Happy Feast of Stephen!

A thoroughly charming and thought provoking title.

Or, Happy Boxing Day if you prefer. I hope your Christmas Day was happy and surrounded by friends and loved ones. Or maybe quiet and calm? Whichever you prefer.

Today, the wonderful Grand Duchess (assisted by Young Master Paul) will prepare and bake her annual Dresdner Stollen! I cannot wait (something of an understatement). In the meantime, a large piece of chilled pumpkin pie with fresh coffee for breakfast in a few moments I think.

Yesterday was a toy soldier Christmas for yours truly and included the title above, a lovely large format book on German armies from roughly 1740-1945, featuring mostly previously unpublished Herbert Knoetel watercolors, and a small box of Minden Miniatures (various French Staff figures and some Austrian dragoons). The Grand Duchess tells me that some Hessian infantry are on the way once they are back in stock.

I felt like a child again for a few hours yesterday, but the best part was spending Christmas with my wife and son, watching them open gifts, and not having to venture out the front door to go anywhere. Although we did enjoy a nice, long mid-afternoon walked around the absolutely quiet neighborhood given our unseasonably warm weather here in Mid-Michigan at the moment. Usually, we have snow on the ground by this point. Still, it was a special day.

Today, the forthcoming stollen as I say (wife and son are preparing the dough in German overhead in the kitchen right now), more idle time for daydreaming, more watching the cats enjoy their Christmas catnip mice, more pleasure derived from seeing The Young Master happily engaged in play or reading new books, more good food, more quiet Christmas music, and some delicious leftovers for dinner by candlelight. I might even be able to find an hour or so for some additional brushwork on those 14 Bosniaks. Christmas contentment. Ahhhh. . .

-- Stokes

Comments

Simon said…

Those A Gentleman’s War rules are a great read. Very humorous, the melee rules seem a bit clunky though.

10:11 AM

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...

Warboss Green Bases. . .

I t's amazing how something as simple as applying two coats of Citadel 'Warboss Green' (ex-Games Workshop 'Goblin Green') can enliven a unit of figures and get 'em that much closer to glossing and completion. In much the same way that applying fleshtone early in painting process helps bring the figures to life. Just some limited dry-brushing to bring out the manes, tails, and some equine musculature, and I'm calling my version of Saxony's von Polenz Cuirassiers, circa 1733, done and dusted. Longtime visitors to the Grand Duchy of Stollen might recall (the blog will turn 19 years old in September) that I generally go for an old school approach when it comes to unit bases and paint them a nice, bright green. Exceptions include command vignettes, skirmishers of one kind or another, transport, camp followers, and various other civilian one-offs. The approach is not to everyone's taste, but I like the cheery toy soldier appearance once everything...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

Search This Blog