I spent a bit of time this lunchtime getting some more of the crates ‘built’
I still have half a dozen of the larger ones and one of the smaller ones to saw the planks into. I have two sitting there half finished too. I imagine they will look a lot better once they are painted.
By the time I am finished I will have 10 of each size. I was, however, considering making a double length one to see what it looks like. If I had thought about it earlier I would have done it with the smaller ones too.
Highlights on greatcoats and breeches. Not that you can tell from the photo.
The officer has been given a silvered cuirass whilst the rest are not as swanky.
Still a long way to go before they are done. I am wondering whether to head away from the red cuffs as shown on the website to something else instead. A bit of research is required methinks.
Very little achieved last night as I was sorting out my shed.
I managed to get a wash on the cloaks, a second coat of red on the breeches. I also added some dark green on the command section tunics. I did consider white as befits an elite cuirassier unit but decided on the Russian Green. The other conundrum is the musician. Quite often these had reversed colours to the rest of the unit. I was worried that it would look like a figure from a different regiment.
I have ordered the necessary green paint to do the cloaks for these and the two resin ones. Hopefully it will come soon as I want to crack on and get them finished.
At least these are Zombie cuirassiers!
Here we have Preserovitch’s Elite cavalry unit who have dismounted to hunt for Ferach stragglers in the Witchlands. I have basically just blocked in the cloak and breeches. I started quite late so I haven’t got as far as I would have liked. In reality the officer would have had a silver-grey greatcoat but I felt if I went down that route the unit cohesion would be lost. I might give him a silver breastplate to allow him to stand out a bit.
I am either going to put a wash on the cloaks or paint them in some grey-green paint. They aren’t as bright as they look here, but I am just not too sure if I like them or not.
The ones in the background are being painted up for my mate’s birthday. I need to find out the colours used on the prepainted ones so I have some hope of matching them in.
I really do like these figures and tried to buy just these from the starter set; instead I have had to wait a bit before I managed to get some.
I eventually got these painted…
As per normal, they look better in the flesh so to speak. They are in fact highlighted which is not visible at all on most of them 😦
Next up is this merry lot:
The Savant Zombies will be first. The ones for my mate have to match into the ones he got painted from Alternative Armies. I will check with Gavin to see what colours he used ( I have a pretty good idea as I am using the same paints myself).
Mine can be a different colour as I see fit/fancy the look of. Mine are the ones on the circular bases and his are on the square bases.
Making crates – production line method
I decided to do some more crafting this lunchtime. I had sawed lines into a pile of cubes so I brought them in to get them sorted.
I found that the index cards are an ideal thickness as well as having a pile of lines on them. This meant that I would only have to measure the inner widths.
The first time I did this, I used a single length of card and then when it ran out I cut some more.
Each cube uses twelve lengths of card… I can get 6 x 20mm out of each piece of index card. Luckily I can also get 5 lengths of 25mm card.
I did a whole card to start with. I cut the strips out and folded each.
Once they were all folded I measured the required length of each cube face and cut these out.
It was then a simple case of adding them to the cubes with PVA. I like this glue to affix the card to the wood as it soaks into the card making it easier to bond them together.
Although seeming to be tedious, to begin with it actually meant that I did the four cubes in not much more time than I did two.
I am still to add cross pieces to all of the faces, however, part of me wonders whether I should bother.
Adding lights into my shed took a bit more time than expected.
I still managed to slap some paint on these tonight. I am not sure you can actually tell in this picture.
My purchases are thus:
The new Savant zombie colour party with sergeant, drummer and standard bearer. The rest of these in the range are resin, these however are white metal.
Below the zombies are a selection of Ferach troops from the Witchland’s campaign. These poor souls are wrapped in blankets and heavy coats to keep out of the cold. I will be painting these up for my mates birthday present.
The one thing I was not expecting was the amount of flash on the flag bearer. This, I can honestly say is a first. It will take a couple of minutes to sort out so there are no issues there. The other two zombies have a bit of a mould line so I think it was a bit of a wobble with this individual figure.
Next up are my toys.
Another four Savant zombies to take my initial squad to ten. I really do like them in their cloaks. If the colour party had been modelled wearing them I might have been tempted to get some (I am still not sure about kettle drums in a skirmish game).
A bit of a clean up is required but it won’t take long.
Next up are another couple of civilians.
An Othari aristocrat and a hobgoblin miser. These are full of character, the Aristo is wafting his, no doubt perfumed, handkerchief whilst the miser is writing something down in his notebook.
I really do like the civilian figures from the various ranges. It is my aim to collect them all.
Last of all was my free pile of carrots 🥕. As I got these models under an offer I received free postage and another set of carrots.
I got a bit more painting done tonight.
These half dozen zombies are all in greatcoats. Instead of giving them a contrasting cuff I decided to leave them as either brown or grey. Bizarrely enough there are three identical pairs. Even though I picked them up at random I have managed to paint one of each pair in brown and the other in grey.
Their flesh tone is skeleton bone at the minute, but once dry I will add various washes. Some greenish and others a more khaki colour. Even though I have been painting lots of zombies and other undead I still haven’t got the hang of painting their flesh.
The greatcoats have yellow epaulettes, mainly to add a bit of a brighter colour, but also because I saw them in the Osprey book on Russian Napoleonic infantry and I quite liked them. I will try and add a number on each, however it may lead to a repaint 😁.
My MDF bases have arrived so I can base up to 100 infantry on the 2p sized base. I managed to find one to base all six of the lot I am painting now.
We had never heard about this 19th century smugglers cave even though living up here for 12 years. We found out about it today and set off on an expedition to find it.
We eventually did…
In the 19th century the fishermen didn’t own their own boats. The paid for them in the fish they caught. A friend of my wife has done some research and for every one boat registered another four were smuggling. The crews would go out in their sixareens to the fishing. This was a deadly job and a fair few tragedies happened around these shores. In July 1881 58 men were lost from Gloup when 10 boats foundered in an unexpected storm. Basically every able bodied man from the village was lost.
These clinker built boats would head out up to 40 miles off shore and then return. Some would stop off in Foula, an island off Shetland, sell or trade some of their fish for brandy and then head into their secret locations. They would Drop off the brandy and then head home. They would either return for it later or some of their accomplices would do it for them.
This cave was one such secret location. One end opens directly to the sea and is not visible from the nearby village of Hamnavoe. The other entrance is about 100 metres away and is well hidden amongst a jumble of rocks.
On the way back the kids just had to jump off every available rock…
We had an awesome afternoon out exploring somewhere around 7 miles from where we live.
Bogenwald 