Happy New Year from the Grand Duchy of Stollen!

It’s hard to believe that 2007 is almost history! Where did the year go? My grandmother always told me that the older one becomes, the faster time seems to pass by. I think she was right.

With that in mind, what has that rapidly dissolving time been used for during the last twelve months here at Stollen central? Well, let's pause and reflect a bit. It's ben a pretty good year here in Stollen I think.

First, there has been painting, and a lot of it apparently, including Revell dragoons (30), RSM95 grenadiers (63), a monster-sized Revell infantry regiment (80), plus some Revell artillery and MiniFig cannon (13+2), RSM95 generals (2), and Spencer Smith/Holger Eriksson cavalry most recently (12). Total of painted figures for 2007? 200+! That’s a record for me.

Next, let’s not forget that there was lots of real estate constructed early in 2007 too. Many townhouses, a bridge, town gate, and etc. were featured right here a year or so ago. Several of these were again seen only a few days ago. There is still a church awaiting its coat of paint. And yesterday, I finished painting the two Magister Millitum round pavilion tents in (more or less) the national colors of Stollen and Zichenau plus another hill -- this time three layers. Photos to follow on January 1st!

Finally, there was lots of fun "contextual narrative" (Geeze, can you tell I endured graduate school?), focusing on a bizarre cast of characters like Oberfeldwebel Klatschen, Heinrich- Schatzi von Pelznikkel, poor, old Irwin-Amadeus II and the their fellows. Who could forget when the Grand Duke refused to remove his gamey lobster costume at the height of the Stollenian summer? And let's not forget the duel between Klatschen and the arrogant and foppish colonel of the 4th (Trakehnen) Dragoons late last winter. Why, Stollen even had its first battle against the Electorate of Zichenau late last week in the Action at Zollamtstadt. Unfortunately, the latter won the field that day.

Despite these setbacks,however, the Grand Duke somehow manages to keep his good humor. He wishes each and every one of you a Happy New Year and good gaming/painting/collecting in 2008!!!

P.S.
It began snowing steadily at about 3PM this afternoon and is laying all over the ground. We already have about an inch and the forecast calls for 5-6"" total!!! And the expected high temperature for tomorrow? Only 18 degrees Fahrenheit. Could be the Grand Duchess and I ring in the new year by skiing tomorrow morning.

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 ...

Sunday Morning Coffee with AI. . .

A rmed with a second cup of fresh, strong coffee, I messed around a bit this morning with artlist.io using its image to image function in an attempt to convert my hand-drawn map from September 2006 to something that more resembles an old map from the mid-18th century. And just like my experiments with Ninja AI in June, the results are mixed. The above map is pretty good, but Artlist keeps fouling up the place names and has trouble putting a faint overlay of hexes across the entire area. Hexes, admittedly, are not likely to be found on any genuine maps from the era in question, but there we are. Frankly, I prefer the appearance of the Ninja map, but there were problems getting it to correct its errors. Grrrr. As is the case with so much having to do with the various AI's out there now, the output generated is a direct result of the prompts entered. For text alone, and when you develop a lengthy, highly detailed prompt, it is...

Continued Regional Map Revisions. . .

F ooled around a bit more with the revised map just before and after dinner this evening, using the Fotor app to reinsert missing text . I also removed a few other things using the 'Magic Eraser' function, which works surprisingly well. Now, we're getting somewhere. I just have to figure out how to ensure that the text is all a uniform font style and maybe figure out a way to add a few bunches of trees to suggest forested areas, Ninja AI is not always entirely cooperative to the tune of "I'm sorry Dave. I can't do that." -- Stokes

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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