The Spoils in Closer Detail. . .

The fully assembled Berliner Zinnfiguren Prussian mobile field forge with Fife & Drum limber horses and an RSM95 rider.

A few of you asked the other day for a peek at the items schlepped home from Berlin recently by the Grand Duchess, so here you are.

-- Stokes

Various Willie (Suren) 30mm ladies of ill repute, with The Naughty Lola at the center of things, and a 30mm Black Hussar Prussian military chaplain. I'd say he has his work cut out for him.

More 30mm Willie (Suren) sutleresses and vivandieres. I'll use these in two or three small vignettes, one of which will include a couple of soldiers' wives tending a large pot of laundry over a fire and hanging wet things on a line.

A 30mm Willie (Suren) plucky stable lad and running farm girl.

A 30mm Willie (Suren) bishop. This one has, as yet, no practical application, but he was too good to pass up since he bears such a marked resemblance to Monty Python's Terry Jones. "Oh no! It's. . . da Bishop!"

30mm Willie (Suren) dueling gentlemen, their seconds, and spectators. A neat little vignette all on its own. Eventually, I'll either add these to that bunch of Jacdaw frolicking aristocrats, painted in the spring of 2013, or make them dueling officers as part of a larger camp scene that I'm mulling over.

More 30mm Willie (Suren) figures, this time male servants and musicians, who will definitely become part of General Phillipe de Latte's retinue at some point in the not-too-distant future. A very special "Thank-you" to my friend Stefan Schulz for his extremely kind and generous donation of the figures shown here and in the preceding photograph. Much appreciated, Stefan. Vielen Dank!

Finally, one of several items I purchased last Friday from Fife & Drum/Minden, which arrived Tuesday this week. The 1/56th Fife & Drum French marshal on horseback, who is destined to become the "new" version of that most notorious cad and bounder. . . the French mercenary-adventurer and veteran of the Seven Years War. . . General Phillipe de Latte. I opted to have him holding a spyglass and with his head covered, but the figure comes with an extra head and right arm holding his hat in salute, so there is a bit of room to create just the figure you want. Just two small drops of Gorilla Super Glue, and voilà! De Latte's arm and head were firmly in place.

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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