Saturday, March 22, 2008

Evolution of Bases

This is Kinda a replay of some of the other post, but I just wanted to show how my bases have evolved



This is my very first base, all 24 on the same shoebox cardboard.












When I read my rules I said that you should base you soldiers on company size bases everywere from 3 to 8 pr. company. As I do brits the ended up on 4 man pr. base, this is ofcourse still just a shoebox thing.






Here I finnaly got some real bases, they are for flames of war but that was all the store had. they look better then cardboard but they do look somewhat naked.









Oh look, they got grass, my most basic "finished" bases. just glue and grass, they are very simple compeard to my later ones.








I got some sand from gamesworkshop, the sand is kinda to big for 15mm but that's what I got. I did give some grass here and here.






And this is what my bases look like now. I can't take any credit for this, as this is a standard way of making bases. The recipe is litko bases, GW sand, painted with brown, then drybrushed with light brown and finaly glued some grass on them.
They are by noe means art but look quite more professional then cardboard.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

More 28 AWI and improved bases

I got some Battle honours 28mm that I orderd before I knew I as going to buy my entire army from the perry's, but you cant leave unpainted figs around so I started to paint them.


They aren't that diffrent from the foundy figs, there hands and muskets are realy good, but the legs and arms are about thick, and the coat isn't as easy to paint.





Here they redcoats give the militia a close range volley, sending them for the hills.












I also finaly got some 15mm highlanders that will make it possible to finish they 1st British Division at Salamanca. But I do wonder whats it going to be like to go back and paint 15mm after i've painted 28mm

Saturday, March 8, 2008

Militia on temporary bases.

I finished my first 24 militia and put them om bases, the bases are only temporary while I wait for litko bases.


The figures aren't even going to be put in the same unit, they are going to be spread out amog other units. Some are going to regular continental units, other among other militia units.











I like the way all the diffrent colors go together.
White, browns, blue, red ect.










Thursday, March 6, 2008

Photoshoot, Militia on parade


Just a short photoshoot of the militia I have painted so far










I have tried to make them looks a uniformed as possible






On a hilltop with some 15mm Peninular Brits in the background


Wednesday, March 5, 2008

My first 28mm

Today I got my first AWI minis, from the foundry a total of 24 Uniformed militia.

I've painted two and with thiese milita, and you can more or less paint them the way you like.
But I looked at the foundy site for inspiration, some of them you can actualy paint more or less like a uniformed continental solider, and I did this with one of the two I painted today.
I think it will look good if one of two milita have the blue/red jacket of the of the conitnentals.
I also painted one that is more or less the opposite, he hasn't even got shoes, and he has a plane brown jacket with a gray hat.

I'm quite satified with the outcome of the two paint jobs I did today, but I still havn't gotten the hang of the faces. I did try to give them eyebrows and and lips aswell as eyes. but it didn't go all that well, but still better then a faceless face. When it came to the skin I had to mix paints, the flesh colors I have are WAY to light, even I that am as pale as moonlight have more tone then the flesh color. So I mixed some light brown into the flesh color and it became alot better. I alos dybrushed som brow over it to give it a dirty look.







Ah!! the giant american are comming run for your life, must be all that fastfood.











The two I painted today














Edit, did two more today
and took some better pics









the backside

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Finishing up my British Divsion, and what to do next


I'm now into my fourth month as a wargamer, and have almost finished the Britsh Division at Salamanca. I now only need the 42nd Highlanders AKA the black watch, and the divison is complete.

I also got some warhammer terrain that I had to Macgyver into 15mm scale, not high quality
moding but better then nothing. I also got some Miniature Building Authority buildings anda bridge.





I like making small "dioramas"















Here I tried to make a buring house with smoke, and with the classic cottonball smoke












A close up of my Artillery











But what to do next?
I knew I wanted to do 2 things,
1. 15mm ACW
2. 28mm AWI
But I aloso needed an opposing force for my Brits, so first I decided to do a French Divsion at Salamanca. and this time I wanted to buy all the minis at once and I had a clear path to go, instead of the half assed thing I did with the Brits were I bought a few at a time, and often had alot dead time between the time I finished all my minis and had to wait for more.
But I still wanted to do another time period, and I was realy curious about the 28mm scale so I decied to do that at the same time as I did my French 15mm.
So now I'm waiting for the money to buy about 300 French 15mm and almost 400 28mm American and British, that will become the battle of Guilford courthouse





Monday, March 3, 2008

The next month, my first bases and the quest for players

Hello again.

After Christmas I got some bases, they were made for Flames of war, but seemed to work ok, for my purpos.

I got some loose grass from games work shop, and started baseing my figures, which at the time I had about 250 of.








This is pre grass,














This is what they look like after the grass, and with some trees, also is my first atempt at making scenery, a small river and a small bridge











these bases were prety primitve, just glue and grass, some time later I got a tub of sand, and I had seen pics of people doing sand with some grass here and there, and they looked great so I tried to do the same thing


This is my first atempt at sand bases, I think they look alot better then simple grass, and I plan to do these from now on
I also invaded my paretns dinigroom, with a game mat, buildings and trees.
I also changed my figures from Old Glory and battle honours to Fantassin, they are slightly bigger, and I find them easier to paint, I also see some improvments in my painting skills, still not award winnig, but better.
Now to one of the bigger problems, living where I do, finding someone that does wargaming is hard enough as everybody into miniaures in Norway do warhammer or warhammer 40k, I did find a small forum for historic miniatures wargameing, but there was two problems, 1, it dosn't look like anybody does Napoleonics, or horse and musket period at all, it looked like they all did ancient or medieval. 2 and the biggest problem, there was someing wrong with the forum, and I couldn't registere there. and I still can't.
Napoleonics in norway is more or less nonexistent, both in wargaming and in the historic sense.
I have found one player, orignaly a Scot that now lives here, but he is on the other side of the country, so probebly not someone I can play with on a regular bases.
Next time I'm going to write about finishing my 1st divsion at salamanca

First Few Weeks

Not realy sure why I started this hobby, or more correctly why i didn't start it sooner, in retrospect, this is the perfect hobby for me, I have in the past 5-6 years been prety oppsesed with history, it fast became my favorite subject, and I had a nack for it. my teachers told me that I should consider studieng history at college/university level, I still havn't gotten that far, but it's something I want to do.



Anyway, the reason I didn't start wargaming sooner was probebly that about 10 years ago I started with warhammer 40k, and I wasn't very good at painting the stuff, we were a group that started it, but I have up after a few months, it was just to expencive for a 12 year old, and my painting skills weren't much.

But that was 10 years ago, so I thought I might have gotten more stady in the hands.

So now I had decided to do this hobby, but where to start, i knew I wanted to do Napoleonics as thats my favorite time period, I also wanted to do brits as I'm a anglofile and love the readcoats.

But I didn't have a direction, I first thought I should only buy a few to see if I could paint the damn things.

So I bought 100 Old Glory recoats just to try out. I bought them from battlehonours, and by random events the store closed down for about a week, and it turned out to de a long week, everyday I went to the mailbox to see if anything good and turend up, but I think it was 3 weeks before I got my first 15mm Minis.

Now I had in the timebefore getting the little lead soldiers bought paint and brushes. The paint I bought was the only hobby paint they had, and it was Panduro allmoge, waterbased paint, when I painted warhammer long ago I jused Enamel, and it was a pain to paint with as you had to use terpentine.



Now I had both paint and minis to paint.
I started out with 10 old glory I didn't have any fancy baseing paint so I jused the regular black to base them with, probebly a bit to thick, but better then not baseing them at all.









To the left you can se my very first figure, standing on a Norwegian Krone, to show the size if the figure. Not a great work art, but alot better then I would have thought I could to. I then got hocked on painting the stuff. and in the first week I panited about 100 minis, one day I was just going to try and paint 30 minis in one go, I mangied to do it, but I felt It was to much, and havn't tried that again, it looks like 10 is a good number to do in one day.






This is what I had after one week, I didn't know any better so I justed glued all the minis in groups of 24 on the same "base" or cardboard.










As I said I realy had no ide ide were I was going with this. I just bought more and more minis.
But after some time, I decided to do General de bridge, I also decided to do the first brish Division at Salamanca, I choose this as the gdb site had the full oob for that battle.


I then found out that the bases were divied into companys ranging from 3-8 figs pr. base.
I then just cut the cardboard into companys with 4 figs on each base as I still didn't have any real bases.







And this is how my "army" looked after 3 weeks of beeing a wargamer.