15,000+ Visits to the Grand Duchy of Stollen!!!

The Grand Duchy of Stollen has been visited slightly over 15,000 times since the start of this blog in August 2006. Flags are flying from bridges, government buildings, and the palace in Krankenstadt this morning. And the Grand Duke Irwin-Amadeus, dressed in the fanciest version of his lobster costume, complete with TWO left-handed claws, will speak before an assembly of his ministers later today.

Besides the expected self-congratulations, it is widely believed that the Grand Duke will comment on the continued build-up of Zichenauer forces along the Zwischen river that separates largely Protestant Stollen from its arch-enemy the predominantly Catholic Electorate of Zichenau. Unusually, it is thought that a winter campaign might possibly be waged against Zichenau. Keep reading Die Krankenstadt Tageblat for further developments.

Katrina-Bettina von Heffelfinger

Comments

Steve-the-Wargamer said…

My congratulations sir, I am happy to report that I have contributed a (small) portion to the number.. :o))

7:47 AM

Stagonian Jeff said…

Congratulations, Stokes.

Of course it is due not only to your writing and photography, but also to the lovely figures the Grand Duchess has provided for you . . . so do something nice for her today.

-- Jeff

3:24 PM

WSTKS-FM Worldwide said…

Thanks Jeff!

You are so right. I certainly will.

Best Regards,

Stokes

4:21 PM

old-tidders said…

Congratulations from the Kingdom of Wittenberg

-- Allan

7:39 AM

WSTKS-FM Worldwide said…

Thank you, men! Have a good weekend.

Best Regards,

Stokes

2:27 PM

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

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...

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 ...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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