Happy Christmas Sunday!

A pair of Norwegian Fjord Horses in the snow. I'm not necessarily pining or the fjords myself this morning, but some snow for Nordic/Cross-Country skiing would be nice.

Another blissfully quiet morning here today although things are beginning to heat up in the Raid on Fickmuhlen play-by-email game between General MacDuff (Ross MacFarlane) and General von Tschatschke (yours truly), hosted by Greg Horne. Watch this space for a photograph or two later today.

-- Stokes

The latest Kodak Moment in The Raid on Fickmuhlen. General MacDuff's infantry have occupied the village ahead of General von Tschatschke's cavalry. Drat! Meanwhile von Tschatschke's guns at the far left have fired on MacDuff's cavalry, inflicting only minimal casualties for their trouble. It seems von Tschatschke's troops are having difficulty establishing a line. And what of the good von Tschatschke himself? After one ale too many, he looks woozy and wobbly in the saddle. Time for two aspirin and a lie-down.

Comments

CelticCurmudgeon said…

My Dear Heinz-Ulrich, Greetings!

It is so very nice to see that you are able to enjoy the holidays by participating in a game with friends.
All the very best for a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Years!!

With kindest regards,

Gerardus Magnus
Archbishop Emeritus

3:23 PM

Der Alte Fritz said…

In the battle pix, it would be helpful to identify the relative positions of the two sides. Which side of the table is Side A and which is Side B, etc.?

Jim

3:57 PM

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...

Warboss Green Bases. . .

I t's amazing how something as simple as applying two coats of Citadel 'Warboss Green' (ex-Games Workshop 'Goblin Green') can enliven a unit of figures and get 'em that much closer to glossing and completion. In much the same way that applying fleshtone early in painting process helps bring the figures to life. Just some limited dry-brushing to bring out the manes, tails, and some equine musculature, and I'm calling my version of Saxony's von Polenz Cuirassiers, circa 1733, done and dusted. Longtime visitors to the Grand Duchy of Stollen might recall (the blog will turn 19 years old in September) that I generally go for an old school approach when it comes to unit bases and paint them a nice, bright green. Exceptions include command vignettes, skirmishers of one kind or another, transport, camp followers, and various other civilian one-offs. The approach is not to everyone's taste, but I like the cheery toy soldier appearance once everything...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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