From BobV: A Peninsular Brigade and some bonus 18th C. Command [Children's Books] (280 Points)

 This week I have completed the second of four planned Napoleonic brigades. I had a little extra time with this batch and decided to  paint some of my remaining 18th Century command figures. This portion of the project includes 112 infantry and 8 mounted officers, all in 18mm. 

After perusing the foyer of the Analogueville Public Library, I decided that this brigade has a definite connection to the Children's Book section, at least it does in my world.  We'll see if you agree. Many, many years ago, in the summer between 5th and 6th grades, I volunteered to work at a tiny branch library in a little valley town on the edge of the Southern California Desert. For a kid who loved books it was the perfect job. I was taught to reshelve returned books and eventually even given the heady responsibility of working behind the desk to check out books. All of that was fabulous experience but it wasn't even the best part. The best part turned out to be the daily responsibility of shelf reading, going through each shelf to ensure all of the books were in their proper place. 

Not only did I end up learning the Dewey Decimal system in spades, I got to see every single book in the branch library. I soon discovered my favorite sections and some of my favorite authors, including C.S. Forester, George Fielding Eliot and Martin Caidin. While most kids discover Forester via Horatio Hornblower, I happened to find an old copy of Rifleman Dodd. That afternoon, I forgot about the shelf reading and quickly found myself beside Rifleman Dodd, crawling across Portugal behind enemy lines. Thereafter, I was hooked on the author, the genre and the history. Rifleman Dodd is still my favorite "children's book" as it started me on a long and pleasant road of reading history and led to a hobby I greatly enjoy. To this day I remain enamored with almost any book that can be found in my beloved 940's and 359 sections.     

On to the Brigade...

This brigade consists of two Portuguese battalions in winter colors and two British battalions in Peninsular uniforms. All figures are 18mm AB from Eureka Miniatures USA. The flags are from Fighting15's. The Brits are flying the colors of the 33rd West Riding and the 35th Sussex. I have tried to get the correct facings for each but that sort of detail is not all that important to me. I like using historical OOB's whenever possible but all of my battalions (or brigades as the case may be) may stand in for others in any given engagement, so hyper-accuracy is not really a requirement.  

This portion of the project was kind of a bear to paint, I found the Bavarians much easier. It is likely because the British battalions are larger at 32 figures so progress is not quite as visible but they have some extra detail as well. I use a variety of base and shading colors with some contrast paint for shading. You have to be careful with contrast paint as it tends to flow everywhere, especially on top of any layers that are not fully flat. I do like the depth of color it provides. I rarely drybrush anything at this scale.

The extras this week are 8 mounted officers from Eureka's 18mm SYW range. I believe they are labeled as Prussian or Austrian but at this scale and in this era, they are pretty interchangeable.

This week's scoring is as follows:

112 x 15mm foot @ 2 points = 224 points

8 x 15mm mounted @ 4 points = 32 points

Children's Book Section Bonus = 20 points

Total = 276 points

In two weeks it's back to the Empire with a brigade of French Ligne. Happy Monday all!

Sylvain: The story about how this post fits with "children's books" is well argued. You really had a dream job as a kid. Your colors (the blue and the red) are vibrant and almost burst through the screen. I will throw in some extra points (4) for the flags to bring your total to 280 points. Great production and great read!

JohnS - B is for Bugler and C is for Cacadores (50 pts)

This is actually the first lot of miniatures I started for Challenge X but I was half done when I decided the undercoat was so dusty (because I didn't wash the release agent off the minis) that I stripped them back and started again. That's when I did the previous submission of goblins while I was waiting for everything to dry.

These ten Portuguese Cacadores are from the 5th Battalion in winter uniform. Uniform details are conflicting in the sources I found so I have done a combo that I think looks good. The plume on the shako should be green for light infantry or black for sharpshooters. I have chosen black as I intend to field these as sharpshooters in most games of Sharpe Practice.

This is a view that I never hope my opponent sees - Cacadores don't run!

I particularly like that this set came with a bugler as this is the symbol of the Cacadores and it also lets me complete two of my self imposed Alphabet Challenge letters - B is for Bugler and C is for Cacadores.

This is also my first entry towards the Sharpe Practice side challenge proposed by AlexK. These will form part of my British Peninsular Allies force. (13 Sharp Practice force points Cacadores 6, Ldr II 6 and Musician 1) and will be joined by some Spanish militia shortly. I am aiming to make my SP armies as flexible as possible to play the full range of scenarios.
The miniatures are made by Warlord Games.

So in the real world of AHPCX I believe that is 50 points towards my total. And I know the photos are rubbish, I am trying a new camera next submission.

From MilesR: These chaps are very nicely done and should do very well in a Sharp's practice game.  I do like the Alphabet challenge and am now wondering what "D" will be.

From Curt: 3mm Napoleonic Portuguese Infantry (50 Points)

Hi Folks,

A wee entry from me today, quite literally.

Here are five brigades of 3mm Napoleonic Portuguese infantry. 

These are 3mm Napoleonics from Pico Armor (sourced from Oddzial Osmy out of Poland). The figures are based on 2" x 1.75" MDF bases with a 3mm thickness and rounded corners. The thickness is to allow players to pick them up easily and the rounded corners is simply because I like the look of them (it gives the finished product kind of a wargaming chit appearance).

The common base size for 'Blucher' is a 3" frontage, but I've decided to go with 2" as it allows for very large battles to be played on the 8 x 5 surface which we typically use. To provide a bit more perspective, using my base scale each inch equates to 150 yards, so one square foot on the tabletop is equal to about a square mile. Utilizing this scale allows us to recreate sprawling actions like Wagram or Vitoria on a single tabletop.

Examples of various unit types, left to right: French foot artillery, infantry and heavy cavalry

For my way of thinking, painting these figures requires a fairly minimalist approach to maintain a basic level of detail to communicate what the figures are supposed to be. For the infantry, I base everything up, texture the base and then prime the whole thing black. From that I drybrush everything a light grey and then start applying saturated colours. 

The way I see it is that these figures should simply convey their primary features, first most being their national uniform colour, with only a nod to other physical elements (namely face, hands, trousers, shako and bayonet), otherwise you can easily get drawn into the rabbit-hole of trying to paint fine details which will never be appreciated when they are seen en mass - in fact I find that too much painted detail can make the figure too 'busy', detracting from conveying the main uniform colour: French should primarily be blue, British red, Austrians white, etc. I think of these bases almost as boardgame chits, perhaps more like  three dimensional playing tokens.

Examples of three British infantry brigades moving through a Spanish hill town.

Perceptive readers will have noticed that, since I base and prime everything from the start, I don't worry about painting the middle ranks or any inward-facing detail. In this scale I only paint the front of the front rank, the rear of the rear rank and the top of their heads and shoulders. Early on, I discovered that after painting every figure, the interior facing detail is completely lost once the strips of figures are based up. A complete waste of time and effort. So now I just paint the perimeter of the formations and I find that you can't tell the difference between the 'all-figure-detail' bases and those which are more minimalist . 

The basework is drybrushed two tones of brown with a khaki highlight. I then use a semi-opaque green tinted model railway emulsion to provide a base tone for the light scatter of flock I apply later. I'll often use a brown ink wash to make 'tracks' behind the formations, showing where they have trampled through the terrain. I then paint a mark on the front center which is used in the rules for purposes of line of sight and measurement (it is red here for the Portuguese, but would be blue for the French, white for the Austrians, etc.). Finally, I print off a 3.5mm label and affix it to the rear corner of the base (these are so we can use roster sheets for all the unit information).

As to points. For a benchmark we typically award 12 points for 3mm figures based on 60mm x 30mm bases, but as these bases are a bit smaller (aprox 50mm x 30mm) I suggest pitching them at 10 points each.

Thanks for dropping in!

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You know this scale has been whispering to me for some time now, and you're not helping me resist temptation. I was admiring some similar 2mm stuff in WSS Magazine recently and my wife looked over my shoulder and muttered something derogatory about my mental health!! Doesn't she know it's my eyesight she should be worrying about? 

These bases are absolutely beautiful work. I always love the attention you lavish on the groundwork, and I guess it's even more important in a scale this small. If I were wearing a hat right now, I'd take it off to you. 

Lee