A Wargame Figure Painter's Things-to-Do List

Agh! It’s finally Friday, and I can’t do any painting! Life is so unfair sometimes. We have a couple with whom we are good friends coming over for wine, pizza, dessert, and good conversation this evening. All fine and dandy. The bad part is that I need to swiffer and vacuum the apartment plus clean the bathroom before they arrive at 7:00. If we didn’t actually LIKE this couple, I’d be more upset, but they are interesting and good company, so I guess it’s not too bad.

And then we’re going to Chicago early tomorrow for a day and dinner in the big city, so it’s unlikely that I’ll feel up to painting when we get home tomorrow night. I think the Grand Duchess must be involved in some sort of silent grand plot, along with other wargaming wives and girlfriends around the world, to keep me from finishing the Zichenauer infantry! Hmmm. . .

Sunday is November 11^th, Veterans’ Day (originally Armistice Day), the day on which general fighting ceased on the Western Front in 1918, and which is usually thought of as the beginning of the end to WWI, at least as history is taught here in the USA.

I always think of my maternal grandfather on this day. He was a paratrooper during WWII (13th Airborne Division), a tall, handsome, fair-haired North Carolina boy, who was drafted almost immediately after the

entered WWII. Luckily, he saw no combat and survived to come home and start a family with my grandmother. His two brothers and three brothers-in-law also made it home relatively unscathed. Pretty amazing when you think about it. We didn’t always see eye to eye on everything, but as an adult, I often ask myself how he would have handled various situations that come up in everyday life. He was quite a guy.

Finally, the 30 Spencer Smith cavalry figures, in the classic charge pose, are waiting for their basecoat of artists’ acrylic gesso as you know already. I just have to finish the Zichenauers first. Let’s see, we have about a month and a half of 2007 left, and I’d also like to paint a two-gun battery of artillery with 13 crew, General Phillipe de Latté and his two staff -- you’ve seen them lurking unpainted in many photos for the last several months -- and two medieval bell tents from Magister Militum, which arrived last March.

The question naturally begs, can I actually do it? Well, you never know unless you try, right? Or, as an old Pennsylvania lottery commercial used to say in the early 80s, “You’ve gotta play to win!” So, I think I’ll make a painting challenge to myself, and see if I can get all of this “stuff” finished by December 31^st. If I am unable to meet the challenge, you Grand Duchy of Stollen regulars receive full crowing and cajoling rights up to and including actual mockery and derision. Hopefully, that won’t be necessary though. ;-) Happy Weekend everyone!

A Little More Brushwork. . .

A little more brushwork on the first batch of (my version of) the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment yesterday (Saturday). Taking a different tack this time and addressing many of the details first before the white coats and other larger areas of uniform. The eagle-eyed among you will notice that I've painted the (dark) red stocks of the enlisted men. Always a difficult and frustrating item to paint, it made sense to paint from the inside out as it were and get that particular detail out of the way first rather than try to paint it in later after much other painting has been accomplished. Trying to reduce the need for later retouching of other items on the figures you understand. Hopefully, I will be able to get back to these later today after a second trip back to the Apple Store for help with a couple of new iPad issues and, following the return home, some revision of Google Slides for tomorrow's meetings with my students. -- Stokes P.S. And according t...

Basic Reds Done at Last. . .

S till quite a way to go with the current batch of 20 human figures and a horse (of course), but they're actually starting to look like something after all of the red distinctions. Quite a bit of painting in hour-long sessions the last week as and when time has allowed. Mostly applying the basic dark red to facing areas and turnbacks followed by the inevitable touch-ups to clean up wobbly edges and those misplaced, minute splotches of Citadel Khorne Red. They're looking like so many Austrian infantry regiments of the era at this point, but the eventual flags will turn them magically into the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment, more or less, of the AWI period. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. One frustrating point (ahem) of sad discovery. I've started trying to use those Winsor & Newton 'Series Seven' brushes (#1 rounds) purchased last spring, and the blasted things simply will not keep a point. Very frustrating since I have heard over the y...

It's Early Days Yet. . .

M aking some early progress with Batch A of the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment over the last several days/evenings. Nothing terribly exciting just yet, but the basic black, brown, and flesh areas are done as are the green bases, and gray undercoat. The latter two areas needed some careful retouching early in the week. Next up, the neck stocks. I might just do these in red for the enlisted men although some of my source material suggest they were black, but I always look for an excuse to shake things up a bit. Any errant splotches of red (or black) can be covered with another application of light gray before I move onto the next step. "Giddy up!" as one Cosmo Kramer might have said. -- Stokes

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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