Showing posts with label Gorgon Miniatures. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gorgon Miniatures. Show all posts

Monday, 20 May 2013

Ptolemaic Elephant Corp


Last night I completed basing the Ptolemaic Elephant Corp, for Raphia.  Ptolemy deployed 73 of these African elephants in an attempt to counter the rather larger number of rather larger Seleucid Indians.  Unfortunately he failed to put them through the elephant equivalent of assertiveness training, and most of them subsequently routed back, through his own forces.  As usual, all photos are clickable.


The magnificent beasts and crews are from Aventine's range.  I painted the elephants, and my good friend Nick Speller, the crews (beautifully).


Nick also painted the escorting Cretan and NeoCretan archers, who are a mixture of Foundry and Gorgon miniatures.  You may be able to see that they are in several different shades of red.  In the game these will form 5 units, each of one elephant and two stands of escorts.

Tuesday, 19 July 2011

Big Men

Here are some of the command figures from my recently completed XIIIIth Gemina Martia Victrix legion; the Aquilifer, Primus Pilus Centurion and Imagifer.


The Aquilfer (below) carries the legion's Aquila, or eagle.  He is a heavily converted Aventine figure (some of the Aventine Republican figures are very suitable for later periods); the eagle is Foundry and I added the mane on the lionskin, not bad, eh?


The Primus Pilus Centurion (or first spear centurion, for "Rome" fans), below, is an unconverted Gorgon Studios figure by Steve Saleh, one of his nicest, I think.  He has featured here before, but this is a marginally better photo than my last effort.


And finally, the Imagifer (below) carries the image of the reigning Emperor; in this case, Nero.  Another Aventine conversion with a Foundry Imago kindly donated by Mr Allen Curtis.


I've still got to finish the mounted legate and tribunes, and have various lictors and other supernumaries to paint.  But first I need to finish the effing French on my other blog... they really are doing my head in.

Tomorrow, I'll post a pic of the legionary cavalry....

Saturday, 12 February 2011

Primus Pilus

This is a lovely miniature that was generously sent to me by Hank of Gorgon Miniatures.  He is now Primus Pilus (senior centurion) of my almost-finished legion. 


I'm very chuffed with him. Thanks, Hank!

Sunday, 9 May 2010

Gorgon Etruscan cavalry

Hank from Gorgon Miniatures has very kindly sent me some samples of their new Etruscan cavalry (thanks Hank!).

I'm very taken with the mounts, which are from the same Saleh stable as the Polemarch steeds. They are IMHO very much more satisfactory than the former, having much better necks, and fuller bodies.  There is a tiny bit of flash between the legs, but this looks easy to remove.  These are amongst the nicest horses I've seen in 28mm.
 
Here are the riders.  In all honesty I still don't know all that much about Etruscans, let alone Etruscan cavalry.  They are heavily armoured for Greek-style cavalry.  I have read that one of the intended uses for them is as mounted hoplites.  The armour is crisply executed (scale, lamellar and bronze cuirass respectively). The shields on the right are small and not very curved, and not intended as hoplons. 


Here is a size comparison shot of the horses.  I've always liked the Foundry WotG horses, but I prefer the new Gorgons, which have larger front quarters and are slightly fuller in the body.  The Aventine horse on the right is a little smaller in the body, and I've included it for size comparison purposes.

One last thing (and unfortunately the photo didn't come out, but you can see this from the Gorgon photos); the riders are a perfect fit onto the horses, with the cloaks sculpted to fit neatly over the horses rump, and the legs fitting the sides of the horse.

These are very nice minis; I think I may use these as Tarentine heavy cavalry in my projected Pyrrrhic army.

Tuesday, 15 September 2009

Aventine meets Gorgon

Hank at Gorgon Miniatures in the USA http://www.gorgon-studios.com/?page_id=2 has very kindly sent me a few more samples; this time of the new Etruscan range.  I thought it might be useful to post a couple of shots next to the recent Aventine range http://www.aventineminiatures.co.uk/


Above are two of the Gorgon "second class citizen spearmen" Etruscans, flanked by two of the Aventine Volscians.  I still know relatively little about this period, but what is apparent to me is that, as I had hoped, the two ranges are an excellent match for height and build.  Indeed, at one stage, I got the minis mixed up and couldn't tell which range they came from!  They come with a tidy rectangular shield (not shown), and are finely sculpted with very little flash, indeed.


Above are two hoplites and a phalangite; from left to right Foundry, Gorgon and Crusader (I couldn't lay my hands on a Crusader hoplite).  It is a pity that the light was poor because I couldn't catch all the detail on the Gorgon Etruscan 1st Class hoplite figure.  If you click, you still should be able to see the trim around the cheek plates on the helmet, and the scales on the composite cuirass are fantastic; the detail on this mini is exceptional.  These figures can also be used as Greek Hoplites.

So I'm delighted with my new minis; thanks Hank! It's likely that the next year (post-Zama) I'll paint up some units of mixed Aventine and Gorgon minis.

Thursday, 6 August 2009

Saleh Persian from Gorgon Miniatures

Hank at Gorgon Miniatures ( http://www.gorgon-studios.com/?page_id=2 ) in the US was kind enough to send me some samples from their range of Steve Saleh-designed Spartans that were formerly sold through Amazon, and a Saleh Persian miniature that I believe is a giveaway with orders (rather than a precursor to a new range).

Now I've previously seen images of the excellent Spartans (I may do a size comparison shot, later) and one of the painted Persian, but not a size comparison photo of the Persian, so here he is sandwiched between an OOP Foundry Persian and a Polemarch Successor phalangite, also both sculpted by Saleh. I'm not particularly knowledgeable about Persian equipment so I won't comment on that; but the hand is designed to be drilled out for a spear, which marks a major improvement over the previous Persian, whose spear appears far too thick!

The Persian is a delightful figure, full of character. The detail is really crisp and, anatomically, it is superior to the previous Persian, IMHO. The height matches his other, larger 28mm ranges.

There were rumours, a year or so ago, that Steve was going to do a Persian range to complement the Spartans. Having seen this mini, it would be really great if he did! But I hope to see the Polemarch Successor range and the Gorgon early Etruscans finished first, especially the latter as I'm becoming very interested in the early Italina armies.