Napeoleonic British: 1st Unit, 2nd Wave

Finally the next wave of 28mm British Napoleonic Lineinfantry is done. It took two weeks of weekly labour to paint nine figures. Altogether I needed about 1000 minutes for painting from basecoat to varnish. That's about two hours per miniature. I'm a rather slow painter though but those Perry miniatures are awfully detailed. Those bloody lacings on the jackets nearly drove me crazy...

All 14 soldiers which are done yet.

As before I used Vallejo paints and Armypainter Quickshade to paint the boys:

Five of the new ones... I especially like the one that is biting open the cartridge...

Some details had to be improved: I used a brighter skin tone this time (Citadel Elf Flesh) because the first firgures looked too pale to me. Addinitonally I used a darkish yellow (Citadel Foundation Iyadon Darksun) to paint the cuffs and collars, as second step I highlighted them with the bright Vallejo yellow I used for the first figures already. And I spent a little more time on the metal parts. This time I added some final highlights with Citadel Mithril Silver after quickshading.

Here's a comparison picture of a new one (left) and an "old" one from the first wave (right):

Soldiers from 2nd wave (left) and 1st wave (right) in comparison.

Overall I'm satisfied with the result and I'll finish the unit this way. Doesn't look award winning but like solid wargaming stuff to me.
Maybe dark tone is a bit too... dark. Currently I'm shying away a bit from bying another can of Quickshade for 25 EUR.... But maybe I should consider it (meaning Strong Tone) and spare the Dark Tone for some Dark Elves...

Well... That's it for now. On Sunday I prepared the final ten models for this unit. Two standard bearers, an officer, a sergeant, a drummer and five additional privates. I hope to finish them within the next two or two-and-a-half weeks... I'll provide some WIP pictures from time to time.

Next unit on the workbench will be a battery of British Napoleonic foot artillery. Three guns with limbers and fifteen men. If you're interested I could provide a short step by step review then.

New Gaming Board: "Cutting Practice"

Although I the last evenings with painting the next nine British soldiers I found some time to test my new hotwire-cutter. Since I'm about to build a new gaming board I used it to cut the shelves into the right shape.

Nothing too spectacular but here is a shot review what I did.

First I cut the foamboard roughly with my electric jigsaw.

As a kind of ruler for the hotwire-cutter I fastened to beads on top and bottom of the foamboard.

Then I cut the overlapping foam with the Thermocut.

The wire of the cutter is rather soft. Therefore in some parts the cut wasn't smooth. So I sanded it a bit.

After removing the screw clamps... A clean and smooth cut.

Well...Four board pieces done, eight to do, since I'm planning to use a setup of twelve pieces to create a board of 1,5m x 2,0m (about 5' x 7'). Next time I'll present the Lineinfantrymen but you'll get an update of my table building efforts soon.

Daddy's got a new knife... And it's hot !

Although a set of nine British Lineinfantrymen are currently in the focus of my efforts, the other 2012 projects aren't forgotten. Especially a new gaming board shall be built this year. I decided to use styrofoam as base material but cutting the 5cm boards (about 2") with a usual knife is really hopeless. Jegsaw works but is kind of makeshift tool for that.
However yesterday I upgraded my arsenal and bought a Proxxon Thermocut hotwire-cutter. It looks like a simple fret saw but it holds an up to 350 °C (about 662 °F) hot wire of hardened stainless steel. It goes through the foamboard like a lightsaber through butter (*insert maculine grunt here*). Or at least it should since I wasn't able to test it yesterday evening...

Here is a picture of my little beauty (official Proxxon product picture):

Isn't it nice?

I've been wanting such a thing since I read of it in a Citadel compendium in the late ninteen-nineties. Back then those tools were both inaccessible and unaffordably for me. But this one seemed a bargain for just around 35 EUR (about GBP 29 or USD 45). When the infantrymen are done (hopefully this weekend) I'll give the thermocutter a try. Those 2" foamboards shall be engraved and ornamented with a nice winding 1" deep river...

Napoleonic Brits: Testfigures finished

Viktoria helps me to unpack the first brave British...

As I told you some days ago the last two weeks were packed with time-consuming happenings which detained me from tinkering and blogging.

So let's start at the very beginning of my 28mm Napoleonic project:
Months or maybe even years ago I became aware of the Perry 28mm plastic range and the Napolionic miniatures they make. Since a lot of my former projects were never finished completely I was putting all new stuff on hold for a while. During the first weeks of 2012 I recorded some good progress with my 20mm stuff and managed to finish a sufficient force of WWII British and a some terrain for the new gaming board project. As reward I allowed myself to start something new and brandished towards Napoleon and Wellington.
After getting a survey of the different metal and plastic ranges I decided to invest in Perry plastics first. Especially the low price for those nice miniatures caught me. You might judge the miniatures' quality yourselfs. Here on Youtube is a short video review a guy called Danamor from the Austrian wargaming board W6-Tabletop broadcasted.

When the miniatures arrived I was surprised how small 28mm can be... All those tiny details... However I deflashed them when we were on leave for a weekend and primed them with white spray paint. Five miniatures for the beginning...
The painting took about five evenings. As usual I used Vallejo Model Colour paints and leftovers from Citadel (Games Workshop) paints. Afterwards I covered them with Army Painter Quickshade "Dark Tone" and outlined some highlights after drying. A coat of rather matt varnish completed the job.

Finally done... The first British soldiers painted for testing purposes... Rather satisfying to me.

Altogether I'm satisfied with the result. The faces look a bit pale to me, so I'll use a slightly brighter tone next time. And the buttons are a bit too bright. They look almost white and don't stand out. Next time I'll try a darker metal tone like Citadel's Boltgun Metal. What I decided to neglect are extremely small details like the regimental number on the water bottles. There some companies which profide decals in favour of that. Maybe I'll add those later. The bases will be formed later because I'll set the figures on regimental bases.

Please feel free to post tricks, hints and suggestions. As you know I'm much obliged for each and every comment.

Still alive...

It's been more than a week since I posted the last message on this blog. Although there isn't a lot to report from my workbench I want to give a sign of life.

The last week was rather busy. Our daughter fell ill and was afflicted by a viral infection accompanied by rather heavy fever. However that little girl is really tough and she recovered three days later but those three days were really stressful.

Simultaneously Mrs. Monty swapped our sedan car for a estate wagon. Newer, roomier and just nicer as the old one. The administration and insurance matters took additional time from my modelling account so that I simply hadn't time to finish any great things.

Nevertheless I took some tiny steps and started a new project: 28mm Napoleonics.Although this Blog was dedicated to 20mm wargaming originally I'll include my efforts for Wellington's troop here. I hope you don't mind this potpourri of scales and ages. I managed to get a box of British Line Infantry from Perry and already finished the first five men. I'll post a more elaborate post on this within the next few days.

Additionally there are 20mm bocages to finish, houses to paint, tanks to build and miniatures to re-organize. A busy spring is foreshadowed...