Skip to main content

Is it possible to go snowblind from figure painting?

After a marathon painting session last night, that’s how I fell at least. So much white everywhere: shoulder belts and musket straps. I feel like Danny from Kipling’s The Man Who Would Be King. Anyway, I’ve reached the home stretch with the last batch of Zichenauer infantry. Tonight, we’ll start with the metallics: brass cartridge pouch badges, scabbard tips, and sword hilts plus the officer’s gorget and gold sash. Giddy up!

Comments

guy said…
Hi Stokes,

I was fortunate to be able to spend a couple of hours at the Warfare wargames show in Reading, UK on saturday morning. For once I did not buy a single figure but stocked up with paints and lots of splendid flags for my SYW armies.

My main purchase were 2 SYW books and the BAR rules. The books were Prussia's Glory by Duffy on Rossbach and Leuthen but the highlight was a large book in German by Dorn and Englemann called Fredericks battles. Contained in this are about 20 fantastic full page plates depicting the various battles and crammed with uniforms etc. My daughter is studying german at the moment so I commandeered her dictionary to try and decifer some of the text. A little expensive but I had been told to go and buy some Christmas presents so there it is.

Regards,
Guy
10:43 AM
Der Alte Fritz said…
Guy: Perhaps your daughter can translate some of the passages for you for a Christmas present. It's a very good book with lots of good orders of battle. Some of the pictures are dead wrong, for example some of the Russians are depicted wearing 1812 Kiwer shakos, while some of the Austrians are wearing casquets!!!!
4:14 PM
Fitz-Badger said…
I am constantly amazed by the quantity and quality of your output! If I didn't go blind from painting so many minis of the same type in such large batches I'm sure I'd go bonkers (whattya mean you thought that ship had already sailed?). :-)
8:32 PM
guy said…
der Alte Fritz,

Thanks for those comments. I will have a fresh look at it to try and spot these faults. I think the translation could take some time. The first word in the title could we thought be translated as either battles or slaughter. We settled on the first.

Finished reading the BAR rules last night and set up a couple of regiments to try out the various aspects such as firing and manoevering. V enjoyable. I will try them out with a brigade sized force at the weekend.

Regards,
Guy
4:03 AM
Snickering Corpses said…
Looking very good, Stokes. A little closer each round to getting them finished and on to those lovely cavalry.
5:02 AM
MurdocK said…
Yes you can go 'snowblind' from too long a painting session...

I was definately very tired of 'green' and its variations by the time I was done with my 5 Russian Dragoon Regiments last year.

I note, for myself at least, that when I am tired of painting I start to 'blink' really fast a few times. Once I do that two or three times in a row I know that it is time to stop painting (no matter how far from complete I am) otherwise I will be very 'squinty' for the next day.

I can definately relate to the 'snowblind' idea.
12:46 AM
Bluebear Jeff said…
Mind you, it is much easier to go "snowblind" if painting French or Austrian troops where white is the major color.


-- Jeff
2:13 AM
Der Alte Fritz said…
I tend to put in 2 to 3 hour stretches of time at the painting table. And my kiester starts to feel sore, then I know that it is time to take a break. That usually goes before the eyeballs give up. :)
12:44 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Presenting the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere!!!

Here they are, with the rearmost nine figures still drying, three squadrons of the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere, now in the service of the Grand Duchy of Stollen. And now, it's onto that artillery!
14 comments
Read more

Keepin' an Eye on the World Going By My Window . .

'The Nap at the Palace' by Jose Triado Mayol N ot much in the way of hobby-related activity happening here in the Grand Duchy lately.  Sigh.  And no surprise there really since there are only so many hours in the day, only so much mental and physical energy to spare, and you sometimes simply just have to give in and know when to say, um, "When!"  A glass of wine and/or evening yoga by the hearth with the Grand Duchess (who has practiced for over 20 years), and then off into la-la land.  Zzzzzzzzz.   More immediately, I'm recovering, mentally speaking, from a grueling Friday in which I was involved with three (online) conference sessions, one right after the other, followed by a 90-minute meeting at the end of the day. Also virtual. My brain has been mush ever since, so an easy, completely unproductive Saturday watching intermittent snow fall outside (no accumulation however) and drinking coffee while the visiting handymen completed some repair work down h...
3 comments
Read more

Having a "No Day". . .

  F or the almost 20 years that she lived in Mexico, one of my late mother's Irish friends frequently mentioned having a "No Day."  A day with no social obligations, chores, tasks, or other work that interfered with whatever personal interests took one's fancy on the day in question. Since today -- a gray and chilly Saturday -- is Mom's birthday, the Grand Duchess is out with friends, and the Young Master is ensconced on the sofa in the TV room with a cold, yours truly is taking his own such No Day.  I think Mom would approve of my decision to make the world go away, as the old Eddie Arnold song intoned, even if only for a little while. So, I will spend Saturday afternoon focused on that first squadron and small regimental staff of Eureka Saxon cuirassiers.  These have stood waiting  untouched over on the painting table for almost three weeks while we skied and otherwise gadded about with snowy, winter outdoor activities. I hope to share a painting update Sunday...
3 comments
Read more