Thursday, April 24, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Take This Mans' Credit Card Away From Him!
I've been buying things.
I know I oughtn't.
I have though...
I was messing about last night in front of the TV and decided to get all my Minden Prussians out and line them up. I was pleasantly stunned to realise I'd got almost an entire unit.
I'll be getting more to flesh this lot out. I'm going to have to get some French, too, just to take a look, you understand. Not to build a batallion of them... honest.
Then I went and bought some (about twenty) Hanoverians from Jude Beckers' Venture Miniatures. I'm very eager to get these. Very eager - I'm extremely keen on the style of the sculpting; and the officer with the raised sword looks just like I imagine Baron Munchausen to be. They look a little cartoony, but in a good way, if you understand me.
Then there are the Eureka Sumerians. I've just bought my first 40 or so as I intend to follow Phil Olley's example on how to build an army. Here's hoping I have the discipline... Oh, who am I kidding? I want to paint the little domkey-chariots!
On the imagineering front, I am reading the Cambridge University Press volume on the Agean Bronze Age that I picked up in an excellent 2nd hand bookshop here on Brunswick Street. This has led me to fondle the sample Myceneans I bought from Eureka a couple of years ago and to really regret that it is nowhere near being complete. I must resist the call of the 100 Club - I've other irons in that fire! It's really nice to be reading a volume of history or archaeology that has actually been published less than twenty years ago and represents a rather more recent state of the art than I have been used to in recent years of "self-directed study".
On that topic, I have been watching with a great deal of interest the debate at the Old School Wargames YahooGroup on the topic of Anglocentric history. It bodes well as a topic worth exploration. Indeed, the topic could very well be broadened to take in the whole wargaming-history axis. Who knows what directions that might take us in?
I know I oughtn't.
I have though...
I was messing about last night in front of the TV and decided to get all my Minden Prussians out and line them up. I was pleasantly stunned to realise I'd got almost an entire unit.
I'll be getting more to flesh this lot out. I'm going to have to get some French, too, just to take a look, you understand. Not to build a batallion of them... honest.
Then I went and bought some (about twenty) Hanoverians from Jude Beckers' Venture Miniatures. I'm very eager to get these. Very eager - I'm extremely keen on the style of the sculpting; and the officer with the raised sword looks just like I imagine Baron Munchausen to be. They look a little cartoony, but in a good way, if you understand me.
Then there are the Eureka Sumerians. I've just bought my first 40 or so as I intend to follow Phil Olley's example on how to build an army. Here's hoping I have the discipline... Oh, who am I kidding? I want to paint the little domkey-chariots!
On the imagineering front, I am reading the Cambridge University Press volume on the Agean Bronze Age that I picked up in an excellent 2nd hand bookshop here on Brunswick Street. This has led me to fondle the sample Myceneans I bought from Eureka a couple of years ago and to really regret that it is nowhere near being complete. I must resist the call of the 100 Club - I've other irons in that fire! It's really nice to be reading a volume of history or archaeology that has actually been published less than twenty years ago and represents a rather more recent state of the art than I have been used to in recent years of "self-directed study".
On that topic, I have been watching with a great deal of interest the debate at the Old School Wargames YahooGroup on the topic of Anglocentric history. It bodes well as a topic worth exploration. Indeed, the topic could very well be broadened to take in the whole wargaming-history axis. Who knows what directions that might take us in?
Friday, April 11, 2008
Heckenfeur
It is with a rather guilty start that I noticed the amount of time that has elapsed since my last post. Still as they say, it's a hobby, not a job, and so...
I'm still here and as usual painting far more than ever I game, which suits me well enough, although I do have a little Sword and the Flame bash lined up for a couple of weeks from now. That the game will be between Anglo-Egyptians versus Mahadists is about all that has so far been finalised, so I suppose there will be more as we talk it through.
Continuing along the Colonial front I have finished my first TSaTF unit (20 figs) of Victorian infantry. They look very smart; I'm pleased with how their red tunics came out. Red is a colour I normally struggle with a bit, but this has worked pretty well, despite Games Workshops' dreadful Mechrite Red bought in the hope I really would be able only to put on one coat of it over my black undercoat. I had to bulk it up rather with my trusty Vallejo paints to get an even enough coverage, sadly.
Still, they are done and I've moved on with my reward which is to paint the first four figures of the Victorian cavalry. The castings were most unpromising, just being really quite unattractive sculpts with poor location points for their seperate sword arms. I hope superglue will be enough to hold them on, and that a good paint-job will lift the poor chaps up a bit. Still their horses have painted very nicely and only need a shot of spray varnish to finish them off.
I'm still here and as usual painting far more than ever I game, which suits me well enough, although I do have a little Sword and the Flame bash lined up for a couple of weeks from now. That the game will be between Anglo-Egyptians versus Mahadists is about all that has so far been finalised, so I suppose there will be more as we talk it through.
Continuing along the Colonial front I have finished my first TSaTF unit (20 figs) of Victorian infantry. They look very smart; I'm pleased with how their red tunics came out. Red is a colour I normally struggle with a bit, but this has worked pretty well, despite Games Workshops' dreadful Mechrite Red bought in the hope I really would be able only to put on one coat of it over my black undercoat. I had to bulk it up rather with my trusty Vallejo paints to get an even enough coverage, sadly.
Still, they are done and I've moved on with my reward which is to paint the first four figures of the Victorian cavalry. The castings were most unpromising, just being really quite unattractive sculpts with poor location points for their seperate sword arms. I hope superglue will be enough to hold them on, and that a good paint-job will lift the poor chaps up a bit. Still their horses have painted very nicely and only need a shot of spray varnish to finish them off.
I actually went a bit overboard with the horses and painted seven of them - but I'm cheating and regarding this as preparation for my next "reward stage" which will be converting a couple of Cavalry to a mounted Infantry Colonel and his rather glittering ADC.
On the topic of rewards, I think I remarked in an earlier post that the "Defence of Melbourne" project would be soaking up about 60% of my hobby time this year. At the time I'd not really thought too much about what the rest would be, but now I know.
I've enough Grenze castings from DPC to finish of my Croat forces for the Strudelberg game (whenever that may happen); along with them I also got a couple of bags of Austrian German infantry who I intend to paint up per the test shots I did a while back with the red pants. Too gorgeous.
This ought to see me with some leftover Grenzers. Hm, what to do, what to do... I am thinking of cutting them up and trying to create some pose variants - after all, DPC only offer three - including the ropey Officer/NCO type wearing the cloak with an un-pleasing looking sword being freely brandished. Secondly, I think the cut of the Grenze uniform is not unlike that of the Hungarian infantry during the War of the Austrian Succession, and I'm doing to try my hand at producing some. Ulp! That's about 20% of my hobby time.
The remaining 20% will be taken up with some of the new Eureka Sumerians. This is a period of history that has always exerted a strong fascination for me and I am looking forward to getting some of these minis and really getting to grips with them. I'll review them when I have them to hand and talk about the project when it has gelled a little more.
What else, what else? I was moaning before about the poor quality of the GW "Foundation Paints". Let's go on and suggest that GW get out of the paint game and just stock Vallejo - or someone who does quality paint! Furthermore, have we seen the packs of plastic bases? 20mm and 25mm and 40mm and then the horse bases all in one pack! I guess I won't be buying any more of those then - Litko, here I come!
On the topic of rewards, I think I remarked in an earlier post that the "Defence of Melbourne" project would be soaking up about 60% of my hobby time this year. At the time I'd not really thought too much about what the rest would be, but now I know.
I've enough Grenze castings from DPC to finish of my Croat forces for the Strudelberg game (whenever that may happen); along with them I also got a couple of bags of Austrian German infantry who I intend to paint up per the test shots I did a while back with the red pants. Too gorgeous.
This ought to see me with some leftover Grenzers. Hm, what to do, what to do... I am thinking of cutting them up and trying to create some pose variants - after all, DPC only offer three - including the ropey Officer/NCO type wearing the cloak with an un-pleasing looking sword being freely brandished. Secondly, I think the cut of the Grenze uniform is not unlike that of the Hungarian infantry during the War of the Austrian Succession, and I'm doing to try my hand at producing some. Ulp! That's about 20% of my hobby time.
The remaining 20% will be taken up with some of the new Eureka Sumerians. This is a period of history that has always exerted a strong fascination for me and I am looking forward to getting some of these minis and really getting to grips with them. I'll review them when I have them to hand and talk about the project when it has gelled a little more.
What else, what else? I was moaning before about the poor quality of the GW "Foundation Paints". Let's go on and suggest that GW get out of the paint game and just stock Vallejo - or someone who does quality paint! Furthermore, have we seen the packs of plastic bases? 20mm and 25mm and 40mm and then the horse bases all in one pack! I guess I won't be buying any more of those then - Litko, here I come!
Thursday, April 03, 2008
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