Six Finished Stollenian (Prussian) Limber Teams. . .

Three views of the now FINISHED half-dozen Minden Prussian limber teams, which have tormented me since late summer last year.

Time to start those additional line infantry drummers and replacement standard bearers and those several new units of cavalry beyond that. No more transport for a while. Whew!

-- Stokes

Later that Next Day. . .

And now for some technical details! Here they are:

1) The 3mm thick ply bases are from Litko and measure 165mm long by 50mm wide. Well worth the wait of a few weeks after ordering late last winter. I don't know why on earth it took me so long to discover laser-cut wooden bases!

2) Once painting and glossing was done, last weekend, I used an old brush to apply liberal amounts of Liquitex acrylic matt medium and then covered each base in sand -- collected during the summer of 1984 from my maternal grandparents' creek bed in Berks County, Pennsylvania where yours truly spent his formative years -- tapping lightly to dislodge the excess and then setting everything aside for 24 hours to dry. Using matt medium as an adhesive is a trick I learned 20 years ago in a book on creating scenery for model railways and dioramas.

3) The second night, I applied dark brown acrylic ink -- Liquitex Burnt Umber -- thinned with a bit of Liquitex flow enhancer using another old brush.

4) The third evening, heavy dry-brushing with light tan acrylic paint followed. . . I've learned over the years by observing the various ways Der Alte Fritz finishes his painted figures in Hesse-Seewald.

5) The limber teams were finally wrapped up yesterday night, following the Young Master's bedtime, with the sparing application of more acrylic matt medium with careful sprinkles of Woodland Scenics scatter grass material and the odd tuft of more coarse foliage. The trick, I have learned by trial and error over the years, is to use very small amounts of grass and foliage material. Less is more as the saying goes.

Of course, given the color of these limbers, I'll have to bring my existing cannon in line by (re-) painting my gun carriages. Or replacing most of the guns with new models from Minden. Now, there's an idea!

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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