Good day, hopefully your head won't be too fuzzy after yesterday's party, Happy New Year to all you lovely people.
Entry number 2 this year is from my second theme of the challenge, my 28mm Crusades Project.
Here we have 12 figures ready to join Saladins ranks. They are from the Gripping Beast plastic box set called 28mm Arab Heavy Cavalry ! So 12 x 10 is a nice 120 points to add to the 80 I bagged for the Italians which keeps me nicely on track for my target. I have used the Spear arms from the box for these to give a uniform weapon, except for the unit leader who has a sword and the musician who has a trumpet type thingy taken from Infantry set by the same company.
We have bounced around a few rule sets for the Crusades but Deus Vult seem to be the front runner at the moment. Painting wise the horses are done in my usual oil wipe method with Acrylics on the riders. I got another couple of boxes of these at Xmas so they can go in the back of the queue.
On the paint table at the moment is my entry to the Recon round along with the next 8 figures of my Papal Pike Block. With some of the Italian Wars units being pretty big I plan to do a small 6 figure Cavalry Unit each week (having the points tally moving works to motivate me rather than going for the bomb) and when that's in the bag I will work on bits of the larger units.
Welcome to 2019, Regards Ken
Wonderful entry Ken, these are quite beautiful. I like the variety of poses and shades on the horses and riders which makes every one look subtly unique. I can almost feel the ground shaking as they charge... I wouldn't want to have to face these fella's in battle! The hand painted shields also add some nice detail and are worthy of a couple of bonus points in my book, bringing the total for these up to 122 points.
Lee
Lee
Really nice looking cavalry unit there!
ReplyDeleteThanks very much James
DeleteNice cavalry, Ken :)
ReplyDeleteCheers Tamsin
DeleteLovely looking Arab’s Ken, those shields are great. I’m another one for the piecemeal approach, like you I find getting something done is good motivation even if it’s only part of a unit.
ReplyDeleteThanks Peter, just got to keep the scoreboard ticking over.
DeleteVery nice figs. Love the sheilds
ReplyDeleteThanks Martin, very kind
DeleteTerrific cavalry unit, Ken. I love the oil wipe on the horses. I've seen others work on this and am curious on how you go about using the effect.
ReplyDeleteCheers Curt, it's a really simple technique that I am surprised more people don't use it. I use an acrylic paint for a base layer now and on my last batch I used an airbrush to put it on, 80 horses in an hour.
DeleteFor base colours I usually stay quite light, Yellow Ochre, Tan Yellow, Pale Cam Brown, Buff etc, too dark and you don't get a decent effect.
Simply slap a layer of oil paint on and wipe off the excess. I have about 8 different brown oils I use. There are so many variables, how much oil paint you wipe off, how long you leave the oils on before wiping off. The variations are massive and every horse has a subtle difference.
It works best on well sculpted horses with some form of muscle definition on the mini.
The only draw back is the wait time for the oils to dry, since using an acrylic base this has dropped drastically and I leave stuff a minimum of a week to dry before going back and painting the hooves, horse furniture etc in acrylic, once the oil drys completely it will take Acrylic on top, and that's the horse done.
Awesome work on these Ken.
DeleteA tip for you dealing with the oils and dry time. Simple do you normal process as described to Curt above, then clear coat them. The clear coat dries in 20-60 minutes and you can then keep painting over them. That's how we deal with oils around here. Probably not "technically" a correct method, but it works.
Cheers Byron, not thought about using clear coat, it be honest the drying time has never been an issue for me personally
DeleteGreat cavalry unit. Some nice work on the shields in particular.
ReplyDeleteCheers 👍
DeleteWhat a great looking unit Ken. Terrific brushwork!
ReplyDeleteCheers Ray
DeleteGreat looking cavalry unit, nice shields!
ReplyDeleteBest Iain
Thanks Iain, decal shields are nice but hand painted are worth the time.
DeleteFantastic cavalry. Does the Arabic translate? (Or shouldn't I ask?)
ReplyDeleteThanks Noel, on these it doesn't but I have had some fun with Google translate in the past, putting phrases into Arabic and putting them on shields, it's fun.
DeleteWonderful stuff Ken. I'm going to be diving into some of these myself once my Crusaders are done. I've considered the oil wipe method but I don't have the patience to wait for it to dry :-)
ReplyDeletePatience is a virtue Millsy 😁
DeleteIn terms of paint on model time, oils is loads quicker !
Very nice indeed - well done sir!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the kind comments 👍
DeleteExcellent job on this kit. Have done these in the past and they make for great miniatures. Very nice! Cheers
ReplyDeleteThanks Kiwi, they are a lovely set and great for building up troop numbers at a decent cost.
DeleteGreat work Ken. I have always been fascinated by this period, will be looking forward to all of your posts on this.
ReplyDeleteCheers Greg, it's been on my to do list for a long long time
DeleteThose are excellent Ken!
ReplyDeleteVery kind thanks
DeleteThat's a lot of horsies in a short amount of time, respect!
ReplyDeleteWith Oil Wipe horses are easy, probably only a couple of hours tops for 12 including horse furniture, I did the oil work on 80 more last week in just over an hour.
DeleteSuper looking cavalry Ken!
ReplyDeleteChristopher
Cheers Christopher 👍
DeleteGreat cavalry unit, which reminds me an unfinished Reconquista project I have somewhere in my lead pile... where did I put that El Cid model??
ReplyDeleteCheers, grab that model now !
DeleteLovely work Ken. I have a load of Gripping Beast Arab cavalry in my pile of shame, maybe I should try to do some for the challenge.
ReplyDeleteThanks Paul, they are a nice little box set, recommended 👍
DeleteThese look great!
ReplyDeleteCheers 👍
DeleteFantastic looking cavalry! The horses look great for the time they took you.
ReplyDeleteThanks Stuart, it's very efficient in terms of actual paint time, it's the drying that's a pain.
DeleteGood one Ken, especially the shields.
ReplyDeleteCheers Barks
Delete