Hi,
Short update as I completed those by yesterday evening.
Time for varnish to dry, and as I am now on free time (vs. job), here they are :
Top 4 strips are 1st rgt. Then the 3rd. They are Baccus minis.
I did not expected doing them past Sunday, but in fact I did.
It took me about 3 hours.
Now, I have 3 Landwehr batalions to paint... by next Sunday.
I will probably start later on this evening.
Cheers and stay safe,
Bruno.
Hi,
Here is a short advancement status about the old guard I started about one week ago.
On going Grenadiers of the old guard are painted and varnished.
Same thing about the Chasseurs à Cheval de la garde.
They have been painted on evenings, by 1+ hour sessions along the week.
As a total time spent, I may estimate between 4 and 5 hours of total work to get there (for each of Grenadiers and Chasseurs, so about 10 hours total)
I used a black primer (brushed Humbrol black matt 33, slightly diluted) then I used Prince August (Vallejo) acrylic colors except when said otherwise. Here are their references (numeric only as names are in french).
Conversion tables exist between PA and Vallejo references, so that should not be an issue if use Vallejo rather than PA.(ie : (PA) 970 = (V) 72)
Uniform blue : 965
All whites : 918 (Ivory - I never use pure white)
All blacks : 950
Red : 817 (kind of scarlett red)
Rifle wood : 846 (Mahogany ?)
Back pack : 875 (clear brown beige ?)
Rolled jacket : 836 (a grey - realized once done it should have been blue for the guard)
Flesh : 327
Gold : 996 - Metal colors in standard Vallejo/PA are not good. I still use that one (as I have it) but it has to be applied on a black background. At a time I will better use Vallejo Airbrush Metal Color (see thereafter).
Steel : Vallejo Airbrush Metal Color 77.716 (Aluminio satin) applied with a brush (obviously). That metal color is far better than any conventional Vallejo/PA metal colors.
Green (saddles/uniform) : 970
Trumpet exception (blue) : 840
Yellow : 948 - I prefer that "gold yellow" as offering better coverage and color depth than regular yellow.
Horses : 846
All other colors (red, white, black, metal,...) are like Grenadiers.
As a varnish I use an art acrylic painting varnish (Amsterdam 115 MATT for acrylic - brush applied). My 250 ml bottle is still 2/3 full after 3+ years... I pass 2 layers of it each tme. It makes it inexpensive in time, does stay clear and offers a good protection. Only thing is that it is a little bit satin but at 6mm it perfectly does the thing on my side.
Still to be done is the basing. I have too few bases ready for them, so will have to cut and prepare (far) more. As I usually do, I put them in a bag waiting for bases to be ready. Also, I prefer to run dedicated basing sessions so will anyway wait to have more minis to be based before running a session :
Now, my French backlog :
So, here are :
Anyway, my current focus is on Prussians.
So this week, I plan doing :
Once this will be done, I will probably change my mind with some english troops (that are nice too ;-)) for which I have an even more huge backlog.
Cheers and stay safe.
Bruno.
Hi,
This week evenings I worked a bit on my french old guard but not only.
For monthes I had some painted command I did not based yet.
Mostly French and English.
So, I did it as it was not that long after all (spent less than 1.5 hour in three evenings)...
They are mixed minis from different providers in time, so I am not sure of whom they were from (except for the Baccus english and some frenchies)
I took pictures yesterday evening and quickly post them to conlude my remotee lunch break.
Here they are for France...
... and for England
They are based on 1, 2 and 5 € cents coins.
Depending on rules, 1 mini means Brigade command, 2 minis Division command, 3 minis Army corp command, or respectively ADC, Brigadier, Division at lower gaming scale.
This week end I'll continue my old guard and prepare some prussian Uhlans.
I will see if I have something advanced enough to be shareable.
Now back to job.
See you later...
Hi again,
As said in my Prussian WIP I, I am completing my French side in parallel with some French Guard. Here as well, those minis are from Baccus.
Currently planned are 3 old guard infantry batalions and 1 Chasseur de la guarde regiment.
I just ended up with a first set of strips, including command and some line.
Here they are just after first varnish layer.
As usual, light balance is wrong (underlying support is deep flat black, not blue), but however...
Flags are from napflags free flags, resized with inkscape as 7x7 mm side wide, then printed on photo paper. Historically, French flags were far smaller, but with scale, I prefer to size them to the available space left on the minis poles.
Here are two closer views on the command then line strips I did on that session.
Obviously, when looking so close paint job seems really bad looking, but you never see them that close on table top. To give you an order of idea, here is a comparison with a 35 mm height zinnfiguren.
Another time, picture is weird (contrasts are crazy and colours not right) and Zinnfiguren will be addressed in other posts, but it was just to give an order of idea for those not familiar with 6mm.
Next to come are those folks I introduced at the begining of this post, primed 2 weeks ago.
My french army is currently the biggest one I have and it's backlog of to-be-done minis is important. I will probably share on that as the old guard will move forward.
Cheers,
Bruno.
Hi,
In 2021 I plan finishing my ongoing Pussians.
Here are 2 line regiments, 2 battalions each, I just flocked.
They are 2nd and 3rd as per 1815.
Minis are from Baccus.
Pictures have been taken with a mobile and somewhat yellow light, so shadows are somewhat "greenish", but real colors are OK.
Battalions are sized as Small (3 bases) or Medium (4 bases) so far. Those are my last remaining Prussian Line miniatures, and I had not the exact ratio between command and line. In my next order, I will manage solving that, including some more line bases to extend some Prussians to large units (5 bases) if required.
Next step will be creating their packing box.
So, in addition of now owning 5 line regiments (10 battalions) what is next for 2021 ?
Well, I plan addressing this (in other things)...
In the background are some ready to be primed Uhlans, with others still in their bag. I have material to build 3 to 5 regiments depending on gaming size for units.
Also, in bags are Landwehr (8 to 10 battalions), Command, Hussars (3 to 5 rgts) and 2 artillery batteries (2 guns each).
This is not a big backlog, but I will share as I move forward with those Prussians.
In parallel I am working on some french old guard and command.
As well, I have more important backlog for French and English troops, but that is another topic.
Cheers,
Bruno.
Let's use my lunch break to share a second post.
I tried 6mm miniatures long ago.
I liked that scale very much from day 1 I discovered it.
I ordered, from time to time some units and packs, initially for collection/fun.
I then quickly started to play them with short solo games, requiring no more than 50x70 cms space as I reduced standard rules scale.
Then, from year to year I slowly extended my troops, and finally get nuts about 6 mm.
Those are really cute, fast and easy to paint despite what one could think if he have not tried yet.
Also, they are wonderful on your table, should it be for mass effect, if you have room for that, or to play short games at reduced scale in a limited space that is mostly my case.
Finally, they have a very good price/quality ratio.
I've finally gone with Baccus miniature, and am really happy with them.
Acceleration occurred one year and a half ago. I was in vacations, bringing with me my "survival kit". That was meaning brushes, paints and a good load of miniatures.
It was one bag more in the family car, but we somewhat survived that. ;-)
Back from vacations, end of July 2019, I had painted (and varnished) a good number of strips. It was the first time since years I had not done somewhat mass painting, and it was good to feel.
Here they were at that time, straight out of my luggage :
Then I based them...
I did some french line and light infantry, lancers of the line and the guard, dragoons, chasseurs and cuirassiers. Also, I started some Brunswick and English infantry, cavalry, artillery and command as well. (I only had Austrians and Prussians from the allied side at that time).
Then it extended a bit in time...
Here is the main part of my current collection as it looked few days ago.
Rules I use are amended General de Brigade and more recently General d'Armee, where an infantry battalion is between 3 and 5 bases.
For 2021 I plan completing my Prussians with some more infantry Line and Landwehr, Uhlans and more command. I also plan adding some British guard or elite troops, and when it will be possible (due to Covid cart closing) ordering and starting a Russian Brigade or two.
I will follow up on that in later posts.
Cheers and stay safe !
Bruno.
It's so long I did not update that blog...
Reasons are quite numerous, but this is not the real topic.
The real topic is what have been done all those years I did not see moving forward, and what is next.
In fact, I believe most of us have, at some time, some lowering in their motivation for sharing or even modeling, should it be due to job, social, family, health or pandemic context.
However, when being passionate about something, one never totally leave and will always get back to its roots at a time.
During those quite 9 years, I never left miniatures and modeling away, otherwise I would have lost my mind.
I went on painting (oil/watercolor), Zinnfiguren (roots again), did some modeling (plastic and wood) but quite abandoned 15mm war-gaming. There are two reasons there. First one is I lacked room, second is that I was deeply disgusted by some providers as I wanted to extend my punic war-gaming stuff.
However, in parallel I went 6mm, back on my preferred period, meaning napoleonics.
At the very beginning of that year I made a status about what I did in that area.
I also questioned myself about motivation, objectives and ways moving forward.
In next post I will share about his.
First, about 6mm miniatures, and army corps I built so far.
Then about my projects for 2021, as one always need to have projects to move forward.
Also, I will probably extend to zinnfiguren (I really enjoy now and that is a pure oxygen bowl) or some other non war-gaming modeling stuff.
As you will notice, even if not my natural language, this blog will be exclusively written in english, there won't be any French parallel translation anymore. It costs too much time that is finally not justified.
Cheers to all, an happy new year, stay safe (important) and tuned (eventually).
Bruno.
