Back in the Cuirassier Saddle. . .

Besides goofing around with artificial intelligence, I have also tinkered with the second half of those Eureka Saxon cuirassiers during the last week or so, applying the basic flesh tone (alkyd oil) to the 14 faces a short while ago. Tomorrow evening, I'll apply the Army Painter flesh wash and then go to work on the horse furniture first this time around to shake up the painting process a bit and tackle those more tedious bits before the tedium demon notices what I'm up to.

The plan is to paint these as the von Polenz Cuirassiers, circa 1733 when the unit had coffee brown facings and, at least in full dress, red coats and saddle cloths. I've combed through my two books on the Saxon army (the Summerfield and Pagano titles) and as well as the Project Seven Years War website, and I fear the kollets worn by all but the trumpeter should be an off-white or tan rather than the hoped for red. But I'll check one more time before making any rash decision.

In the interest of shaking things up, I've also given the above squadron three dark brown horses. I reason that the beasts cannot ALL have been black although that was the preferred color for heavy cavalry units generally speaking. As usual, these too will get some kind of light dry-brushing to provide subtle highlights. The trumpeter's grey will eventually get some dappling although I have yet to determine how I'll do that. I might try a dark wash first followed by sponging on a very light gray or white if I can find a small enough sponge at my arts and crafts bog box store.

Ok, time to get things ready for Monday morning, so I'll sign off for now. G'night eveyone!

-- Stokes

Comments

caveadsum1471 said…

Always good to keep the tedium demon confused! Good start, I can't cope with white priming, slows me down with my slapdash style, I'm sure you're correct about the horse colours too!
Best Iain

3:08 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

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