Tuesday 18 June 2013

Great Northern War again

Onwards and upwards.  Facing colours and muskets, faces, shoes and general tidy-up. It was at this point I forgot the Swedish officers had blue stockings so I did a quick white paint over.



Anything to painted metal is undercoated yellow or grey then a gold or steel wash gives the final effect. Also started the sash for the Russian officers and did the proper blue stockings on the Swedish officers.  Almost there.  



And the finished figures. I don't think I'll do a final oil / liquin / white spirit wash with these. Instead I'll just do a matt varnish. 
 




I've seen pictures where the Russian officer's hat trim has a red stripe and gold lace on the cuffs. I might do these later, but I'm going to stop here for now. Finishing the bases will be next along with adding the second rank chaps.  

Next will be finalising the standards and I've already printed off a batch to use. I've decided to base most of my GNW units on the battle of Poltava. I'll be looking to get a good colour contrast to the uniforms.     

And finally - silly fact of the day - in the GNW there was (and maybe still is) a Swedish regiment called Bjorneborg. I'll have to do them sometime.     

More later on rules and bases and sources.

Friday 14 June 2013

New Great Northern War project

A project that's been in the background for a while finally got underway in the last couple of weeks.  The Great Northern War and WSS in 15/18mm.  My idea is to start with Swedes and Russians then expand the forces to include other colourful units from the era. 

So here are the first couple of units.  These are all Blue Moon miniatures.  I was going to try the layered painting technique, but after an experiment that didn't look good, I decided I could do better with my normal wash technique and controlling the flow of the paint with the brush.  

I've decided to do the first two units in the 'standard' Swedish and Russian infantry uniforms.  Here are Swedes in the blue uniform.   Just the basic wash of Humbrol blue over white undercoat.  


And some pictures after I'd tidied up any overspill from the base uniform colour with white and painted in the buff belts.   





And two pictures after I'd added the facing colours.  I'm not sure if I've got enough of a contrast between the buff of the Swedish breeches and the yellow stockings and turnbacks so I might use a lighter highlight on the buff. The yellow and red are Humbrol colours which I've always found excellent to work with.      

      
More pictures shortly I hope. 

Sunday 2 June 2013

Late Imperial Romans

These will be the next chaps I intend to sell. This will be split into Eastern and Western armies of roughly equal aize. I'm not too sure yet what will be in each except that the cataphracts and most light horse will be in the eastern army, and the cavalry will be in the western army.  

I.m sure this is everything. If not, then another photo session and another post to come! 

I found these early pictures of work in progress.
The Light Horse generals for the Eastern army.   

 Legion and more legion.  All with supporting archers.  
 another picture of the above. 
 Another legion.  
 Light Horse archers. 
 Light horse.   
Archers. Part of eastern army.   
The psiloi or skirmishers.  I've forgotten their proper name at this moment.   

 More legion - just in case they're needed on the battlefield. And all with supporting archers.  

 Auxilia.  Again with supporting archers.
The blue shields. 
  another picture of the above.   
Two pictures of white shield chappies.  

And two pictures of the red shield lads.   

The cavalry command group for the Western army.   

 The cavalry.  Two pictures of each.    



 And the cataphracts of the Eastern army.    


And more light horse from the eastern army.   

And that's it.