While the Grand Duchess is away. . . playing Mah Jong no less. . .

From left to right: The regimental inhaber Herr Colonel Heinrich von Heide along with his standard bearer and trumpeter. These are going to be a fun bunch of figures to paint and a nice change after all of that white-coated infantry last spring and summer.

Imagine! The nerve! So, obviously I have had a couple of hours to myself this evening. And what better way to spend that spare time than working on some RSM95 wargaming miniatures.

Just a little bit of painting on the first three figures tonight: green bases, the faces, and a quick coat of Liquitex black acrylic paint on the horses and tricornes. I like the blue-black of this particular color -- very suitable for noble cuirassier steeds. It dries quickly with a nice sheen and a stretchy surface, so it stands up well to handling and doesn't flake off of metal or plastic figures. An added benfit of Liquitex is that it helps prevent the black gesso undercoat from rubbing off the ears and muzzles of the horses plus the boot toes of the troopers before I finish everything and slap on a couple of protective coats of Future/Klear acrylic floor finish.

So, only about 60 minutes of work this evening while listening to Croatian Radio on shortwave -- in Croatian, English, and Spanish no less -- but it's really amazing what you can accomplish in a week's time if you make yourself sit down for an hour or two each evening. Marathon painting sessions can be very productive and a great deal of fun, and I certainly enjoyed them at 17 or 18, but I suspect that consistent regular painting is far more productive and produces faster results.

The great love of my life, the fair Grand Duchess Sonja, and I are of to the Chicago suburbs tomorrow to visit. . . Yes! The fantastic mid-blue and yellow IKEA!!! Always a fun trip and after ABBA, Gustavus Adolphus, and our old grad school friend Helena up in Minnesota, possibly Sweden's greatest contribution to the world! ;-)

P.S.
And let's not forget the late, great Holger Eriksson either!

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...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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