Showing posts with label Elephants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Elephants. Show all posts

Saturday, 6 February 2010

Elephants- Before and After

I've finished two more dead elephants, displayed here next to their live equivalents.  All the elephants are Gripping Beast resin; tidy little models.  I must say these are very nice products; very nicely sculpted; I wonder whether GB designed them for their own Zama project?  I picked up the two dead models at the Salute B&B for a fiver. the pair.  Bargain! 

 
 I've tried to make the dead elephants match live ones I painted two or three years back.

 
Transfers are LBMS, arrows are made from broom bristle.  I can make and fit an arrow inside two minutes!  Expect to see many more...

 
I tried to make the two models just a little different from each other, by adjusting the trunk position and adding a wounded crewman to the left-hand one.  I did a bit of retouching on the two live elephants I completed earlier.

4 dead nellies down; 2 to go!

Friday, 11 December 2009

Nellie Fever

I'm very frustrated that I have picked up no less than 6 elephants in the last few months, and don't have the time to paint any of them because of my preparations to the Zama game!  To ease the pain, I've treated myself to a couple of nights off Zama to at least stick a few together, even though I know I won't be able to paint them until May.


First (above) is the excellent Aventine Pyrrhic Indian elephant. This is a fine beast; very expressive with his raised trunk.  It went together very cleanly, with just a little greenstuff at the seams.  As with other Aventine minis, there was no flash or mould lines.  I was very impressed with the two part Howdah; so impressed in fact...
                                     

...that I used a spare Aventine howdah on the female Indian elephant from TimeLine, shown above .  I will be using Aventine crewmen, too.  Aventine sell howdahs and crewmen seperately, which is a valuable facility.  I still need to add some ropes in greenstuff to this model.  I wanted at least one female elephant in my elephant "brigade".

        

Finally, above I have a most unusual beast (above).  Mario of Empire Models very kindly sent me one of his African elephants.  I felt it was rather too large a model for an African beast, but couldn't resist the magnificently sculpted armour and so have given it an Indian head donated by Barry at Timeline.  I should say Keith of Aventine also very kindly sent me a spare head (thanks!), but the Timeline head was slightly larger and more closely fitted the large, broader frame of the Empire torso.  I've had to trim the neck of the torso to get the head to look OK; in due course I'll add a crest so that it matches the other Empire elephants I own.  I damaged the crenellations on the howdah, and took them off.  Again, it'll probably have Aventine crewmen.

Other elephants I have not shown here include one each Aventine Sassanind Royal, Pyrrhic and Seleucid.  I'll try to put the Seleucid together next week.

Finally here are the three together; they match surprisingly well in size.  The Empire in the centre is larger, but not unbearably so. 

                

Roll on May...

Friday, 6 November 2009

New Aventine Nellies

Keith at Aventine has sent me some very exciting pictures of their beautiful new elephants.  He's posted a couple on TMP, but not this one, which I like best:



Really excellent painting...  the cloths, shield designs and the painted armour are very frothworthy.  The Aventine shop is at http://www.aventineminiatures.co.uk/catalog/ ; I shall be wending my way there, later this weekend!

Thursday, 8 October 2009

Aventine and Empire Models Elephant Size Comparison

Mithridates on TMP was asking how the Aventine http://www.aventineminiatures.co.uk/catalog/ and Empire elephants compare sizewise. 

Accordingly, I've bluetacked the Aventine Royal elephant together, sans trunk and tusks.  It is supposed to be rearing, but I've put all 4 feet on the ground for comparison purposes; it is the unpainted model at the front.



From the above view, you'll see that they are both pretty well the same size to the shoulder; roughly 53mm.



The build of the two elephants torsoes is not dissimilar.  The legs and feet are similar sizes.  The Empire body is rather longer, at 58mm to the Aventine's 49mm.

The big difference between the two is in the heads.  The volume of the Empire head is perhaps twice that of the Aventine, largely because is is very much broader, with a bigger forehead and eyes set wider (perhaps rather too wide) apart.  The elephant has a very large helmet and crest on the beast.  I prefer the smaller Aventine head, but can live with the bigger head on the Empire model because it is such an imposing beast overall, with excellently depicted armour.

Broadly speaking, the two elephants would work well together.  I'll be adding Aventine elephants to my Seleucid elephant corp as soon as they can sculpt them, and I can get around to painting them!

Friday, 3 July 2009

Elephant Size Comparison Shots

I promise that this is the final post featuring elephants for the time being! I'm going to compare the Empire Models (Indian) elephant, on the right in each photo, with three African elephants from other ranges, in part to convey the sheer mass of the former. Indian elephants should be much larger than African forest elephants, and Empire's certainly is!  All photos are clickable.

The African elephants will all feature at the Society of Ancients Zama game, next year.First (above) we have the Gripping Beast Carthaginian elephant http://www.grippingbeast.com/shop.php?CatID=154 . This would convert very well to become a Ptolemaic elephant at Raphia; it is very much smaller than Empire's Indian, but then it should be! The bulk of the Indian elephants at Raphia apparently gave them a considerable advantage.The second elephant (above) is an African from Essex http://www.essexminiatures.co.uk/frames25mmcont.html . I feel this is the least satisfactory of my Africans, and won't be buying more; it doesn't look much like I think an African Forest Elephant should appear. It is very plump and rounded, with 'orrible thickish legs.Finally, we have a heavily converted Renegade elephant http://www.renegademiniatures.com/numidian.htm
. The basic Renegade elephant is an unhappy composite between an Indian and an African elephant, with features of each; however, extensive work with greenstuff makes it into a rather satisfactory African Forest nellie, in my view at least, and it is my favourite African at the moment (not least because it was the cheapest, at £6).

Altogether we will field 11 elephants for the Society of Ancients Zama game next April; my six, another 4 from my mate Dr Simon, and one that still needs to be sourced. In our first game trialling the battle, they managed to inflict a surprising amount of damage against their Roman foes; rather more, in fact, than they should have!

Monday, 29 June 2009

Empire Models Armoured Elephants... completed!

I love these models, and it was fun painting them but they were a lot of work and am delighted to have finished them!
The detail on the models is terrific, and I'd commend these weapons of Mass Destruction to any aspiring Eastern potentate!
I've named these two after the titans Oceanus and Kronos. I plan to add a third, when Empire's new armoured elephant comes out. And then there are rumours of Pyrrhic elephants from Aventine... and I also need some elephant guards.

But these will have to wait; I've got a handful of Tegeans to finish, and then it's Operation Zama!

Wednesday, 24 June 2009

Pimp my Nellie 6 - Assembly!

It has taken me 10 days to paint 12 crewmen (the ones on the beasts plus four spares not shown), and they came out pretty well in the end. I stuck an officer in one of the elephants for variety. I found that 3 crew fitted better than 4 in the howdah, and felt that there was also slightly more historical evidence for 3. In hindsight I regret painting both with the saddlecloths yellow ; I might repaint one for variety, in green, perhaps.

So now they just need basing... a few days work in parallel with the Tegeans I have started painting.
Re names; I'm still mulling. I'm thinking maybe something from Greek mythology...

Sunday, 14 June 2009

Pimp My Nellie 5

Well the elephants themselves are pretty well painted; and I'm very pleased with them. I still have the small matter of a dozen assorted crew and hangers on to paint, though, and the bases; another week or so's work.


The beasts painted up very well; lots of detail to paint, but it is all in good relief. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I substituted Crusader shields for Empire's, because I already had the appropriate Crusader Seleucid transfers, which make a certain statement! I tried to make the colour of the elephant drapes tie in with the shields, but got the red a little wrong.

I was particularly pleased with the "rear elevation"; the crevices in the skin took a wash very nicely. All in all these are splendid beasts and I'm itching to get them finished...

Thursday, 11 June 2009

Pimp My Nellie 4

Here's where I am with the Successor elephants; I estimate that they are almost half painted (not counting crews and basing). There really is an extraordinary amount of work on these; most of what you see is base coats which still need highlighting and inking. I've decided to up the crew to 5 men on each elephant, and one on each base as a "guard".

Tuesday, 9 June 2009

Pimp my Nellie 3!

Oldbob on TMP unwittingly suggested a new title for this thread. For those (Greg) that believe I'm being too slow at painting my Empire Models elephants, here's evidence of a little progress. They look pants at the moment, but I know they are going to look great when finished.

I keep increasing the amount of time that I expect I will need to be painting these for! There is a lot of surface area, and a lot of detail, which I'm discovering as I paint. I'm very impressed with the way the straps and metal rings that suspend the armour are depicted.

I'm also toying with increasing the number of crewmen on the models to 4 each, as described by Livy for the battle of Magnesia, and adding some figures to the base as "elephant guards".

Sunday, 31 May 2009

Painting Nellie 2

Not much Nellie related progress, because I'm trying to clear the painting table of the 54 Legionaries that seized control of it around 3 weeks ago. Consequentally, I won't be able to start the elephants for a few more days. However, as a taster, here are some of the primed crewmen (all photos clickable).





The miniatures took a while to prepare, because there is a little assembly required (heads and weapons), and because the metal from which they are cast is fairly hard and needs a bit of work when filing. There are mould lines visible on some of the legs, presumably because the mould-halves are slightly out of alignment, but this won't matter as they will be hidden in the Howdah. Aside from that, they came out very nicely; the detail is extremely crisp. The separate heads (which Mario kindly sent me a small bag of) came into their own, because they enable each figure to be different from the next, and the heads can be posed looking downwards. I sat each of the heads in a little greenstuff and superglued for safety.

I have taken three minor liberties with the elephant models that Mario sold me. The first was to replace the cast pikes provided with wire spears. I did this because I hate cast spears (because they are too thick and yet bendy), and in this case I felt they were too short to enable the crewmen to engage enemy on the ground. The second was to replace one of the crewmen with a spare Empire Model, for the sake of variety, and the third was to swap the shields for Crusader shields, because they are larger and will look more imposing, and because I already have appropriate Crusader transfers.

Monday, 25 May 2009

Painting Nellie 1

This series of posts is goint to be a mix of review and painting log for the Empire Models armoured Successor elephant.

The Empire Models Successor Elephant stands a mighty 54mm at the shoulder, is 85mm long from tip of the trunk to hind feet and is 84mm to the top of the howdah. The model comes with 4 crewmen, which I'll deal with in a later posting.

The elephant is very easy to assemble, just requiring the head and metal trunk and tusks to be attached. I have left the tusks off for the time being, because it will be easier to paint with them absent. I had to do a small amount of filling on the join of the head and body, as you'd expect. There were a number of tiny airholes in the casting; less than I would have expected, though, and I easily filled these with greenstuff. One very minor issue with the model is that there are small crevices along the edges of the howdah; I filled these, too. After assembly I primed white.

I wouldn't claim to be expert on elephants, nor Successors, but this is an imposing beast. I estimate that, compared to a Foundry World of the Greeks miniature, it must represent a creature around 10' to 10'6", at the shoulder, not far off the maximum 11' height that Wikipedia suggests Indian elephants grow to.

Paul was asking on TMP about the size of the model. Now I don't have a Newline elephant to compare it with, but I've taken a shot next to a couple of Foundry figures. This is a big bull, and isn't going to be very useful if you have 25mm scale phalangites; it'll dwarf them. I think, though, that a couple of these will make fantastic centrepieces in a bigger 28mm Successor army such as Foundry, Empire or Polemarch.

In general the model is very well cast, and the detail is extremely crisp. The scale armour and the draperies are beautifully depicted. I'm very much looking forward to painting them (I have two)... going to be a big job, though, because they are fantastic pieces that will warrant careful attention!