. You can see the WOTR sets here:

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To see the rest of my WOTR articles just click on the War of the Roses category in my blog:

WAR OF THE ROSES

Happy Modelling!

Painting DeeZee Cavemen

In last weeks blog, I explained how we went about producing the new DeeZee cavemen packs. In this weeks blog, I’ll show how I went about painting them. Painting cavemen was something of a welcome break from the strict colours and details of painting my Napoleonic army. I also wanted to finish them quickly as I needed some pictures for my web store, so I resorted to a ‘batch paint’ job to get the 10 different figures finished in more or less one sitting – fast for me!

Cave men primed!

The first job was to clean up the castings, blutack the figures to their temporary bases and prime them. I used Army painter leather brown spray.

First coat of Dark flesh 70927

I decided to use the Vallejo flesh tones to paint the skin – Vallejo Dark flesh 70927 was applied liberally over the skin! I would be using quick shade at the end of the paining process to shade the models and bring out the detail. If you are not keen on this method, then I would start with a darker flesh tone, possibly a brown.

First dry brush with Basic skin tone

I then dry brushed the figures with Basic skin tone 70815 to get a contrast. With hindsight, another dry brush with 70955 flat flesh before jumping straight to the lighter colour would have helped.

Hair and loin cloth painted

I painted the loin cloths on the figures using orange brown 70981 to represent a basic animal skin. They have all got the same loin cloths – again for speed. I think that it would be fun to add a bit of variety and I will do this on the next batch that I paint! Their hair was painted 70822 German Camouflage black brown – again no variety!

Spears painted

I painted the spear staffs with flat brown 70384, the cuff guards with 70871 leather brown and the detail and bindings with 70914 Green Ochre. I also dry brushed the hair with flat brown ( as the colour was on the pallet!) to give it some detail. The spear heads were painted 70869 Basalt grey.

Strong tone applied

The final details were painted – I highlighted the spears by simply dry brushing with grey with white added, and finished off the very tips with off white 70820. I used off white for the eyes and then used the german black brown to paint the eyes and eye brows. Incidentally, I rarely bother to paint eyes on my wargames figures these days but I have found that using dark brown rather than black for the irises gives a more natural, less harsh appearance. The models were then brushed with Army painter Strong tone (dark brown) quick shade.

Matt varnished and based

Once the quick shade was dry (I leave for at least 24 hours to let it harden), I brushed the figures with matt varnish. As you can see, as well as bringing out the detail the quick shade has left a bit of a ‘dirty’ effect where I was a bit heavy with the paint brush! I decided to leave this, I guess cavemen were more likely to be less fastidious with bathing…

The full tribe – basing in progress

The picture above shows the basing process that I use. You can see that the Shaman is still being painted but I have put him on a 25mm round MDF base, added some Vallejo Dark earth Textured paste and then some small ballast stones from Woodlands scenic. The whole base is then painted and highlighted using my Dehli Bazaar emulsion from B&Q and highlighted by brushing with 70819 Iraqi Sand. I then add Woodland scenic Blended turf and finish off the bases with some gamers grass tufts.

The clan!

So the first batch of cavemen are ready for the gaming table! I will be painting a few more as I will be play testing a rules set that I am writing – but that is for the future!

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

You can buy all of the DeeZee models from the arcane scenery web store and at the time of writing we supply post free to most worldwide locations!

For the Chief and Shaman, click here:

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DEEZEE CAVEMEN HUNTING

For the cavemen attacking, click here:

DEEZEE CAVEMEN ATTACKING

For the full tribe, click here:

DEEZEE CAVEMEN TRIBE

To see all of the DEEZEE range click here:

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Of course we also stock a huge range of paints and scenic accessories. You can purchase Vallejo paints and textures here:

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If you need a specific colour, use the shop search bar and enter the Vallejo number.

You can purchase Woodlands scenic here:

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We have a huge range of bases here:

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Happy Modelling!

The Black Watch

To give them their full name, the 1st Battalion, 42nd (Royal Highland) Regiment of foot, or the Black Watch, is the final Highland regiment that I wanted to add to my Napoleonic collection. I am using the 100 days War order of battle as the basis for my Napoleonic Army. The Black Watch is the last Highland regiment that I need to complete and the penultimate battalion required to finish the British contingent of the 5th British Infantry Division at Waterloo. I already have the 1/28th, 1/32nd, 1/95th and 1/79th of Kempts 8th British Brigade as well as 2/44th, 1/92nd of Pack’s 9th British brigade. The two brigades together, along with the 5th Hanoverian Brigade, formed the 5th Division under the command of Sir Thomas Picton.

1/42nd Battalion Centre Companies

As usual, I referred to the superb Mont St John web site for painting details – I’ve put the link below. The challenge in painting Highland regiments is of course the kilts. As yet, paint manufacturers have woefully failed in attempting to produce tartan paint, so you have to do it yourself! ( That was a joke by the way – a very old one, but a joke nonetheless!) As I had already painted two Highland regiments, I was fairly confident that the Black watch would be straight forward as there are just three colours, Blue, Green and Black. My painting skills and patience are not sufficient to make an exact copy of the tartan in 28mm scale – I wanted something that looked about right for the wargames table. As is often the case, I did a ‘test figure’ before committing to batch painting the Battalion.

Black Watch Sergeant next to the Camerons and Gordons.

I was reasonably happy with the result but did try a figure with a slightly different, lighter green on the kilt. It made little difference and if anything, I preferred a darker look to the kilts so adding an extra black line to the design had the desired effect. Just for fun, I produced a very quick step by step guide to how I painted the tartan. It won’t be to everyone’s taste but if you are new to the hobby, it might be helpful as a place to start.

Vallejo Prussian Blue 70965

First I painted the kilts in Prussian Blue Vallejo 70965. You can see this both on the paper above and on the actual models below. For clarity, I’ll show the rest of the process on the paper only.

Kilts in prussian blue

Next paint three stripes in Vallejo reflective green 70890. The trick here is to select the right sized paint brush and to make sure that the paint is flowing easily off of the brush by thinning it to the consistency of milk.

Three stripes of Green – vertically or horizontally – which ever you prefer first!

Now paint another three stripes across the first three. Again, let the brush do the work. The only other point to note is to try to space the stripes evenly at about the same width.

Reflective green 70890 cross hatched.

Now purists could paint the squares where the green lines cross with a slighter lighter shade. I ignore this detail – I am looking for a decent approximation of tartan, not an accurate reproduction.

Cross the lines! Outline the green lines in black.

The next two pictures show that I take a finer brush and again, thinning the paint to ensure that it flows smoothly, outline the green lines in black. You can see that it doesn’t have to be perfect! A steady hand does help but you can always touch up the green lines if the black is too thick.

Outlining complete

The next part is tricky and again, you will need a steady hand and importantly the paint must be thinned so that it flows off of the brush in one stroke. So paint a black line through the blue squares, both vertically and horizontally!

cross hatch through the blue squares!

Repeat the same pattern through the green lines.

Cross hatch through the green.

You can see that I’ve made a few mistakes but I’m not too concerned and the next picture will show why. That said, it would be easy enough to correct with a touch of green paint. It’s worth pointing out again that you are painting a cloth pattern on a small miniature and unless you intend to enter your figures in a competition, perfection is not required.

The finished pattern, cut from the paper.

I did the above step by step in about 10 minutes last night just for the blog. Hence the glossy look on some of the pictures – the paint was still drying! I hope that you agree that the finished result, which I have tidied up by cutting from the paper looks fine for a battalion of wargames figures. Incidentally, I do paint straight onto the figures – this an exercise to show the method.

The nearly completed figures

So this is how my first batch of 12 figures look at the moment. A few points to note. The Black Watch had all red tufts (hackles) on the centre company, red over green for the light company and red over white for the Grenadiers. I need to ‘dot’ in the green squares on the hat band and of course they need to be based properly. All of which I’ll do once the other 12 have been painted. I also need to go back to the test figure ( the sergeant) and add some extra lines to his kilt!

Another view of the first 12 figures

I hope that this has been useful to anyone that is wondering how to go about painting Highlanders. In the links below you can see how I went about completing the Gordons and Camerons. I’m putting these aside for a week or so, whilst I go back to my War of the Roses army – there’s only so much tartan I can paint in one batch!

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Almost all of the paints, miniatures, bases, basing materials and anything that you are likely to need for your hobby are available POST FREE from my shop here:

ARCANE SCENERY

The Victrix Highlanders can be found in the Victrix category here:

VICTRIX MINIATURES

We carry a huge range of Vallejo, either browse the category – or to find individual paints, type the number into the search bar:

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You can visit the Mont St Jean site here:

MONT ST JEAN

To see another blog article on painting tartan, in this case the Camerons, click here:

TAMING THE TARTAN TERRORS

Happy Modelling!

John Rattenbury, Sir John Savage and other distractions!

You can tell that I have been distracted over the last month, as my blog has been focused as much on Battle reports and shows as it has on painting. Add to this, I have only written two blog posts since the end of July and you would be forgiven for thinking that I have had very little hobby time. My Wife would disagree! To be fair, it’s been a bit of a mixed month, with some nice weather, meaning that gardening and family barbeques have been a major part of my leisure time.

John Rattenbury takes to the seas!

However, I always find time for my hobby and the truth is that I have not been quite as focused as I usually am when it comes to churning out the next unit for one of my armies. Duncan at Trent Miniatures hasn’t helped. He keeps producing some lovely character figures for his range and often pops into the office to show me the latest release. I was very taken with the new figure of John, or Jack Rattenbury, a famous Devonshire smuggler from the turn of the 18th century. I stopped everything to finish him and add him to my collection of maritime subjects!

John Rattenbury, the lastest addition to the crew!

I’ve also been working on my WOTR army, assembling the balance of a box of Perry’s European Mercenary’s. With a bit of ducking and diving, I now have 12 crossbow men assembled and primed, 6 handgunners and 12 Pikemen ready for painting.

The next batch of my WOTR army ready for painting.

With the crossbowmen being the first on the list to complete, I painted the Pavises that go with them and used a set of LBM decals to finish them off. I think that they will need a bit more work before I add them to the figures but I was very pleased with how straight forward the LBM decals were to apply, despite making a few mistakes with positioning.

Pavises with LBM decals applied

When chatting to Duncan about my WOTR project he reminded me that the Newark Character range has a model of Sir John Savage from the Battle of Stokes Field. Well, it would be rude not to include him in my army! Once again, Everything was put aside whilst I finished Sir John!

Sir John Savage joins my retinue!

As if this all wasn’t enough, I am working on the final Highland Battalion for my Napoleonic Army, the Black Watch, or 42nd Highland Battalion. I wanted to do a ‘test shot’ of the tartan pattern that I would use and so finished off a sergeant to see how he looks next to the other battalions.

Black Watch Sergeant next to the Caerons and Gordons.

Black Watch Sergeant next to the Gordons and Camerons.

I think that I’m going to go with the dark pattern, essentially, my usual approach to painting Tartan but with more black lines! He looks a bit better in the next picture, as I have retouched the hat band and covered the grey base.

Another picture of the Sergeant of the Black Watch

As is often the case with my painting, I’ll mull over whether to change things – I’m thinking of a slightly paler green tartan stripe but I better make my mind up as the other 11 on the painting desk are moving towards completion!

42nd Battalion Highlanders!

As if all of this wasn’t enough to keep me busy, there is also the small matter of the forthcoming release of the DeeZee Cavemen. There will be 10 cavemen in three blisters and I had test shots of four of the poses to play with. As a teaser, here is a picture of my first attempt at painting them. All being well, there will be more information and details of how I painted them to follow!

DeeZee Cavemen – sculpted by Matt Sofar of knuckle bones miniatures.

So, August has passed and we are well into September and the weather here already has that Autumnal feel, with the evenings being both cooler and shorter. I doubt that I will find much more time for painting in my busy schedule but perhaps this month, I can be a bit more focused!

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The Other Partizan

The ‘Other Partizan’ show at Newark goes from strength to strength in it’s new location at the Newark Show Ground and under the steady stewardship of the organisors, Laurence Baldwin and Richard Tyndall. This will be the last time that the show will run in August – it moves to October for next year. This can only be an improvement as far I can see. The summer slot has meant that it can get rather too warm in parts of the exhibition hall when the sun is at full strength and there are other pressures on both traders and visitors, in the form of Holidays, that get in the way of attendance. October should be less of a problem with regards to temperature and it is a great time to get back to your hobby with the nights drawing in and fewer distractions elsewhere. That said, with over 800 people through the doors this year, attendance is not a problem!

Iceni and Trinovantes meet the romans in battle! A most impressive display!

Iceni and Trinovantes – some of the detail was fantastic!

It was the first time in years that I was there as a customer rather than a trader. We have an arrangement with Sarissa Precision to take some of our ranges to shows, so Sarissa were doing the hard work whilst I loafed around at the show! It was a pleasure to wander around the games and chat to friends without having to look over my shoulder at what was going on at my stand. I stayed the full day, fueling up on coffee and other refreshments at the excellent catering facilities in the hall. The show has a nice friendly atmosphere, there’s plenty of space, even with such a good attendance. The lighting is excellent, so you can see just how much work has gone into painting the miniatures on display. Free car parking, as well and easy access is a nice bonus! The great strength of the show is it’s consistency, so that you know which traders will be there, enabling you to plan your purchases. That said, it was good to see a couple of new traders and one in particular, ABC brushes, managed to prise open my wallet!

55 Minutes in Peking! By Victorious Miniatures

The format of having the inspirational demonstration games ( look but dont touch) at one end of the hall and most of the participation games at the other end made it clear where you could join in and roll some dice. That said, I find that the guys playing the demo games to be very welcoming and open to conversation. I think that it would help if the participation games were on smaller tables and had clearer ‘guest’ seating. Some sort of indication as to how long the game would take would also help. I found that I didn’t engage as much with the participation games as I didn’t know how long I would be committed to a particular game. Perhaps some of the manufacturers could persuaded to move their games into this area. Mind you, it’s easy to come up with ideas but as a trader, I know how much time and effort goes into just getting the stand to the show and manning it without having to find the resources to run a ‘remote’ demo. You also want your customers to be able to see that the product on the table is available to purchase. So I am mindful that as a spectator, my observations are at odds with playing on the pitch, so to speak!

Blood and Plunder – Leicester Phat Cats

Without wishing to be controversial, I actually think that from a Historical Gamers point of view, the Partisan shows are superior to Salute, with quality winning over quantity. The relaxed, friendly atmosphere, easy free parking and access, great selection of traders (yes I am biased here!), great showcase of historical games, a history resource area and good value refreshments mean that you will have an enjoyable day with more of your money spent on your hobby rather than the logistics of being there. If you can make a weekend of it, there is plenty of History around Newark to absorb you, from the Newark Aviation Museum (which is next to the Newark showground) to the Town of Newark itself, cradle of the English Civil War! Oh, and Stokes field down the road, if you fancy a bit of WOTR history. With Games Workshop in Nottingham, about 40 minutes drive away, you can even scratch your fantasy and 40K itch, so to speak!

Detail from the Battle of Madonna Dell’ Olmo

I’ve posted a selection of the games that caught my eye through out the blog post and below. They are only a small selection of the games on show and really don’t show half of what is there. The pictures do not do justice to some of the larger games. A really great day out for me and I’m very much looking forward to the next Partizan. If you can get there, you will not be disappointed!

The Great Northern War

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Dan, the owner and editor of WI showing off his steady cam skills!

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DeeZee Woolly Rhino and Cavemen

It’s been nearly three weeks since my last blog but I have been busy with all sorts of projects. As far as my War of the Roses project goes, The heavy cavalry are now complete – I have 12 ready for action. I have also built 12 Crossbowmen, 6 Handgunners and 10 more pikemen as well as painting 12 Pavises for the crossbowmen. I’ll write an update on this project in a future blog along with a report on the playtesting of ‘Nevermind the Billhooks’ – the WOTR rules set that Andy C. is developing.

Likewise, my Napoleonic project continues, with the next 12 highlanders, representing the Black watch, primed and the batch paint is underway. I use any ‘spare’ time to add colour to these until I get to the tricky tartan bit, when they will get my full attention!

Batch paint on Black watch with pavises in the foreground

I have been distracted by the latest addition to the DeeZee range. Not so much a new item as a re working of an old one. The mold on the Charging Rhino DZ8 was beginning to burn out, so we took the opportunity to re do the master and put the model into resin. I dont think that it’s a secret that we have a very good working relationship with the folks at Footsore and the master Resin Caster, Vince, was happy to take this on as a project. I was delighted with the results and the detail of the model shows much better in resin than it did in metal.

DZ08 Whoolly Rhino Charging - now in resin

DZ08 Woolly Rhino Charging – now in resin

This coincided with the production of the first ‘shots’ of the new range of DeeZee cavemen that we have commissioned. They are being sculpted for us by the very talented Matt Lupus, of Knuckle Bone miniatures. So I had a good reason to ‘park’ both the WOTR and Napoleonic projects and move further back into history to paint some cavemen and a Woolly Rhino!

Cavemen and Whooly Rhino primed and ready to paint!

Cavemen and Whooly Rhino primed in Leather brown and ready to paint!

I will write a future blog explaining what we are doing with the cavemen – for now, I’ll just say that there will be 10 cavemen in the initial release and of course if they sell well, we will add to the range. It’s a new venture for us and once the figures are available for production, I will be pleased to show them off in full! For now, I’ll focus on the Rhino and tease you with them in the pictures as I was working on them at the same time as the Rhino!

Fur now painted Chocolate Brown.

Once the Rhino had been primed with Army Painter Leather Brown, I painted the fur with Vallejo Chocolate Brown 70872.

Flat Brown Dry Brush

Using a large flat brush, I then gave the Rhino fur a heavy dry brush in Flat Brown 70984.

Fur Highlighted by dry brushing.

The picture above shows the rhino with his fur highlighted again with Flat Earth 70983, then Orange Brown 70981 and finally a light dry brush with Orange Brown lightened with Green Ochre 70914. I used the same large flat brush for all the dry brush coats. The toe nails were then picked out with Black Grey 70862 and the Horn painted with Iraqui sand 70819. I added some ink to the inner ear and around the legs to give these areas more definition. Incidentally, the horn should probably be the same or a similar dark colour to the Rhino fur as it is not really bone but I wanted the horns to stand out on the model!

Basing The Woolly Rhino

I gave the horn a brush over with Ivory 70918 and painted the eyes black 70850. The rhino was then mounted on a Sarissa MDF base and using Vallejo Dark Earth Texture paste, blended in. The large ‘rocks’ are small stones from the garden, the smaller grit is ballast from the Woodlands scenic range.

Base painted with Emulsion.

I used my tried and trusted basing routine to finish off. The base was painted with Matt Emulsion – Dehli Baazar and highlighted with dry brush coats mixed with Iraqui sand. I’ve covered how and why I use Emulsion paints for basing in a previous blog here:

DONT JUST DO IT…

It was then just a case of adding some Woodlands Scenics green scatter to the base ( I had decided on a Spring time look rather than Winter!).

Grass added to the base

I had also toned down the brightness of the horn by painting with Army Painter Soft Tone – this also brought out the detail at the base of the horn.

Gamers Grass Tufts added to base.

Finally, I added a mixture of Gamers Grass tufts to the base to finish things off. I’m quite pleased at how he looks and also how straight forward the Rhino was to paint.

Woolly Rhino completed and based.

As for the cavemen…all being well, I expect to have them in production for late September – watch this space for more details. In the meantime, they are off to catch their dinner!

Here comes dinner!

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Don’t Just Do It…..B&Q it, again!

As a retailer of model paints, I’m not sure that I should be sending my customers off to the local DIY chain, B&Q, but as a hobbyist, I like to share the tips that I have picked up over the years. I’ve mentioned before that I use DIY type emulsion for the bases of my figures. My particular favourite being Dehli Bazaar, which is a nice greeny brown colour, or as my father would have said, ‘shitty coloured dim’. I was coming to the end of the tin of the Dehli Bazaar emulsion and the dregs were getting too thick to use, even with thinning, so it was time to get a new tin.

Paint samples and the originals

I also decided to try out the in-store colour matching facility at B&Q. Whilst I was replacing my usual basing paint, I thought that I would see if I could get some emulsion pots pots of the two other colours that I most frequently use when basing; Vallejo Chocolate Brown 70872 and Iraqi Sand 70819. I just brushed some samples of each paint onto a scrap of paper and off I went to the local B&Q. The young lady behind the counter did warn me that the colours may not be an exact match as they were using Valspar Emulsion as opposed to Vallejo pigments but she would do her best. The sheet above shows that the two vallejo colours are a bit ‘off’ and on the light side but close enough for me. After all, I will be using these for basing, not to replicate a uniform colour.

B&Q sample pots next to Vallejo for size comparison.

The process took about ten minutes but here’s the best bit. The cost was £3.00 a pot! Each pot contains 263mls! So for £9.00, I have enough paint to keep me basing for the next couple of years. They even kept my details on file so when I need another batch, they can just make a batch up from the details on file. Brilliant!

The beauty about using emulsion for your bases is that it is water based paint and can be thinned with tap water; you can wash your brushes in water and it seems to give great coverage over sand and basing material, even when thinned. If you need to you can mix it with with Vallejo or other actrylic paints – I often add a small amount of White to the last highlight to get a final dry brush highlight on my bases.

Gordon Highlanders – These are just about ready for basing

So, with my new basing paint purchased, I’m ready to finish off my next Battalion, the Gordon Highlanders. As you can see above they are just about ready for basing. I need to touch in the green squares on the hat bands and tidy up any obvious errors. You can see that the back packs are all done and waiting to be fixed on. Then it’s just fixing the flags, which I have ready to go.

Portuguese Artillery

Next up, Portuguese Artillery! The painting goes on!

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Happy Modelling!

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Category Archives: Whats on the work bench?

Work bench update. Mary Rose and Billmen

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A bit of Flitting does you good!

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Good year – Bad Year?

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Nevermind the Billhooks!

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Pikemen and the Caribbean.

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WARS IN THE CARIBBEAN

What’s on the Workbench – WOTR and Napoleonics

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PERRYS MEDIEVAL RANGE

Painting DeeZee Cavemen

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The Black Watch

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John Rattenbury, Sir John Savage and other distractions!

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The Other Partizan

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ARCANE SCENERY SHOP

PARTIZAN SHOW

DeeZee Woolly Rhino and Cavemen

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Don’t Just Do It…..B&Q it, again!

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