The reason that my joy is not entirely unconfined, is that I hadn't realised form the ebay photo that the bronze on them is not my usual brass shade, but instead a much redder (and wronger) Dwarf Bronze that is going to look very odd indeed next to my other minis. I might try a brass drybrush over the top. Anyhow, plan is to paint 8 more minis to match, replace the guardsman with the hoplon in the front row with a 9th phalangite, and see if I can't get them looking half decent. I think I'm going to need a lot of pikemen, this year...
Thursday, 13 May 2010
Perdiccas' Purple Phalanx
Here's another eBay purchase; perhaps a less wise one than yesterday's auxilia. Each phalangite is clad in a magnificent purple linothorax, and someone has written "Perdiccas" underneath each element. They are only an average paintjob but look good en-masse.
Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Coh. I Britannorum Eq.
This is a unit I've been working on since Salute; the third unit of Auxilia for my very slowly expanding EIR army. I bought 24 painted figures on eBay, painted 6 more to match, retouched and rebased. I fear that the shield patterns are legionary, but they look great so I don't care. Have a click; they aren't bad minis! The Centurion is GW.
It is over-strength compared to my other 24 man cohorts, which represent 480 auxilia at 1:20 scale (so each base is a century). I'm tempted to add 8 more figures and call it a Milliary cohort, or another 16 and divide it into two cohorts. Some day I may get around to painting its integral 6 figure cavalry unit.
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!).
These are very nice minis; I think I may use these as Tarentine heavy cavalry in my projected Pyrrrhic army.
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.
Saturday, 8 May 2010
Dipping my toe...
These chaps are some Foundry/Companion/GB ancient Spanish Caetrati (small shield-bearing infantry) that I've blocked in, and hope to find time to dip later today. If it works, they will have been a pretty quick job by my standards. The Foundry Spanish are very nice, I wish there was a compete range of them. I like them rather more than their Crusader/A&A equivalents.
Monday, 3 May 2010
Busman's Holiday
So after the better part of a year spent painting Romans and their foes, when I get a break I choose to paint some... more Romans.
This unit is going to be built around 2 dozen Foundry Auxilia minis I bought painted on Ebay. The basing wasn't up to much (and to be honest the shield images look rather legionary to me) but by painting half a dozen more minis, and rebasing, I can make a large unit that should look pretty good. I still have far too few Auxiliaries relative to my EIR legionaries.
I have at least half a dozen other units of Romans, Macedonians and Spanish that are in similar part-painted shape to this one, and I want to finish some of them off before I launch into another grandiose Zama-like project.
Monday, 26 April 2010
Zama- the Last Post
Super Bletchley Zama Slideshow!
These are the photos that my mate Ian took of our Bletchley game, and very fine they are, too! They include quite a few closeups.
Enjoy!
These are the photos that my mate Ian took of our Bletchley game, and very fine they are, too! They include quite a few closeups.
Enjoy!
Sunday, 25 April 2010
A fine day out...
Yesterday was Salute 2010, and I've half a dozen or so photos of the day, mostly garnered from Matthieu's phone (merci!). They are mostly of the people (I've got a disc of photos of the game at Bletchley from Ian that I will post later).
Muswell Hill Militiamen (Paris chapter) drinking beer outside the Maid of Muswell pub, our spiritual home.
Matthieu developing a taste for Landlord.
Scipio confers with Laelius, whils Masinissa appears to be wearing a Hawaiian shirt.
Gregory Privat, Iron Mitten and yrs truly. I look almost as crazed as the sapper in the picture!
Gregory in trouble.
The Carthaginian elephants performed very poorly and one of the Carthaginian generals became despondant, but Hannibal kept the battle going right to the end...
Muswell Hill Militiamen (Paris chapter) drinking beer outside the Maid of Muswell pub, our spiritual home.
Matthieu developing a taste for Landlord.
My son Harry, his friend Alex and I arrived at Excel at 7:01, but it took over 2 hours to get in and finish setting the game up. Various militiamen arrived with their contingents; Ian and Dr. Simon from Muswell, Craig from Leeds, Nick and a friend from Essex. The doors opened at 9:45 and we kicked the game off at 11.00 with the assistance of conscripted players who included another Simon, Chris and Dirk (apologies for missed names here, I have a terrible memory for names and faces). Many of the players were novices but they picked the rules up quickly.
Scipio confers with Laelius, whils Masinissa appears to be wearing a Hawaiian shirt.
Gregory Privat, Iron Mitten and yrs truly. I look almost as crazed as the sapper in the picture!
Gregory in trouble.
The Carthaginian elephants performed very poorly and one of the Carthaginian generals became despondant, but Hannibal kept the battle going right to the end...
Scipio was called away and the other generals decide on cardplay in his absence,. Leadership by committee must have been effective, as the Romans did eventually win at around 4.30pm (whilst Scipio was off queuing in the car park).
Unexpectedly we were awarded the Salute prize for "Most Impressive Troops". This was a considerable acheivement, because there were some fantastic armies out there! The judge said that what most impressed him was that the project was the combined work of 6 or 7 different painters, and yet all the figures worked together beautifully. I think that this, on top of the Best Game award at Bletchley, is a great tribute to all the people that have worked so long and hard to bring the project to fruition!
So what next? I think a few weeks are needed to chill out, and then we might bat some ideas around for another grandiose project for 2011...
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