Getting back on it

It's been a good while now since I put paint to a 18th century miniature. I've been painting plenty of figures from other periods, but this weekend I'm hoping to get cracking on the above.

The photo is pretty awful (still getting to grips with this phone camera), but the figures in front are Ebor Miniatures WSS figures. First off, these figures are beautiful - brilliant sculpted by Paul Hicks, and well cast by Ebor (or whoever does their casting). On top of that, these miniatures are really good value at £1.10 a piece, and the fact you can buy them individually means that you're not buying miniatures that won't be used due to the way they're packaged. Altogether the WSS miniatures above make a 4 point Dutch force for the League of Augsburg's 'Donnybrook' rules.

The figures at the back are conversions (and rather rough and ready ones at that). They were done nearly two years ago now, and are an attempt to turn some of the Perrys' AWI Queen's Rangers into Savolax Jagers for the Russo-Swedish War of 1788 to 1790. This little project stalled when I began to realise just how much work would be involved with the figures I was planning on using for the Swedish infantry. Recently, some new releases of figures and head sets have made the project much more manageable for a person like myself, with little in the way of conversion skills (and even less patience). The aim is to convert a small force for both sides of this somewhat obscure conflict, for use with the Lardies' Sharp Practice rules. Converting these taught me a couple of important lessons that will help me with the project - don't make a rod for your own back, and be prepared to settle for 'good enough'.

I'll be undercoating all of these this weekend, but will probably only be making a start on the Dutch, due to not having suitable paints for the light green coats of the Savolax Jagers.

Free articles on the Seven Years' War and The '45

An officer of the Regiment de Clare, 1767

 

About a year ago I started compiling links to articles that are now accessible for free on Jstor. The articles are taken from various historical journals and have been subdivided into four sections. I haven't had the chance to look at many of them yet but, just going from the titles, I suspect that 18th century wargamers will be bound to find something of interest. As more US, Irish and Scottish historical journals appear to be accessible, subjects related to those countries are more heavily respresented.

Although these articles are accessible for free, you will have to register with Jstor. You will also be restricted to viewing only three articles every two weeks, in the UK at least (or 'the countries formally known as the UK', depending on what happens in the next few hours). But that's a small price to pay to have otherwise free access to this resource.

Articles on Irish soldiers in foreign service, and the experience of Ireland during the Seven Years' War

Articles on the '45 Jacobite Uprising

Articles on the French and Indian War

Articles related to the Seven Years' War

I'll carry on digging around the internet for more, and will add them to the relevant pages as I find them.

Blimey, that was a gap.

Hi everyone. I thought I'd better do an update before Blogspot deletes this thing through inactivity. September to June is quite a gap and, although I've not been posting on here, I've been busy, particularly in the last month. A few weeks ago I decided it'd be a good idea to put on a small Very British Civil War display game on one of the Manchester Area Wargames Society tables at Phalanx 2012 but, needing to wait until payday for most of the materials, it ended up just being a mad week-and-a-half rush with no sleep the night before.

I'd decided I wanted to do a locally themed layout and went for the typical terraced houses of a Lancastrian town and a colliery with headgear (of which all but one have disappeared from our fair county). It soon became clear that I'd seriously underestimated the amount of time it would take to build terrain and it wasn't until the last day that I'd finished building the terrain, and painting was only started in the afternoon. There was a little disaster that means bits will need redoing. Not having enough time to cut out strips of roof slates, I decided to cut a corner by scoring a pattern into pieces of textured thin card for both the roofs and the pavement flagstones. The pavement stuck down fine but didn't pick up the drybrush so I will have to paint the flagstones individually (eek). The roofs were much worse. Being the first time I'd made terrain I had no idea the degree to which the card could warp due to the glue. I'd added superglue dots of superglue to the card as well as the watered down white glue, and whilst the superglued bits stayed in place, the bits with just the white glue started to come away from the foamboard and actually bend it outwards as well. The roofs will have to be redone but at least I'll have time to do a proper job this time. I'll also be adding windows, doors, civilian vehicles and some street furniture. One of our club members (SuicideBadger) took a few photos at Phalanx and has done a write up of the event on the MAWS 40k blog. I've nabbed a couple to post here, mainly to show that I'm not a complete slacker.

The starting position for both small forces. I'd only managed to get twenty or so Wiganers and Liverpudlians (and only started painting Artizan's miniature of George Orwell at 5.30 on the morning of the show).

Wigan Rugby players and Liverpool Revolutionary Sailors in their starting positions.

A WIP photo of the Rugby players under natural lighting rather than that in the Sports Hall, that I originally took for a project log on the new VBCW forum.

And a WIP photo of the Sailors

I really enjoyed the show and it was great getting to meet loads of new gamers and have a good chat. I think there will definitely be another game done for next year, but it won't be a complete rush job again. I'm not sure whether it'll be VBCW or something else.

I've also actually started to reach the point where I'm beginning to enjoy the painting part of this hobby (or at least not finding it as much of a chore) and over the next couple of days I'm going to be painting some archers from GW's Bretonnian range of about 1990. These figures in particular and nice to paint and are essentially just early 14th century English Archers with no fantasy elements modelled on them at all - but loads of nice detail like gloves stuffed into belts etc. Then over the next couple of weeks I'll be painting up some French Infantry for a Muskets and Tomahawks game which means (drumroll) that after 2 years this '18th Century Painting blog' will soon have some painted and based 18th Century miniatures on it.

I also recently bought some 18th Century miniatures last month for a new project but more on that when I get round to it.

Anyhow, back to the painting.