The washes arrive...

Hooray, the Vallejo washes set arrived from Maelstrom Games today. I'm looking forward to trying them out if my thumb settles down, I have been putting an ice-pack on it for 15 minutes a day plus have been taking anti-inflamatories. Bit hard not to use your thumb if much of your work involves pen pushing, mouse clicking and keyboarding- I did have a break from playing the drums on the weekend however.
I have just downloaded the PDFof Battlegames issue 25 and am looking forward to having a read - it's my favourite wargames magazine, Henry Hyde does a great job.
It's been great to read some of the encouraging comments people have put up here and on TMP about the stuff on the blog- thanks.
I have been giving some more thought to WW2 in 1/72 (20mm) and have been trawling PSR to see which figures look best. I would be happy to mix plastics and metals, and already have a few Revell Germans painted up, plus I have painted up a few for son of jacksarge's collection. I used to have heaps of 1/72 WW2 stuff as a lad and enjoyed building armour kits- bit of nostalgia about this scale I guess.
If I can part with my 1/72 Napoleonic stuff I may consider doing Napoleonics with Baccus 6mm, I used to have some of the old Heoics & Ros Napoleonics but sold them on.
Here's a couple of my Revell Germans:

Revell 1/72 WW2 German MG Team

German Hood

"YooHoo Britischer Schweinhunds, over here" said Herman waving vigorously.

Erwin & Kurt line up some Tommies.

More soon.

Conversions of 1/72 Napoleonics

Just thought I'd put up a couple of images of a Napoleonic conversion. I have been messing about with the blog a bit because I have injured my thumb and cannot do much painting at the moment.
Here he is:


Wurttemberg King's Chasseur

This particular figure is a conversion from Revell 1/72 British Guard Cavalry. Firstly it is a paint conversion, but I have also replaced the rear blanket roll with a miliput one and constructed a saddle cloth of the appropriate shape from paper. Here is another shot:

My point of reference was an illustration from Histoire et Collections lovely full-colour hardback on the battle of Borodino. These other pictures are a paint only conversion. They are from the Zvezda French Light Infantry set and have been painted as Italian light infantry.

These are really beautiful sculpts with so much excellent detail. I have metal and plastic figures in my collection but I have to admit that plastics such as these are far superior in terms of detail when compared to many metal ranges.
Whilst I am prevented from painting I will try and keep my camera busy.......


War of Spanish Succession in 6mm and other stuff...

Back again with another riveting post.
 I am still working on the 10mm Austrians but have also been doing a bit of brushwork on my WSS French, can you spot the tiny fellows on the plastic containers in this shot of the painting table?

I thought I might post a few shots of the 6mm Baccus WSS which I have already completed as well.

British WSS Baccus 6mm

Again, apologies for the quality of the camrea work. I know not everyone likes static flock with this scale, but I'm quite happy with their general appearance. Some more:

"But the detail gets lost when you step back" some critics might say-- ah yes but I know it's there and I enjoyed painting it...
I have started work on my second unit of French line, here's the first:

Must have had the flash on for these...

I do like these little guys, Pete Berry of Baccus has done some really cool stuff, don't think I'd like to paint in this scale all the time though.
Whilst in the 18th century train of thought, I have recently read volume 1 & 2 of Wargaming in History by Charles Grant & Phil Olley and found the books really enjoyable. The pictures are very inspiring although I could not find the room for playing with 28mm figures on a table of that size here, there are still plenty of great ideas to be gleaned.
I'm thinking a WW2 photo session may be in order soon, and perhaps painting up some more of son of jacksarge's Airfix US Paras for fun.
I have been thinking of getting rid of my 1/72 Napoleonics (some examples pictured below) probably just for trade, let me know if anyone is interested.

Some pictures of WIP and recent stuff...

I have been busy taking and editing a few photos to put on the blog, unfortunately my camera is pretty basic, as are my photography skills, so any tips would be welcome. So here we go....

10mm Pendraken Austrians

Above are some 10mm Pendraken SYW Austrians which are on my painting table at the moment. They are not too bad to paint although I think I find 6mm and larger scales a tad easier, 10mm horse & musket stuff rates a bit higher on the 'fiddly to work with' scale for me.

10mm Pendraken SYW Command

Above is one of the figures from the command group, I think it's intended to be the standard bearer. The Prussians actually had the flag as part of the casting which was kind of chunky. I guess I will have to hand paint a paper flag or find something I can download and print off for this guy. Apologies for perhaps being too close up with image.

10mm Pendraken SYW Prussians

And again....

And back on....

Prussians, not running away...

These miniatures are painted using acrylics from Derivan, Vallejo and GW. Undercoat used was a pale grey artists acrylic gesso- it comes in a nice big jar. I tend to use grey undercoat on all my stuff now as I think that neutral shades tend to interfere a lot less with the colours which you place over the top. The Prussian flag is hand-painted and ok I guess. The figures are based forthe  Might & Reason ruleset on heavy card, the sort used for picture framing. The basing is done using PVA and fine sand which when dry is painted in usually four stages of earthy colours- I use tube acrylics for this part mostly. They are finished off with a bit of static flock. With my most of my figures I varnish with Jo Sonja's acrylic satin varnish, applied by brush. These miniatures are mounted on ice-lolly sticks for painting, although I don't usually work this way, most of the time I paint figures individually on an old vitamin bottle or similar- Baccus 6mm stuff is handy because it comes in strips and can be easily stuck on a bottle.

Well that will do for now, more to follow.....