Painting Flags

 

Sir Allen Aspley's Foote, ECW

Acrylic on lightly varnished copy paper. Marked up with a pencil and then coloured.

Yuki and Makiko

 

Yuki and Makiko waiting for the bus.

These are a couple of civilian figures that I got with some Maschinen Krieger kits, oh, quite some time back. I am currently building a JGSDF Type 61 tanks and a few other bits and have a rough plan in mind.

The Society of Cavaliers

It was a cold day. Minus 3 Celsius. Father had driven us up to Oxford in his baby blue Hillman Minx. 

I still have the old girl in the garage.

We'd set off bright and early with a packet of ham sandwiches and a thermos flask full of tea which mother had put into a basket for us. Magnifique! Mother was a jolly good egg and proposed to crack on with some knitting that she needed to catch up upon. Good show!

We motored along at a good clip, and the car only broke down on us twice. Father did insist we stop at St Albans so he could get a good look at the Roman walls for a new Ancients project he was working on. Some rules called "WRG" - I knew nothing except that they came with a reputation for the recreation of historical accuracy that was unparalleled.  

I had a Transistor Radio on the back seat and it was playing "Hey Jude" by the Beatles. 

It was quite the jolly outing.

We were filled with curiosity as to what the Brig have in store for us. We had been sent a rather mysterious invitation in the post. We were to present ourselves at the Mitre Hotel in Oxford to hear a proposal.

Rumour had gotten about in certain circles that Mr Featherstone and Mr Bath (among others) had also been invited along.

Now, at the time, the Brig was a big wig -  the Head of Military History at Sandhurst. He had just published a smashing book on the Battle of Edgehill the year before. So, of course, speculation was running wild!

So, there we were. Father parked and we went inside the hotel and were guided to a private dining room. Mr Bath and Mr Featherstone were already there. Mr Bath looked a little nervous and was gripping his G&T tighly. Mr Featherstone was dapper as ever with a silk cravat and his inevitable cigarette holder. Father ordered a pint of Real Ale for himself and a lemonade for me.

Various others filtered in. My Bath was showing off a few of his latest War Elephants. Mr Barker shuddered visibly at the sight of them. "More of your horrid pachyderms, Tony?" 

But then from without came a terrible crashing, a jangling if spurs and a stamping of booted feet. "Damn it all! I can't see a bloody thing with these plumes in my face!"

The door was flung open to reveal a terrible apparition. 'Twas the Brig, red of visage, white moustache bisecting his face, flailing madly at the plume of a large hat the sat upon his head. He was clad in the costume of a Cavalier. All in pale blue with white lacing.

"Ye gods..." gasped someone. 

The cigarette holder dropped from Mr Featherstone's lips.

Mr Bath went a deadly shade of white. 

The Brig tore the hat from his head.

"Gentlemen, I have a proposition for you!

"We shall form a society called the Sealed Knot (or, indeed, the Society of Cavaliers).

"I shall be Captain General. Sergeant Featherstone here will be Secretary."

Mustering

Giving Fire

Appointing Mr Featherstone Sec'y

Well, the meeting was something of a blur as the Brig ordered VAT 69 all round. Goodness me, it was an affair to remember. I especially remember being given a couple of hundred Willies and being told to have them ready by Easter.

He even painted up OK.

 S

See where these little diversions lead us?

Huh, he looks like he just took a snowball to the head.

Do You Wanna Build a Snowman?

 OK, off topic, but I could not resist. And, besides, it's seasonal.

I'll paint him up tomorrow.

So, I've never really sculpted anything before, so this is a bit new and quite a bit of fun while watching "A Nightmare Before Christmas" with Erin.

A Troop of Shew

There's no business like Shew business I whistle through my teeth as I put the finishing touches on my latest for the Brig.

It was different, it was a little out of the ordinary. I thought, oh it's a royal bodyguard for the Graf. Idly I wondered how they would go in "Charge!". A quick puff on my cheroot and I opened the window to let the smoke out and palmed down a mint so mother wouldn't suspect.

Whatever might the Brig be up to? They certainly didn't look like anything from the VFS.

Ye Sealed Knotte

'Twas the week (or two) before Christmas, and all through the house was the rustle of quiet industry.

Mother was creating plum puddings and mince pies and trifles of many kinds.

Father was busy converting Spencer Smiths into panzer grenadiers with two-minute epoxy and a straight-edge razor. 

I was fiddling about at the small desk in my loft bedroom with a number of half-pennies in a desultory fashion. I had just finished the Brig's 'The Cavalier Army'. What a cracking good read it had been; everything you could possibly wish to know about the Civil War. My brain was buzzing with the possibilities. 

I had had an idea of what might be achieved upon the tabletops of Mars with numbers of pikemen and musketeers in the service of the King.

"Eureka..!" I muttered and drew up the following diagram upon a sheet of foolscap.

You know, I pondered aloud... I wonder if the Brig would be interested in this. 

That called for a shot of VAT 69. And a small cheroot. I had to be careful not to overindulge as I had Finals coming up the next morning.

Whoever said Ed Suren did not have a sense of humour?

 

Surely this miniature was sculpted after the founding of The Sealed Knot?

Oh eBay, thou temptress

 

Oh, the shame

I regret nothing. Nothing!

Some cutting in, a few details, maybe some back-lining, and they'll slot right in with the Littler Britons.

Yes, yes, I fell down a rabbit hole.

 One dug by Lord of the Rings.

That'll teach me to watch a few episodes of Amazon's "Rings of Power".

I pulled out my pile of LotR shame, and oo-er, it's a big one.

I was thinking, Uruk Hai, Minas Tirith, Warg riders...

So this happened over the weekend.

They need finishing, but that is how I am heading. I think I have 8 or 9 painted and another 6 or 7 in various states. Enough to give Rohan some trouble.

The GW Uruks always suffered from bendy or plain old broken pikes, but I have salvaged a dozen which are now now on the paint bench.

Wouldn't a pike block of 60 of these fellows look good? 3 ranks, 20 files. And because pikes are Landsknechty, I had to do this:

Nothing like a Berserker with a two-handed sword for ruining your day.

And then there was Minas Turith. I have a few goodies and some scattered infantry, but, I want to go fairly big on this army, so went for this for the core of the army.

I'd add Citadel Guard and Guardians of the Fountain Court and probably more knights as well. However, I think this is a good start!

The High Command

So to speak.

Some years ago I inherited a random and diverse collection of French for Egypt. Some were Willies for the later battles of the campaign, ditto some Old Glory. I believe they were surplus from the Collection of Charles Grant which he's probably had in the 1990s while he was writing his books on the campaign and his series of articles for Practical Wargamer.

Some bits of this collection were useful and joined my current army which is my round about way of saying I painted something.

I forget which regiment this is...

Will he be the beginning of another regiment or will he hang about the Corsican Tyrant?

One just needs a large enough piece of plastic to mount them on.

I do like the uniform and will likely do a unit. I am keeping my French cavalry units fairly small as they did not get to Egypt in any great strength. The 7eme bis Hussars are 8 troopers and an officer for example, and that's the standard I'll build the two mooted units of Dragoons I have in mind as well.

Well, that's enough 'castles in the air' for one day.

Keep on smiling. 

The Ongoing History

 

In one rank

In two

I've sent the past dew mornings on basing the Mamluks and this is where I am, currently. I'm quite happy with how they look. I want to add some more 'rabble' infantry and push the cavalry part to twelve figures at least.

Things ought to look pretty spectacular when there are 24 or more on the table.

Just Passing Through

 Enthused after playing with my French infantry, I have gotten on with starting to base my Mamluk cav
alry.

I think I have posted here about the concept for the basing, so I won't go over it again.

Cha-a-a-a-arge!

The idea is to build up one large unit of Mamluks in the style you see in the picture; quite diorama-like with the smattering of infantry figures thrown in. The effect I am seeking is one of movement which I hope to emphasise with flags and banners. They will be the mainstay of the army. 

I will also build up smaller units of armoured cavalry and I hope, some camelry to really sell the diverse nature of the army. I want to create a large unit of 'rabble' infantry that I can break down into smaller units as scenarios demand as well as small units of musketeers that might be the private retinues of slavers and similar types.

Lastly, I would like to put together a unit of Janissaries because, well, this is officially the Ottoman Empire after all.

Numbers are still a work in progress, but 12 to 16 figure sub units suggest themselves.

Catching Up

 Sometimes I realise that a lot of what I am working on does not always make it to the blog, so to make up for that, let me post a few pictures of a long-term project.

Now, I simply need a horde of mamluks.

A Savant with an exciting piece of natural history to describe.

General Bonaparte passes the time with General Kleber.

A few of the 7ème bis de hussards. There are some more that need to be based.

The Long War of the Quar

 It seems the Quar have always been at war. When the first wandering clans of insect gatherers built their low, mud-walled buildings, it was as much to keep out other Quar as the wild animals. As they first learned to make tools to get food, they quickly learned to make tools to defend themselves. The mud walls quickly became fortified citadels, and then city-states. In five thousand years of civilization, the only constants of their culture have been the changing of the seasons and the threat of war.

So says the fluff. And there os a lot of fluff concerning the Quar and their world of Alwyd. The sustained and deep world-building behind the se figures and the associated game are strong draws. And then there are the miniatures...

Heavy shotgun team

A humble Rhyfler

There have been a few iterations of the Quar in miniatures, the 28mm, 15mm and 6mm metals that go back about a decade and just last year Wargames Atlantic brought out a plastic range to support their version of the game.

I love the slouched, somewhat down-trodden look of the quar. It reminds me a little of the underground comics from the 1960s. That's driven my desire to paint them in something of a Vietnam War style.

I got distracted.

 

I have a bit of a thing for the older Games Workshop stuff...

Recently was inspired to go and scrounge up some of the old RTB01 plastic Space Marines and paint them in the heraldry of the Lamenters chapter.

Just remember. White base coat and two thin coats of yellow...

Prussian Pottering

 

Not much time spent at the painting Desk on the Prussians because I got distracted by another project. 

Still, I have made a little progress as you can see.

I'm aiming to finish them off over the weekend.

Wish me luck!

Back on the Tools

Or back on the Prussians at least. After a remarkably long wait, a small parcel of figures arrived in the mailbox last week, all the way from Sweden. Hurrah, I thought, my Stadden Prussians have arrived! I have myself a couple of days to psych myself up, then turned with due heroism to the task of removing flash. Done and now primed, I started painting.

The proud Fahnenjunker bears before him the Leibfahne of IR#5

For my next trick... the Regimentsfahne.

Tweaking Mameluke basing.

 

Chaaaaaaarge!

I think this might do the trick. Not every horse-man will get his base so liberally garnished with followers, but ... enough will. Then there might also be a subsequent rank to reinforce the illusion.

I need to get my hands on some more 40x75mm Renedra bases to see how an entire unit looks.

What do you think?

Building Little Boats

 or...

Dhow are you?

The bits.

Still painting Frenchmen in Egypt, be reassured.

However, I was reading the excellent 'Napoleon in Egypt' by Paul Strathern and is starting to become clear to me that I would benefit from some watercraft, so wat could be more appropriate or more multi-use than an Arabian Dhow.

I well remember the templates available on the Major-Generals' marvellous website, so off I flew via the Wayback Machine (http://web.archive.org/web/20060614041903/http://zeitcom.com/majgen/index.html) and downloaded them.

The lead ship in her class.

In the photo above you can see the deck united with the hull. The smaller pieces are the fore and aft decks that will be raised a little higher then the level of the main deck by means of some shims underneath them.

The decks are heavy card with the planking drawn in black biro and then with the odd plank picked out with a wash of one colour or another. It's surprisingly colourful and effective. I'm kind of regretting using such strongly coloured paper for the hull - a manila folder seems a better option in retrospect.

Next comes the mast, yard, sail and some rudimentary rigging.

I am thinking three or four might be a good number for this flotilla?