Sunday, October 25, 2009

An Officer and no Gentlemen

A mixed bag of painting this week. Starting with the first command figure for my British. General Cameron, one of Wellesley's first brigade commanders in the Peninsular.
A Front Rank officer miniature, crisp sculpting and a breeze to paint. I went for the classic white horse, and was pleased with the result; as well as that of his scarlet coat and his hair. Little touches that make the model look nice.

Other than him I've finished another batch of WW2 for eBay. This time a late war Russian Battalion with added Divisional artillery support; i.e. one 76.2mm Zis 3 gun.


Most of the figures are Italieri's rather static, but easy to paint Russians, one advantage of their most recent models is the very resilient plastic they use, almost as stiff as metal! However as a result the releasing agent to get the models out of the molds is particularly nasty. Paint will not adhere to them! You must either wash the models in hot soapy water or spray undercoat them; preferably both.

I undercoated white, which worked well with thin coats of the main clothing shades, and the usual black wash varnish to finish.

The gun is also Italieri and is a fantastic model. Excellently detailed and with some really lively crew models, along with the more usual loading poses. The officer shouting and pointing is lively, and the ammo carrying figure (converted below to lugging a maxim machine gun) is perfectly done. Whilst it may not take paint well, this material accepts superglue well enough.

I tried a wintery theme on the bases, though not wanting to go for all out snow. Having lived in the Alps I know what snow looks like and most wargame snow bases do not look like snow! I opted instead for a simple hard morning frost, to imply the a bitterly cold Polish or German dawn.
Or in other words, give the bases a normal treatment, and then dry brush them white. Remembering to give the same attention to large metal equipment, which will tend to attract frost too. If you are really showing off a dry brush of a gloss or pearlescent varnish would add to the effect.

Anyhow, back to finishing my first Cavalry Brigade for the Napoleonics...

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