The Rathaus In-Progress. . .

The Rathaus in-progress. . .

Spent about an hour this morning working on the spire that sits atop my rathaus, and I must say I am pleased. Again, it is far from perfect, and later painting will help hide some problem areas, but for a non-professional modeller, it's not bad.

My modelling skills don't allow me to reproduce a more ornate spire that resembles the late Baroque types like you'll across the North of Germany and along other stretches of the Baltic coast, so this seems like a reasonable compromise. This particular spire though, in my own defense, is not unlike some of the tall, slender prototypes that you'll see in Copenhagen, Riga, or other Baltic cities, so it works for me. The Grand Duchy of Stollen, prior to disappearing from the maps in the third Partition of Poland, was in the neighbrhood of The Duchy of Courland after all.

Coming back to real life for just a moment, there are just a few small touch-ups to the rathaus to take care of tomorrow once The Young Master has headed off to school, and then I can turn my attention to redoing a mansard roof that did not turn out as well as I hoped late this afternoon. Blast! Well, everything has gone so swimmingly up to this point that there was bound to be something that didn't quite work out as planned and hoped, right?

But it's time to wrap things up for today. I'm tired and have caught the cold that The Young Master brought home at the end of last week, so an early bedtime this evening for Mr. Excitement. We live out here on the bloody edge at Totleigh-in-the-Wold.

-- Stokes

Comments

marinergrim said…

Very nice work Stokes. I like that a lot.

1:39 AM

Stryker said…

That looks like an excellent bit of 'spire' modelling to me! Can't wait to see these painted up.

5:04 AM

Wellington Man said…

I'm in awe of your modelling skills, Stokes. Those look fantastic. I cannot even imagine how you achieved that magnificent spire.

5:50 AM

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...

Presenting the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere!!!

Here they are, with the rearmost nine figures still drying, three squadrons of the Anspach-Bayreuth Kuirassiere, now in the service of the Grand Duchy of Stollen. And now, it's onto that artillery!

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

Search This Blog