Musket Detailing. . .

After several [shorter] sessions -- three or four? -- in the painting chair today, the musket detailing is finished. Brass fittings, trigger guards, firelocks, highlighted [musket] straps, and the ramrods in gun metal on the underside of the stocks. Yes, I realize my head should be examined because no one will ever notice them. But I know they are there.

One more easy session this evening to tone down the shako plates with an Army Painter wash, which will also bring out some of the detailing, but then I'll call it a day. The old eyes are tired, and it has been a pretty good day's work with a minimum of mistakes to correct. Nice when that happens.

Tomorrow (Sunday), I'll start the scabbard belts and possibly the brass detailing on the scabbards. There is quite a bit on the Minden figures, and I'll naturally want to suggest the presence of some on the slightly less detailed RSM95 figures in firing position.

-- Stokes

A Sunday Morning P.S.

The painting muse was still with me last night as I wrapped up the work on musket detailing, so I squeezed a few drops of Army Painter 'Basilisk Brown' (really a dull yellow) onto my palette paper and got to work applying the facing color to just three figures in the back row. You know, just to see how that particular step might go. Pleased with the results. Cuffs and collars look good, so I'll finish the rest later this morning after another mug of coffee and getting dressed for the day.

At the moment (9:35am), still in my pajamas enjoying a first mug of my dark mistress with the cats nearby you understand. A lovely, sunny day blooming outside. Birds singing and other early spring activity happening. And while I could do with another month or so of skiable snow -- There are places out west in the Rockies and Cascades where the ski season lasts for five and six months! -- springtime ain't too bad either.

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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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