David's 4th Hussars WIP

I forgot to post these pics. My nephew David has finished half a regiment of the French 4th hussars using AB figures.

I really like the look of the AB hussars, loads of character and the charging versions are particularly nice. The only down point is the officer with sword hanging from his arm. I believe there is a superior officer that you can purchase separately that can be added as a charging officer however we did not know that at the time.

Well done David and hopefully he'll paint the last 12 at some point! I've got a few regiments to paint myself at some point to.

David's Swiss 2

As I mentioned in a previous post my nephew David and I had a painting session to get his polish uhlans on the go, well David also brought down a couple of recently finished items for me to photograph.

This is David's 2nd Swiss battalion painted and they are excellent. David's been refining his painting style recently switching over to the foundry triad paints, buying a couple of napoleonic box sets tinkering here and there and he can really see the improvement.

David's moving away from letting the black show through as we used to do for speed and moving into a whole new area of painting.

You got to love the Swiss! When flicking through my uniforms of the Russian campaign god knows how many years ago I had wee day dreams of doing Swiss, Croats, Wurtemburgers etc . . . Well young David is actually ticking these boxes that I never did!

Plus David is adding to his French command bases a wee bit at a time to. . .

 Then David sent me a text with this attached, Stunning!!!! David's test figure for another of those "would love to own" units for Russia . . . Croats are on the march!

I'll share more as David puts his army together (and not to be undone my brother David has been working on Waterloo Brits! I'll post pics soon!)

Happy wargaming!

Paul

David's Swiss 1

I was up at my brothers a couple of night back and took the camera to get some pics of the figures the Davids have been working on this past year. Young David finished this Swiss battalion last year and is half way through the 2nd battalion however he has moved onto other things. I'll post them on my modelling blog soon as they are mostly fantasy and WW2.

Poor pics I'm afraid as the light in the back room was not great even with the spot light on however you get the idea.

You will notice that the flag has still to be added, come on David pull the finger out!

David's Legere

Yesterday I hit the milestone of 40! I'm quite glad to be 40 as it is all round a much more solid and pleasing number than 39 ;0) Anyways it passed quietly and young David popped round to join us for an Indian meal. Again I'm sorry for not posting much lately however I think you'll understand when you read further down the post. 

  

David also brought round his newly finished legere battalion. Quite fancy if you ask me and a great addition to their French army as this is their only completed legere battalion!!!

I apologise for the scabby thumb shot, I was watching the Liverpool game the other night and by the end I realised that I had chewed my way through all of my finger nails!!! I really thought they were going to get that last goal, substitutions were made at the wrong time for me I feel.

   

And here is the command base complete with the mounted colonel I converted. I think they turned out great!
  

And this is the reason for my lack of posts, I have jumped right into the figures Darren sold me at the end of last year. When I split them up with the spare unpainted figures I worked out I could make up about 10-11 full battalions. This has been loads of fun as I'm getting a great feeling of bringing Darren's old collection to life again.

  

My pride and joy, 1st battalion of my Silesian landwehr. These guys are 100% my own work done with the AP method and only need the flag finished and piping on some caps and then they can be varnished. 

   

So I have been mixing in 10-15 figures of my own to each battalion. The centre battalion will be the 2nd battalion of the Lieb regiment. The 2 line battalions will be in firing lines like this so as they are different from all my other line battalions. The split of figures has worked out very well and as you an see still a lot of work goes in to make them my own.

   

My poor Kurassiers left behind as I drown myself in foot. I have completed 3 at the back and the flag (it's actually crimson/purple not red). I hope to have all of the above finished by the end of March . . . watch this space!!!

  

On a wee side note: I have decided to sell off my unbuilt (and half-built) pile of 1/72 and 1/76 scale military models. I sold a huge batch to my old modelling buddy Calum however I still have hundreds left. I have been selling them at low prices for what they are and I have resin, white metal and plastic. German, Russian, US, Polish. armour, armoured trains, artillery, V2 rocket vehicles etc. Revell, Dragon, Esci, Milicast etc. Is there anyone out there interested in this sort of thing and if so what armies. You can contact me through my profile.

David's Guard Artillery

I had my brother and nephews French collection at my house for a wee while so I decided to take a few pics of it for my blog.

  

These guys are pretty new to their collection. I won a few packs of OG French and British off eBay at a good price and the old guard foot artillery were the main reason for my bid.

 

I think the figures are really nice and David Jnr did a nice job on the uniforms.

 I posted these guys in their WIP state a few months back and this is them finally finished off.

 

 This time very nice painting by David Snr.

  

 And very nice figures by OG.
 
Their guard ranks are growing all the time. Middle guard on the workbench at the moment I believe!

Davids Artillery 1

My brother David has been speeding through his French 15mm figures with the latest on the painting table being these OG French foot artillery.

 

David likes the animated poses of the OG figures for his units.

  

These guys turned out nice but the real gems are the OG guard horse artillery below.

  

I think these are Davids best painted 15mm figures to date?

  

When I was editing the pics I actually thought I was looking at his 28mm Naps as he has guard horse for them too.

     

I always think if you can go in this close and they still look nice then you have done a good job on the painting. I should point out that David painted these figures after a phone conversation as he had no uniform reference material for them in his house at the time so not bad at all.

I haven't stopped painting myself, however I have jumped again!
 
I took a week off for my birthday and as I was free on the Saturday the guys suggested a 15mm Naps game. JP organised the battle and it was planned around a battle on the lead up to Borodino (I think it was Sheverdino? Sorry about spelling). Anyway the allied side was my Russians but I simply didn't have enough so my Prussians had to be enlisted as Russians as well (even my Saxons got a run out as Russians!). We had 7 players and it was great fun with some really side splitting moments (I and 2 others were a little hung over and I forgot my camera). Anyway long story shot is I have jumped back to my Russians (using Army Painter!). Army Painting Russians is simply brilliant, even better than the Saxons. I actually placed the AP'd Russians next to my finished AB unit and I was amazed at how close they look. It looks like I will be doing all my Russian foot with the AP method.
 
Pics to follow when I get a week of work out the way...

Davids Old Guard 2

I thought I would post some pics of the Davids progress on their old guard. I believe all the infantry were painted by young David (his dad has been concentrating on the line).

 

 2 battalions of AB guard chasseurs and 1 battalion of old glory grenadiers of the guard. 
I'm sure they will be a formidable enemy!

   

 Plus the guard command base that I started so long ago and young David continued with is now finally finished and the young guard fanion is also attached (if not waving in the wide).

   

So as things stand I have a battalion of old glory Dutch guard to paint and the Davids have 3 battalions of old glory middle guard and 1 more old glory old guard battalion to paint.
I think they are turning out pretty well.

Our Young Guard

Well the 2nd Annual Analogue Hobbies painting comp has started and I have been stuck painting the house. Anyway tonight we made our way up to my parents to drop off some snow shovels and popped into my brothers on the way home. The Davids have been busy painting and I wanted to get some pics.

  

Seems like a long time ago now when David and I got back into Naps and the 1st show we went to was the Falkirk wargames show. There was a guy selling off all his unpainted OG 15's (large packs of roughly 100). David was cautious as he wasn't sure how long the phase would last but I still bought a stack.

  

  This young guard battalion was the 1st figures I painted from the haul. David decided on French so I chose to go for Prussians (and later russians) so my OG young guard were put to the back of the line.

  

Over the last few years young David has come through as a cracking figure painter and he like his dad has started doing French (as well as space marines, 15mm and 20mm WW2 and LotR). recently he was asking about the young guard and I passed onto him the remaining 2 battalions (as well as 3 battalions of middle guard so watch this space).

It is great to see the young guard finally finished and ready to join David's French army (especially as they don't count as guard!!!).
     

The flags come from "Flags for the Lads" French 1812 range and are excellent.
  

Lets hope I can get some of my own stash of lead finished soon.

BH French Infantry 1

Today I was able to make it down to the club and the guys put on a pretty big Naps game (battle report to come). I managed to take some pics of my brother Davids growing collection. Sorry for the qualtiy of pics.
   

Neil if you are reading this buddy most of these marching dudes are the BH figures you sent up with a few AB command added in. They have helped David fill out his French battalions, so many thanks!!!
   

Flags are from "Flags for the Lads" French 1812 range and are brilliant.
   

You can see the guard command base in the background still needign to have the flag/fanion fitted. Filling in as line command for the day.

Davids Old Guard 1

Well I have nothing to show myself at the moment (almost finished an AB French line battalion) although my young nephew David has been working his way through two 15mm French Guard battalions, 1 AB and 1 Old Glory (Sorry about the crappy pics)
 

 

I personally prefer the Old Glory figures as there are so many poses

 To me they really look like old grumblers

 The mounted officer if anyone is interested is an extra Ney figure we had that I converted with some miliput. The Davids have 2 AB chasseur battalions that I gave them as a Christmas present a couple of years ago and this is the 1st finished (flag are from Flags for the Lads)

French Horse Artillery

I always think what really makes a wargames table is the little extra equipment and details that people add like caissons and limbers

  

My brother David took the notion this year to get some of our old Minifigs eye candy finished up to accompany his horse artillery batteries.

  

This is my personal favourite, the caisson all based up ready and waiting that double 1 to be rolled.

  

I really like the limbers too. We have a soft spot for the old Minifigs range as you could get almost everything for the Napoleonic period. When they are done well, they really look the part on the table. David has based this limber on a hardwood base he cut himself and has magnetic strip underneath for storage.

Davids Cuirassiers

So I was getting used to fighting small Minifigs cavalry units with my British and Prussians and although David and I had discussed our need for more cavalry it still came as a big surprise when David rattled through a 24 man Battle Honours cuirassier regiment! And you can imagine how devastated I was when a 2nd appeared within a week!!

As you would guess they have been taking a heavy tole on our Allied cavalry over the past year but they are really nice to look at.





They did however fall under the wargamers unwritten rule of "newly painted figures tend to get duffed over 1st time out". With some really lucky rolling by myself my Prussian artillery whittled away at them before they were minced by a Prussian Dragoon regiment.

Ahh those were good times!!!

Davids Chasseurs

These were the 1st Battle Honours cavalry that my brother David added to his French collection and really nice they turned out too.

We managed to get a whole load of Battle honours from our friend Robert at a good price as they were surplus to his requirements so a big stroke of luck there.

As we are using the General de Brigade rules the French casualties are on 6 side bases.