Red Facings and Turnbacks Finally Finished!

Here's where we stand now with the second squadron of (Germanic) horse grenadiers in cuirasses and bearskins. That's not a warped base in the rear row, but rather a hardened dollop of super glue dripped onto the cutting mat ten or more years ago that causes the slight lean of one particular pair of cavalry figures and mounts.

Very quiet here in the Grand Duchy of Stollen during these last couple of weeks. The usual encroachments of life into free, uninterrupted hobby time you understand.

It's pointless cataloging the various impediments to painting since school began again a month ago. There has to be an easier way, but, as yet, I have not figured it out. As lamented any number of times here before, by the time The Young Master is tucked in at 8:30 in the evenings, I simply want to collapse into bed myself and not do anything but read or binge on the latest British or Australian TV series that the Grand Duchess and I watch via Netflix or Amazon.

In any case, I have managed at last to get the 'red' distinctions finished on these 14 figures plus the usual retouching of the blues and white shoulder belts after the fact. I think I'll tackle the white wigs and queues next with an undercoat of light tan followed by a sparing highlight of white on top of that before coming back to the white straps around and atop the valises at the back of the saddles.

Still not feeling like the back of the current project has been broken yet, but we're getting there. At some point, I'll need to pull up my socks, tighten my belt, and simply get on with attempting a dapple grey for the trumpeter. This particular horse has been in its undercoat of medium-dark gray for quite a few weeks now without anything further being done to it. It's high time to do something about that.

-- Stokes

The Eventual Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment. . .

The Anhalt-Zerbst regiment musters in the drill square to sort themselves into platoons and companies during the coming weeks Fall maneuvers if you will. A large dose of real life the last few days with the start of classes next Monday, various preparatory meetings, and finishing up a few other things this week. But, I managed to sort out 60 or so Minden Austrian infantry from the pile and get 'em stuck to temporary painting bases. Must carefully drill out the hands of several NCOs for flagpoles and pole arms this weekend before the usual basecoat. I'm thinking of mixing the usual white gesso with the usual light gray to kill two birds with one stone so to speak. Applying both base- and undercoat in one fell swoop as my grandmother used to say. In the meantime, the recently finished squadron of Saxon cuirassiers has been placed carefully in one of the clear acrylic boxes on my shelves until I have the suitable flag to affix. -- Sto...

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 ...

Presenting the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere!!!

Here they are, with the rearmost nine figures still drying, three squadrons of the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere, now in the service of the Grand Duchy of Stollen. And now, it's onto that artillery!

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

Search This Blog