Freicorps Musings on New Year's Eve. . .

Two different versions of the Chasseurs de Fischer infantry gleaned from the web.

Yes. I know. The promise was not to bore you with grandiose plans for much in 2018 given my relatively lackluster hobby activity in the year almost ended. But I find myself getting excited by the prospect of building up that tiny freicorps, and some shortly to be released Crann Tara figures aren't helping the matter any. If I keep things small and modest, what can go wrong?

On second thought, don't answer that! But if all goes well, I might even be able to get things finished before this time next year AND make up some lost ground on the figures I had hoped to paint to completion in 2017.

Anyway, you can see what I'm thinking for a company of 15 or so light infantry types in the illustrations above. The line portion will be an understrength two-company battalion (30) of Frei-infanterie (uniforms probably based on the Von Hordt regiment), a squadron of 12-14 hussars based on one or another unit of land hussars, and that new French artillery troop painted, more or less, as the artillery of Lauzun's Legion (medium-dark blue coats with lemon yellow facings).

The idea is to assemble a small force dressed in a colorful array of uniforms that will not duplicate anything already in the collection. To command the overall formation, I'll use a couple of mounted Minden and/or Crann Tara officers floating around here in a currently unpainted state. Hey, anything to knock off the rust and fire up the painting engines in an appreciable way, right?

Happy New Year Everyone!

-- Stokes

Comments

Steve J. said…

Sounds a great idea to me, as I love formations such as this. Looking forward to seeing updates on this.

2:38 AM

Rob Young said…

I tend to switch all the time, as you know I'm currently going through a small scale army phase producing lots of DBA forces - will later get back to grand designs no doubt! Adds to the overall enjoyment.

Happy New Year.

Rob

4:23 AM

Independentwargamesgroup said…

Stokes, can I recommend Crann Tara's, Fusiliers de Moliere. They are both on foot and mounted and are excellent figures for the petite guerre.

6:56 AM

Ross Mac rmacfa@gmail.com said…

There is something about the green coats and mirletons (I've had versions in 15mm & 40mm) but the Frensh often detached grenadiers to skirmish and what you really need for your Legion is some dual purpose grenadiers in fur caps! Nothing says casual elegance and disdain for foppishness and obeying the rules like a shaggy fur cap and a big mustache!

All the best for 2018!

7:14 AM

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 ...

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...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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