Winter is on its way!

Here's a understated Norwegian Christmas card from years gone by. For you non-Norwegian speakers out there (and there must be at least a few of you) 'God Jul" means Merry Christmas.

Much is afoot here at Stollen Central currently. The Grand Duchess and the Young Master are hard at work in the kitchen upstairs, assembling a gingerbread house kit that the former purchased earlier this month to replace the six or seven-year-old gingerbread house kit that we never managed to assemble prior to and since becoming parents. They must be having a nice time because it is pleasantly quiet in the house.

In other news -- and I'm well aware that you visitors to the GD of S blog are hanging on EVERY word -- the Grand Ducal Feline Princess Gunnlaug went to the doctor's this morning for the Royal Spaying. The doctor's office called a short while ago to let us know that the surgery had gone well, and we can pick her up tomorrow morning. Meanwhile, her brother Prince Onyx is enjoying his short status as the sole cat in the house. Demanding lots of extra attention, purring, and extra food. And, while I thought he might be skittish without his sister given his unpleasant experience with the ferocious bag monster a few days ago, he seems to be taking it in stride.

Work continues bit by bit on the wooden trucks for the Young Master. The bag of 100 wooden wheels arrived yesterday, and I was very pleased to see that they are, in fact, exactly the right size. Painting of the basic colors can commence in earnest later today, and I hope to complete detailing and attach the wheels by Saturday or Sunday.

Soldier painting has ground to a halt for the moment. There are only so many hours in the day, and sooner or later something had to give. Given my Santa Claus activities at the moment -- and I am wearing a genuine Norwegian fisherman's sweater in cream and charcoal that I've had for 20 years, so I certainly look like an elf in the workshop -- it seems unlikely that I'll get even close to finishing those 20 pledged figures for the current painting challenge, but oh well. As I mentioned previously, there will be plenty of time for painting during Christmas Week. And why kill myself during what ought to be a more relaxed period in our lives than is usually the case?

Finally, we are poised for our first big winter storm of the season! Not much snow predicted, but it's already much colder, gray, and dark here in the Grand Duchy today, so it finally feels like early winter. And hey, it's only a few more days until Festivus on the 23rd with its aluminum pole, airing of grievances, and feats of strength. I especially enjoy telling family members gathered around the supper table how they have disappointed me each year! ;-)

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

Fitz-Badger said…

The solstice is nigh, too.

Felicitations to the felines! Good to hear the prince has recovered from his bag incident and that his sister is recovering from her surgery!

Sounds like things all nice and snug there in the Grand Duchy. :)

Happy Festivus for the rest of us!

7:36 PM

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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