Almost Finished. . .

Black lance stripes done?  Check!  Not too bad if you'll permit me to say so.  Just a few touch-ups and glossing left, and then I can begin in earnest with all of those Austrian dragoons shown here a few days ago.

Sometimes, you just have to shut your mouth and get on with it.  Taking my own advice for a change -- Go on!  A little mockery and derision is good for the soul.  The Grand Duchess would likely suggest I deserve it. -- I slipped into the painting chair for just over an hour yesterday evening for the sole purpose of painting lots and lots of black stripes onto and around all but two of the lance shafts pictured above.  I just finished the  remaining pair a short while ago (Tuesday afternoon about 14:30 EDT), and here is where things stand with those 14 Minden Bosniaks at long last.  

We're almost there, folks!  Just a few small touch-ups and the two coats of acrylic gloss.

Interestingly, I am always of two minds as the end of a painting project approaches.  On the one hand, it is very satisfying, as many of you will no doubt agree, to add those last few, final touches that help to make a miniature unit perfect in our eyes.  On the other hand, I'm darn glad (and that's putting it politely) to finish 'em up, so that I can move onto something else.

For me, there is a magic window -- somewhere along the line during the painting process -- between the rather boring early stages of base coats and initial undercoats of color, and those last few licks of paint that make a unit finished.  Which is to say, the interesting parts of painting a unit of 12-60 or so figures are bookended, for me at least, by more arduous tedium at both the start and end of any particular project.  

Yet farming my unpainted figures out to a professional painting service still seems a bit beyond the pale to me.  Although I've thought about it in passing these last few years.  I know that there are quite a few around here who have done so and been reasonably pleased (???) with the results, but I've never quite been able to reconcile myself to following their lead.  Or is that lead?  There's a bad pun there somewhere.  Ok, ok.  Don't throw too many stones.  Give me a chance to find my cycling helmet first. 

Alright.  Enough prattle.  Time to finish 'em up and move forward with the next addition to the Grand Duchy of Stollen collection.

-- Stokes