British Exploring Officer, Iberian Peninsula, 1810

Last week I picked up David Brown's 'General d' Armee' rules and realized that I haven't painted a Napoleonic figure (much less a unit) in an age. This is amazing as when I started this blog years ago that's ALL I painted. It's funny how things go in cycles.

So today's update is a British Exploring Officer serving in the Peninsula, circa 1810. 

These chaps composed a group of intelligence officers that served Wellington during the Peninsular Wars as his 'Peninsula Corps of Guides'. Their primary function was to survey the countryside and make modern maps for strategic planning, but increasingly they were used to gather intelligence on French plans and movements.

The Exploring Officers refused to be considered as spies and so conducted their work behind enemy lines wearing their regimental uniforms. They relied heavily on local partisans for local knowledge, guidance and support. Since they were usually excellent horsemen, mounted on fast thoroughbreds, they stood a good chance of evading French patrols using speed and evasion.

Colquhoun Grant (great name btw) was perhaps the most famous of Wellington's Exploring Officers. He provided sterling service throughout the wars and had many harrowing adventures in French territory (even posing as an American officer in Paris!). Wellington held him in trust so much that during the Waterloo campaign he essentially relied on Grant's reports on French movements to the exclusion of all other intelligence (which, as we know, almost led to disaster).

This figure is from Brigade Games, sculpted by Paul Hicks. I quite like the rider, with his wide brimmed sun hat and jaunty pose, but the mount provided was a little stiff and uninspiring. So I used a damaged horse I had from a spare Riders of Rohan boxed set (Thanks Byron!), feeling that it had a more animated pose. I had to shave off a few bits of offending tack and horse armour and then 'greenstuffed' a more period-specific saddle blanket, blanket roll and a sporty forelock to his noble head. The other issue with the poor brute was that it had one hoof missing - so I sunk the 'abbreviated' leg into a base of greenstuff, affixed both to the base and then masked the mess with some strategically placed groundwork. 

Done!

Have a great week everybody!

Fighting Fae - 'Tom Thumb' and his Furies

Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder. Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels. Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies. Elves are glamorous. They project glamour. Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment. Elves are terrific. They beget terror. The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning. No one ever said elves are nice. Elves are bad.

Terry Pratchett, 'Lords and Ladies'

I first saw these figures last spring on the Eureka Miniatures' Facebook page (lurking under Sarah's profile) and knew I had to get a set. They immediately reminded me of Brian Frond and Alan Lee's illustrations in 'Faeries' published way back in the late 70s when I was just a kid.

These are about 20mm in height, but their very slight physiques make them look quite smaller. Even though they've been scaled to blend with the other 28mm figures from Eureka's fantasy range, I like to think of them at being 'true scale', 1:1. To reinforce this I have Tom leaping from a thimble (kindly sourced from Lynn, Peter's (infinitely) better half).

I love how dynamic the poses are. In my minds eye, their movement echos films like 'Peter Pan' and 'Princess Mononoke'.

The sculpts are very fine and intricate, with each figure's sword even having a unique basket/guard detail. Really lovely stuff.

So, how do you get these wonderful little gems? I'll be frank here: I absolutely love Eureka's stuff. It's creative, beautifully sculpted and masterfully cast. But don't ask me how to actually source these freakin' models (I finally had to send then a direct query as I was completely stumped). I find the Eureka website has been ingeniously designed to discourage people from actually purchasing their products. It's completely impenetrable and torturous - it's as if the site was designed by the Marquis de Sade and coded by Kafka. By the time you find something you've been looking for you feel like they should be paying you for the aggravation and waste of time. 

Sigh... , but I digress. 

Yes, I'll still be there, searching and clicking like a madman, when the next shiny thing emerges from Eureka...

I feel better now (rocks back and forth), no really, I do.

Happy New Year to you and yours, everyone!

The Seven (Female) Samurai' - Onna-Bugeisha

A few months ago I saw these female samurai (Onna-Bugeisha) from Warlord Games and immediately knew I had to pick up a set. Funny enough, there's a bit of synchronicity involved as well as I've had a Samurai-themed game rattling around in my head for a quite some time and these figures fit the bill perfectly. 

I think these are some of the nicest castings that Warlord has produced. They are beautifully crafted, have realistic proportions and are elegantly posed - you almost think they are from a larger-scaled range. Just exquisite.

I have to admit I was a little intimidated when I first set off to paint these figures as I wanted to avoid just knocking them all out in solid colours, instead I wished to try a few patterns that would (very) loosely convey some of the amazing textiles these women would have worn. But, as many of you know, patterns can be tricky, and after a few tests runs on a piece of card, I found that the simple triumphed over the complex (thankfully for me, this is a mantra followed by Lady Sarah in her choice of men). To my eye at least, these fairly straight-forward patterns seem to do the trick in not overpowering or 'muddying' the figures' inherent great lines.

The central figure, about to draw her bow, is my favourite of the set.

The flowers on the bases are perhaps a little excessive, but they were such pretty figures that I thought they deserved the extra bit of ornamentation.

I also managed to get some buildings done for this period as well. These are all from Sarissa Precision. Nice kits and very easy to assemble and paint. Here we have a temple shrine, a modest village house and two rice storage sheds.

I have a few more items for this project to get done but we'll see where the brushes take me.

Thanks for dropping in folks 

...AND a Very Happy New Year to you all!!

Curt

German E-Boats for 'Cruel Seas'

Weirdly, as a prairie boy, I've always had a great fascination for naval warfare, being an enthusiast of the large ship games like 'Wooden Ships and Iron Men', 'Fleet Action Imminent' and 'General Quarters III'. So, when I saw the promo ads for Warlord Games' new 'Cruel Seas' I knew I had to jump in with both feet. 

The WWII coastal war setting really hasn't been done in a comprehensive way, meaning with purpose built rules and a full range of miniatures, so I think Warlord may be onto something really exciting here. As soon as I unpacked my copy of the 'Cruel Seas' I quickly assembled the core set miniatures and tried out the introductory scenarios with The Friday Night Raconteurs. Thankfully the hype for the game is not misplaced. The rules play very well and give a fast, furious, action-filled game without being too ponderous or 'crunchy'.

This past Friday, I hosted another 'Cruel Seas' game for the boys and really wanted to get some of the miniatures properly painted for the tabletop. Thankfully I had the day off so I lashed away and managed to get most of the Motor Torpedo Boats and E Boats completed for the night's fun. So, here are four of the German E-Boats ('Enemy Boats' or as the Kriegsmarine classed them Schnellboots), a brace each of the S-38 class and the later S-100 class.

These are 1/300 scale plastic kits (those in the UK will probably have seen them included with the latest Wargames Illustrated). Very easy to put together and a breeze to paint. I like that Warlord included two sheets of ensigns for both the British and the Germans.

I really like the design aesthetic of these boats, with their menacing low, long silhouettes, exposed torpedoes and decks bristling with all forms of automatic weapons. They really look the business.

S-38 Class E-Boats

The two S-100s here have the optional quad 20mm flak gun ('Flakvierling'), which, as you can imagine, would be a pretty ferocious weapon in setting where most of things you were shooting at were constructed of thin wood planking or thin steel.

Later S-100 Class E-Boats with quad 20mm at the stern

The paint scheme I went with is fairly stock to what most vessels in the Kriegsmarine would have sported. I put aside the supplied painting guide and decided instead to keep the colours anachronistically punchy to help them stand out on the tabletop. In the future I'll do up one or two boats in the distinctive (but more rare) splinter pattern camouflage to denote Veteran crews. (BTW, if anyone has a set of the MTBs/EBoats from the recent Wargames Illustrated that they don't want please drop me a note.) 

The British Vosper MTBs will be coming up soon.

Thanks for dropping in folks!

Opening Entry to AHPC IX: Frodo & Sam - The Beginning of the Fellowship

In keeping with tradition, I try to open the show with the first entry of the Painting Challenge. 

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This past summer I began reading through the Tolkien canon following the chronological order of the stories. As I've not read the core books since my childhood the process has largely been a study in nostalgia. 

In working through the books what really impressed me was the tremendous importance Tolkien placed on value of allies, friends and companionship. This made me reflect that I'm very thankful for all the great friends I've made over the past eight years of the Challenge, and I resolved to make 'Fellowship' serve as the overarching theme for this edition.

Right, enough faffing about. 

Here we have the starting pair of the 'Fellowship of the Ring', Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee. 

These are from the original metal range offered by Games Workshop at the start of the Peter Jackson trilogy. I have some of the more recent plastics, and while the animation and quality is quite good I find they still lack the crispness and definition of the earlier metal sculpts. 

Of course source material for the painting was easy to come by, with loads of books and movie stills available both in the home library and on the net.

The big base is a limited edition resin cast of Balin's Tomb which was offered by GW after the release of the first film. I actually forgot I had it, being it was buried in the shadowy depths of the Lead Shed. I only discovered when I was looking for some LotR figures after  being inspired re-reading the books.  

It's a nicely crafted piece, with loads of detail and nifty labeled base-slots for each of the nine companions of The Fellowship. I did a quick series of layered coats with the airbrush, a few washes and then picked out the details with a fine brush. I wasn't wild about the GW branding so I just left it black, but I did a bit of ink blending with 'The Fellowship' raised label and the character names to give them a graduated red-gold effect.

My plan is to add the remaining members to the Fellowship over the duration of the Painting Challenge, hopefully completing it before it wraps-up in March.

To paraphrase Bilbo, every great adventure begins with a first step. :)

Next Up: Some WWII Coastal Ships from 'Cruel Seas'