Whats on the work bench? – Page 7 – ARCANE Scenery and Models

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.

ARCANE SCENERY FACEBOOK PAGE

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 the we use has units of 8 cavalry.

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:

PERRYS MEDIEVAL RANGE

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:

DEEZEE CAVEMAN CHIEF

For the cavemen hunting, click here:

DEEZEE CAVEMEN HUNTING

For the cavemen attacking, click here:

DEEZEE CAVEMEN ATTACKING

For the full tribe, click here:

DEEZEE CAVEMEN TRIBE

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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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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:

VALLEJO

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!

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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If you would like a model of John Rattenbury, click here:

JOHN RATTENBURY

Sir John Savage can be found here:

SIR JOHN SAVAGE

Perry’s WOTR plastic range are here:

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

VICTRIX MINIATURES

You can see the DeeZee range here…. but you will have to wait a bit longer for the cavemen!

DEEZEE MINIATURES

Happy Modelling!

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

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

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

Happy Modelling!

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!

THE COMMERCIAL BIT

Deezee miniatures, including of course, the Woolly Rhino, are available post free from my shop here:

DEEZEE MODELS

We carry a huge range of Vallejo – to find individual paints, tyope the number into the search bar:

VALLEJO

You can buy Sarissa bases here:

SARISSA MDF BASES

We have a huge range of basing materials but check out Woodland Scenics here:

WOODLAND SCENICS

and Gamers Grass here:

GAMERS GRASS

Happy Modelling!

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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Rain interupts painting!

Horses awaiting their undercoat!

Well, the recent deluge has caught me out and I was unable to continue with my WOTR cavalry as the next six models were yet to be undercoated. Mrs W made it quite clear that spraying indoors was unacceptable, even in the garage, which is accessed through the kitchen door. So I have had to wait for the weather to brighten up before continuing.

The six completed cavalry.

As you can see, I have now completed six of the heavy mounted men at arms, so I have made some progress. I’ve also mounted the riders for the next batch on the temporary holders ready for spraying, so I am good to go once the rain stops.

Let us Spray…knights ready for undercoating.

Despite this hitch, I always have something on the work bench and so I continued with the batch paint of the Highlanders that will make up the balance of the 92nd Gordon’s. The beauty of the batch paint approach is that you can keep a unit progressing and know exactly where you are in the process, even if you have to pause to do something else.

Batch painting highlanders

So a bit more progress in a slightly different direction. The decision I have to make now is whether to crack on and finish the Highlanders or once I can get the Knights undercoated, go back to them. I’m under no real pressure to do either at the moment as I now have sufficient troops to fight club battles in both Napoleonic’s and WOTR. I am favouring the Highlanders though as now that I’ve started them, it would be good to finish them. In reality, I’ll probably do a bit of both, depending on the time I have, after all, nothing like a bit of variety to spice things up! So long as I don’t end up with tartan on my WOTR knights all will be well….

White cross straps and lacing next!

So a short blog for me – besides there’s a break in the rain – I’m off to do some priming!

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Perry Miniatures Mounted Men At Arms

The next additional to my WOTR army is to be a unit of Cavalry. From the little that I know about the battles in the War of the Roses, it seems that the cavalry were used as a shock unit to punch through already demoralised troops or to cut down those that were retreating. The power of the long bow and the defensive blocks of troops with Pikes or Halberds were usually able to hold Cavalry at bay. I am also told that there were very few, if any major cavalry versus cavalry engagements.

However, no WOTR army would be complete without a unit or two of light and heavy horse prowling around the flanks, looking for the opportunity to sweep away those on foot in a glorious charge!

The obvious choice for my army was a box of Perry Miniatures Mounted Men at arms. I wanted to go for the ‘Heavy’ option first. To be truthful, I thought that painting armoured horses would be the easy option! As with all of the Perry Sets, assembly was fairly straight forward, with plenty of choice when it came to weapons and poses. There are seven different horses heads and the horses sides are interchangeable. There is also a choice of armour for the horses. I went for the fully armoured option in most cases, with only two of the horses, lightly armoured.

The assembled Mounted Men at Arms

As you can see, most of my Knights will be armed with lances! At this stage I decided to paint the riders separately from the horses, so they are not yet fully attached! Despite the amount of armour, I undercoated the horses in black primer and then painted the armour with Army Painter plate mail.

Horses primed ready to paint

The next stage was to paint the armour in Army Painter Dark tone.

Armour washed with dark tone ink

I then dry brushed the armour with plate mail, followed by Vallejo Silver. In the picture, you can see that I have over done this – I was trying a new dry brush out and wasn’t careful with how much paint was going onto the models! I then started to under coat the horses. I use Vallejo Chocolate brown as a base.

Starting to paint the horses.

I use three shades of Brown to paint the horses but I’m quite happy to mix things up a bit. The colours are ‘wet brushed/dry brushed’ on from dark to light and I use a light ink wash to tie things together. So the list of colours used are Chocolate brown, Flat Brown, Flat Earth, Mahogany Brown, Orange Brown, Cork Brown, Green Ochre and strong tone ink to wash. I don’t use all of those colours on one horse – just take three and layer them on. When it came to the details , I went a bit OTT with the colours. I was inspired by some pictures of miniatures that I found on the web and I have attempted to copy these. I thought that the brighter colours would look good on the wargames table, so I cannot vouch for any degree of historical accuracy!

Horse flesh done, stating to block in the details.

I’ve also added a bit more shading onto the armour with a light wash of dark tone ink. The next picture shows another two horse in progress. I decided to embellish the armour on one of the mounts with gold and add some ‘socks’ to these horses for variety. I’ve also painted the horse shoes and teeth – a bit OTT but I understand that the horses like to get involved in the fighting, using these as weapons!

Another two war horses!

With three horses done it was time to get some Knights done! I temporarily mounted them on wire and used blu-tack to hold them in plastic tube ready for priming.

Knights ready for priming

To prime them, I used Army painter Plate mail spray.

Knight primed!

I then gave them a good wash of Dark tone ink, before dry brushing them with Plate mail and then again with Silver.

Knights after dry brushing

Once again, I went for a ‘pretty look’ rather than do any real research and I have been free and easy with the few colours that are used on the knights belts etc. I’ve also copied an idea to make the lances stand out and used a spiral design on them. I stress, I have no idea how accurate this is, I just thought it looked good!

Mounted Knight completed – basing started

I used Expo 2mm flexible masking tape to get the spiral effect. If you look closely, there is some bleed on the painting as I simply brush painted the blue over the white base. The next two Lances that I painted were better as I became used to using the masking tape. It really does do what it is supposed to do – It’s flexible and it masks well without taking off the bottom coat of paint!

Three knights ready for basing

You can see that I have started to base the figures using my usual method. The figures are attached to the Renedra base ( I tend to use plastic bases for plastic figures) and then I cover with Vallejo Dark Earth Textured paste and press a few small stones into it.

Basing on the Knights completed – well, nearly!

Once the paste is dry, I paint over it and dry brush with successive layers in a lighter colour to bring out the texture and show off the rocks. It’s then just a case of adding scatter. I will be adding some Gamers grass tufts to finish things off but will wait until all of the figures are done and complete this final task for the complete unit.

So my first knights are ready to take to the table. They are perhaps a bit more suited to a Jousting tournament but I think that they will look imposing on the wargames table once all twelve are completed!

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Nearly every thing that I use in my modelling projects comes from the Arcane Scenery shop. We supply post free to most worldwide locations!

I have some offers running on the Perry Miniatures WOTR range so that you can build an army similar to the one that I am working on. To see the range of Perry Plastics for WOTR, click here:

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Vallejo paint and textures are available here – use the shop search bar to find a particular colour;

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The Army painter range can be found here:

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You can find a range of masking tape here:

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My favourite scenic range of the moment is 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

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WOTR – Project Update

Mustering my WOTR Army

I now have about 100 figures completed for my WOTR army. Actually, completed is not strictly accurate, as six need basing and I want to revisit some of the Men at Arms to add some detail. The Foot Knights will form the core of my army and they are made from a box of Perry’s Foot knights that I have almost completed. Of the 36 knights in the box, 24 are in ‘plain’ armour and so were quite straight forward to paint. A further 12 have tabards over their armour and it was these that initially slowed me down when it came to completing them. Assembly was straight forward enough, although with one exception, I decided to go for ‘sleeved’ tabards, which reduced the choice of poses and weapons available.

Knights with tabards, assembled and ready for priming.

Incidentally, in the background of the picture above, you can see that I have also assembled the final 2 of the 38 figures in the Perry’s set – Richard III and his standard bearer – they may not make it into the army but I will complete them. Painting the figures was fairly straight forward, it was deciding on the colours of the livery that caused me a problem. Despite doing a degree of research, I reminded myself that I was initially building a generic WOTR force for our club games rather than a specific order of battle. This did simplify things in my mind and so I went with a fairly limited set of colours for the livery and I haven’t worried too much about what or who the livery represents at this stage.

Basic colours blocked in.

I followed more or less the same procedure for painting the armour. I used Army Painter plate mail, gave this a heavy Dark Tone Ink wash and then re highlighted by dry brushing with Plate mail and then Vallejo Silver. The Tabards were just block painted, although I did use soft tone ink and red ink to do some shading.

Tabards painted and figures based.

The picture above shows three of the finished figures. You can see that I attempted to paint Warwicks badge on one of the figures…It just about passes from a distance but I decided that I would leave the others without a badge until I can find suitable decals. Besides, my eye’s were at the limit of their endurance!

Foot Knights ready for action!

The final six Foot Knights are almost complete. I just need paint some of the details, add some washes and finish the basing.

The final batch on the work bench.

With the core of my force completed, we have already started to test our rules set and have played our first game of ‘Never mind the Billhooks’. The rules have been written specifically for generic WOTR battles by Andy Callan and played well on the first game. Once we have knocked them into shape, with Andy’s permission, I’ll put them up on the blog as a free PDF download. We plan to fight a series WOTR battles using our own House retinues over the coming year. Sir Harry Hotspur being the leader of my band. No doubt, Lord Bingham, Sir Peter of Woodborough and Lady Jasmine of Papplewick will be just as capricious at choosing allegiances as the real participants of the War Of The Roses!

Of course, my retinue is far from complete. I need a few more skirmishers and badly need some cavalry support, so I will add these in over the next few weeks. For now though, let battle commence!

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We carry the full range of Perry’s Plastic sets. You can see the WOTR sets here:

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Get them when they are young!

I often read articles that are bemoaning the lack of youngsters coming into our hobby. I dont think that there is very much truth in this – if anything, thanks to the power of the internet, the hobby is growing. I’ve been reading the same old stuff since I was a youngster myself, with the same complaint occuring some 50 or more years ago. If anyone doubts me, I have the original issues of Wargames Illustrated and Miniature wargames Magazines and you don’t have to look far in the letters page to find evidence. Like all hobbies, it is either in your DNA or not. Wargaming is never going to be a mainstream hobby, it is a niche at best and I suspect that in itself is part of the attraction.

I will concede that Historical wargaming is now, I believe, a minority part of wargaming itself, with Fantasy and Science Fiction taking the larger share and certainly attracting the younger player into the hobby. Many will stay with this side of the hobby, a few will stray into the historical thread. In terms of introducing my children into the hobby, I have been largely unsuccessful. They did take an interest for a while, particularly my son, who was attracted to Orks in particular and 40K in general but alas, the hobby didn’t stick and he has taken up golf…. My daughter quite enjoyed the the painting and crafting side of the hobby for a while but she too is more interested in sport, specifically scuba diving and swimming. I’m not sure where they got the activity bug from – I like sport but prefer watching it these days! As for golf, I’m happy to agree with the sentiment that it is a good walk spoilt. That said, I do like a game of crazy golf at the seaside!

However, another generation comes along and so the opportunity comes along to try and convert the grand children into willing opponents! Emily is now 6, about the same age that I was when I started making models, so when she stayed over at Easter and asked if she could sit with me while I had sneaked off to the garage to do some modelling, I was pleased to have her company. At first she was happy to watch me working on my WOTR project and we had a nice chat about the ‘Cousins War’. She was intrigued by the story of the ‘Princes in the Tower’ and that a major battle, Stokes Field, took place just down the road from her school.

Memorial stone at East stoke Church

It didn’t take long before she asked if she could have a go and so I looked through the ‘lead pile’ and found a figure primed and ready to paint that might be suitable. In the past, I have been quite protective of my paints and brushes but I decided that if Emily was going to try and paint something, she would be better off using the correct tools for the job! So with gritted teeth, I gave her my best brushes and we started to paint a Japanese Peasant lady.

Emilys’ first model

I was surprised at just how good she was. Of course, you have to explain how to hold the brush, how to thin the paint, how to use the point of the brush, how to draw the brush over the bits that you want to paint, how to hold the figure. Gosh! I had forgotten just how much I had learnt but in teaching Emily, I remembered just how much technique there is to learn. When it came to the colour scheme, I let Emily choose which colours she preferred – I actually quite like the combination that she came up with – I’ll be using that again!

Overnight, I did the basing for her, in that I super glued the figure onto a base and added the texture. Superglue and kids are a dangerous combination! The next day, Emily added the scenic bits and to finish the figure off, we used some washes and did a bit of highlighting and dry brushing. Again, once I explained the techniques, Emily was happy to apply the washes and paints. The result is not too bad and I am thinking about what figure Emily can do on her next visit!

Catan, Ticket to ride and Camel Up!

At six years old I think she is too young to start wargaming but she has already mastered Junior Cluedo and Camel Up so we are not too far away from a more complicated board game – say Space crusade. Another year or so and I think that I might just try her out with a simple wargame. I think a good skirmish game such as Test of Honour or Lion Rampant will be a good place to start. I may yet ensnare her into the hobby….

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Category Archives: Whats on the work bench?

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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Rain interupts painting!

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Perry Miniatures Mounted Men At Arms

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WOTR – Project Update

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PERRYS MEDIEVAL RANGE

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Get them when they are young!

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