Faces and Hands Out of the Way!

Grüβe aus dem Stollenkeller! Here’s another photo update on that latest batch of figures – plastic Revell Prussians this time – in progress here in the best of cellars. Stayed up very late last night and applied Winsor & Newton Griffin alkyd fleshtone (oil-based but dries to the touch overnight) to the hands and faces of all 32 figures comprising “Freiherr Wilhelm’s Pioneers”. Their wigs and hair are finished too, though you can’t see that very well from this photo.

The way is clear now to begin painting the uniforms proper, mid-blue in this case with red facings and silver/white lace for the officers and men. I’m using GW Enchanted Blue and actually basing the uniform of my troops on that worn by Austria’s Pontonier-Corps, illustrated in plate D of The Austrian Army 1740-1780: Specialist Troops in the Osprey Men-at-Arms series. A very pretty uniform, so how could I hope to do better myself? Exactly.

Otherwise, there is much happening in the various corners of Apocryphal 18^th Century Europe as the summer campaigning season gets into full swing. If you haven’t done so already, visit the Emperor vs. Elector blog at http://emperor-elector.blogspot.com/ and take a closer look at related blogs like these:

· The Duchy of Alzheim

· The Duchy of Mieczyslaw

· The Grand Duchy of Hetzenberg

· The Kingdom of Hesse-Seewald

· The Landgraviate of Hesse-Fedora

· The Principality of Hesse-Engelburg

· The Principality of Saxe-Bearstein

· David von Tippelbruder’s new Prussian garrison infantry standards at his Uniform Templates blog

See also the following blogs, which aren’t necessarily connected with the Emperor vs. Elector guys:

· Henry Hyde’s Battlegames blog at http://battlegames.wordpress.com/

· Frivelous Fusiliers at: http://frivolousfusiliers.blogspot.com/

· Flanderkin Serjant at: http://flanderkin.blogspot.com/

· Grimsby Wargaming at: http://grimsbywargaming.blogspot.com/

· Tarleton’s Quarter at: http://www.gilesallison.blogspot.com/

· Steve’s Random Musings on Wargaming: http://steve-the-wargamer.blogspot.com/

· Phil’s War Cabinet at: http://www.warcabinet.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/

To say that there is a great deal of top-notch project design, painting, scenery construction, gaming, and photography going on out there in “blogland” at the moment is something of an understatement. Why, it’s almost more than a man can stand!

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

And We're Off!!!

Arrrgh! Gotta go back into camera settings on my iPhone to bring all of the frame into focus. Blast! Painting is underway on the 60 or so Minden Austrians, which are slated to become my version of the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment of AWI renown. More or less indistinguishable from Austrians of the era really, right down to the red facings and turnbacks, but the eventual flags (already in my files) will set them apart. I went ahead and based-coated all of them over a couple of days lthe last week of August, using a mix of light gray and white acrylic gesso, before next applying my usual basic alkyd oil flesh tone to the faces and hands. In a day or two, I'll hit that with Army Painter Flesh Wash to tone things down a bit and bring some definition to the faces and hands. As usual, the plan is to focus on about 20 figures at a time, splitting the regiment roughly into thirds along with the color party and regimental staff. Depending on ...

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...

Martin said…

Hey Stokes,

That will be a snazzy looking unit by the time you're done with them. Refresh my memory, what do use for the stands to make the Revell figures blend with your other lines? Oh, and by the way, did you ever start on the quarter round fieldworks?

Yours,

Martin

6:25 PM

Fitz-Badger said…

You're certainly contributing your share! Nice work!

8:13 PM

Bluebear Jeff said…

Yes, bravo, sir!

-- Jeff

8:58 PM

Steve-the-Wargamer said…

...it goes without saying that I concur!

My congratulaitons on being in print as well!

6:16 AM