ACW wargame tokens - part 2

I was at the annual pilgrimage to the Carronade games show in Falkirk yesterday. A grand day out. Good conversations with lots of friends and more purchases than I intended, though no photos of tables. I'm sure other bloggers will have stuff out there.

Here's the follow up with the 'finished'  ACW figures. Apologies for the rough and ready photos. 

At this stage it's been blue and greys wash, flesh faces and hands, rifles brown and barrels metal, a couple of more substantial beards brown wash, and a black wash on some hats and cap peaks. I also painted the officers' sashes and trim on the drums and added flags and loose flock. Not painted were straps, belts, packs, boots or the metal bands on the muskets. 

Here are two shots with figures just over 2 foot from the edge of the table. The camera is at my normal eye level when sitting, so these are roughly the 3 foot test. 

For the second shot I dropped down a bit, as we sometimes do, but still about 2 to 3 foot away. 

Now I've come to about 1 foot or 12 inches away.  

And lastly, about 6 inches away. 

Now it's not the best photography, but in all these shots, I don't really miss the straps and belts n stuff. Or at least, I can't see them. However, I 'know' they're not there and that might niggle at the back of a pedantic brain. 

Certainly good enough for the games table. And a good test of what's actually needed to get something on the table. 

Will I continue to paint more ACW this way or sell up? Therein lies the question. I've not decided as so may other  projects are bubbling under.  

More later. 

Wargame tokens vs painting masterpieces

Recent thoughts have turned to the number of 15mm figures I have and the number that are still unpainted. I thought about painting or selling. 

I also remembered a while ago, a friend posed the question - "when did our wargame tokens start having to be painted masterpieces?"

It's still a really good question for me to ask, particularly as last week when we had a great 15mm ACW bash at the club using my figures. Several thoughts went through my head during the evening, including do I want to get more figures painted, or should I keep the painted ones and sell the unpainted, or should I sell the lot after our current campaign. For the record I have over 2000 15mm ACW figures, and just under half are painted. 

After some thought, my friends statement came back to mind and I then thought back to the old wargame adage of - the 3 foot test, i.e. what can you see on a figure 3 foot away in the middle of a table. If you cannot see it at that distance, do you really need to paint it in detail.

Then I thought of all the boardgames I have, such as Commands and Colors, Squad Leader or any number of Russian front or Bulge games, where I'm quite happy to play with wooden blocks or cardboard counters. 

Now there's also the aesthetic side of a game and seeing nicely painted figures, but I guess I'm questioning the need for me to do detail on 15mm figures.

So, my solution to test is just basic colours, and here are some photos. In a sense, I'm thinking of these figures as we did back in the days of good old Airfix, where we happily accepted blue and grey plastic and pushed them around without a care in the world. 

These have all been undercoated white for ages. I splashed on some washes. At the back left is Army Painted green shade. In the middle is Vallejo blue wash, and at the front right is a mixture of Army Painted blue shade and Citadel fancy-name wash. I noticed the Army Painter and Citadel shades are more indigo and the Vallejo more blue. Not pictured was a test with Vallejo inks and their blue is a beautiful striking colour.  

Just a closer view of the Vallejo blue. On a first try, I think I'm happiest with this tone. At the back are some chaps where I'd previously painted the faces, and was wondering how fast and casual I should be with a blue wash over them. I've decided to leave them for the moment and go back later.   

And now with the confederates in shades of grey. The Vallejo wash was a bit light so I went back to my old DIY ways of doing washes and used 3 or 4 different greys. I worked very fast with these and didn't bother if paints were mixed or not. 

I then took some half-painted figures and quickly painted a wash of earth on the bases. The end results look OK. 

And a closer shot of the Berdan Sharpshooters in green with the bases given a wash of earth. This gives and idea what the 'finished' figures may look like, though I may want to add a couple of touches like rifles and faces.  

At the moment, I think I'll carry on with this experiment and see what they look like with the minimum painting necessary to look reasonable from 3 feet away.  They would certainly do as rear rank chaps, supporting fully painted chaps in a front rank.  I'll also have to think about flock if I'd want to add it.  At the moment I'm thinking yes.

Also, as far as I can remember, this took an hour or so.  Not bad for 60 bases. 

A little progess on the Italians front

A couple of pics on progress with the 28mm Italians.  

I did some shading in the folds and creases, then tidied it up with white.  The chaps at the back right of the big group picture have been done, the rest are still waiting with their dark greys shading. 

A closer shot of the chaps where the shading has been tidied. Looking not too bad. 

Now I just have to keep the momentum going here. More later ... 

More Raging Heroes resin

After I had done the initial painting on my previous Raging Heroes resin, I took the opportunity to get some more.  I did wonder if I really wanted to mess with resin and mould release agent again, but decided to go ahead. Thankfully, the new batch came with a guide on how to clear and prepare them, so I'm hoping things will be easier this time around.  

Packs of horses and riders and 10 foot, plus a couple of bonus figures.  

And spread out before lying for a while and then heading for a soapy bath (per the instructions).   

Another batch of figures I picked up had been assembled and undercoated.  However, I think on a couple of models the previous owner may have had the same issues with the mould release agent as I had, as the paint is peeling in a couple of places. It's not much and will be easy to fix. 

I'll see how I get on assembling and starting painting these. The assembling stage may be a bit of a chore as some of the bits seem fragile, but I'm looking forward to painting them. More later ...