Kurmainz Grenadier Company Officer and Drummer Done. . .

All ready for shiny acrylic gloss and basing in the next couple of days.

Not my best painting by any stretch, but they're done and just waiting for the final couple of steps. Sadly, I've got a four-hour professional development seminar of teaching research and writing to undergrads on campus tomorrow morning, so that will delay everything else by a few hours. And we just learned today that the wife of a neighbor couple we a close to has had her Cancer return, and it has spread throughout her system -- not the kind of news anyone wants -- so we might spend some time with them tomorrow afternoon, and see if there is anything we can do to assist. Suddenly, toy soldiers seem rather less important.

-- Stokes

Comments

CelticCurmudgeon said…

My Dear heinz-Ulrich, Salutations,

Nothing can be said that eases the difficulty of such moments. Your friends will need your friendship and assistance throughout this ordeal. The occasional prepared meal, perhaps assistance getting back and forth to the oncologist, but most of all understanding friendship which listens when they relate what is happening - these are the things you can offer and provide.

You have heard me make mention of Karen on the Daisy discussion group. She is recovering from a two year battle with breast cancer and those things I mentioned were given to us by friends and family. They helped us get through this most trying time.

My prayers and commiserations are with you and your friends.

One thing, you may find some solace in being able to occasionally retreat to the shelter of the painting table. While not important at all in the real world, you might need a small break from time to time.

Gerardus Magnus (Jerry)
Archbishop Emeritus

5:25 AM

tidders said…

Stokes,

Great work, the grenadier company looks ready for action.

-- Allan

11:35 AM

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 ...

Sunday Morning Coffee with AI. . .

A rmed with a second cup of fresh, strong coffee, I messed around a bit this morning with artlist.io using its image to image function in an attempt to convert my hand-drawn map from September 2006 to something that more resembles an old map from the mid-18th century. And just like my experiments with Ninja AI in June, the results are mixed. The above map is pretty good, but Artlist keeps fouling up the place names and has trouble putting a faint overlay of hexes across the entire area. Hexes, admittedly, are not likely to be found on any genuine maps from the era in question, but there we are. Frankly, I prefer the appearance of the Ninja map, but there were problems getting it to correct its errors. Grrrr. As is the case with so much having to do with the various AI's out there now, the output generated is a direct result of the prompts entered. For text alone, and when you develop a lengthy, highly detailed prompt, it is...

Continued Regional Map Revisions. . .

F ooled around a bit more with the revised map just before and after dinner this evening, using the Fotor app to reinsert missing text . I also removed a few other things using the 'Magic Eraser' function, which works surprisingly well. Now, we're getting somewhere. I just have to figure out how to ensure that the text is all a uniform font style and maybe figure out a way to add a few bunches of trees to suggest forested areas, Ninja AI is not always entirely cooperative to the tune of "I'm sorry Dave. I can't do that." -- Stokes

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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