Von Polenz Cuirassiers, ca. 1733: Blocking in the Basic Colors. . .

 

As and when time has permitted the last week or so, I've basecoated the latest squadron of cavalry -- this time to represent Saxony's von Polenz Cuirassiers, ca. 1733 (red coats with coffee brown facings) -- applied the basic horse flesh coloring and gone to work blocking in the basic uniform colors that will be highlighted later.  In truth, they look like a bloody mess up close, and I can't recall when I have been less pleased with my brushwork, but we're still very early in the painting process.  

Or so I console myself.  

But as I advise my often less than resilient students during the academic year, you can't row in circles after a disappointing grade.  Rather, make the decision to revise your approach and move forward without repeating the same mistake twice.  A point that dovetails nicely with advice given to my son's Tae Kwon Do class a couple of years ago by the instructor Mr. R.

So, next up, the neck stocks and black cuirasses.  It probably makes good sense to go back over each figure at that point and make certain that all of the basic colors are covering the white basecoat before returning to the horses to highlight the various reins, halters, and the like.  In the past, I have always tackled horse tack last, when enthusiasm has about dried up for the almost finished unit, so I'm modifying my approach this time around. 

Once the various horses are about done, I'll return to the officer, musician, and troopers in the 14-figure squadron.  And on that note. . .

I had another look at the Project Seven Years War pages a few evenings ago, and decided that between that source and my two books on the Saxon army of the era, I had enough information to paint these in the older red uniforms before the switch to nominal 'white' coatees/kollets about 1734.  I'm sure some of the details on the castings aren't quite right, but taking a bit of artistic license has never bothered me.  And as was advised in one of those small supplemental guides that came with a few issues of Military Modelling way back in 1981, dig a little deeper, find some non-color illustrations, and paint up a unit or two that are not seen in everyone else's armies.  

Or something to that effect.  Were those booklets written by the late Stuart Asquith?

In any case, that's my approach this time around as I dig out from beneath the 30 Eureka Saxon cuirassiers that have been in the pile of lead since Fall 2016 when I ordered them as an early 50th birthday gift to myself. And the sooner I get 'em finished, the sooner I can return to the Minden and Fife and Drum figures that are, by comparison, a pleasure to paint.  Funny how we each develop our hobby preferences and bugbears.  The Eureka castings are very nice in all honesty.  They certainly fit in well with Jim's figures, and others may like them, but for some reason these curassiers give me real trouble at the painting table.  Live and learn.

-- Stokes