Getting there. . . Slowly, but surely. . .

Well, where in the world did June go??!! Another sunny, cool summer day here at Stollen Central. I’m enjoying a mug of coffee as I write this at 9:50am, pondering the things that need to be done (in real life) today as well as the next several weeks of painting, modeling, table construction, writing, etc. It’s not an altogether unpleasant task. ;-)

Did manage to sit down for 90 minutes or so last night with the battalion of Revell plastics I’m happy to report. Finished applying the white acrylic gesso base coat to the remaining dozen or so figures and began applying black undercoat to the first half of the unit, which was “gessoed” last week.

This time around, I decided to experiment a bit with the black undercoating and used my GW Chaos Black for the task, emulating Henry Hyde’s process with his Spencer Smith Von Eintopf regiment back in 2006. Happily, the GW paint is much thinner and has much better coverage than the Liquitex acrylic black that I’ve been using for the passed two years. In fact, the Chaos Black just seems to flow over the whole figure much more easily, drying with a nice, ever-so-slight sheen to it.

Use of the GW black makes undercoating with black much easier and faster than before, and I was able to treat 14 figures in this way in about 35 minutes last night. Happy day! Seriously though, one of the overlooked joys of figure painting is the constant tinkering with mediums and techniques. It’s really kind of fascinating as you consider, reconsider, and modify how you go about getting those figures ready for the table.

In any event, I’ll have the black undercoating finished by this evening and can begin applying GW Goblin Green to the figure bases, a nice way to start any new unit. This will have to wait until after our first Salsa dancing lesson this evening though. Yes, the Grand Duchess has signed us up for a six week course in Salsa dancing! Don’t tell her, but I’m secretly looking forward to it. ;-) OK men, I’ve got grass to mow and a newsletter to write. Wherever you are, be good and paint fast!

Comments

Bluebear Jeff said…

My, my, Stokes, you are a veritable "Renaissance Man" with all of your interests. Have fun (and report back to us).

Please also tell us how it feels to be working on plastic figures again after all of your metal figures.

-- Jeff

2:40 PM

Fitz-Badger said…

My thoughts exactly, Jeff. :-)

I'm curious, what does the gesso do compared to just base-coating with paint?

8:10 PM

Martin said…

Can an appearance on "So You Think You Can Dance" be lurking in your future?! The wargaming community waits with baited breath.

Yours,

Martin

8:58 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

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 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...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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