From Kerry T - P is for Polished - Steel Fist Gendarmes (120 points and Squirrel no 7)

  Morning, Afternoon & Evening all

I don't quite remember when it started but I've just found some early pictures - what I'm of course talking about are the early pictures of Italian Wars figures that I found so enthralling in the early editions of Miniature Wargames magazine in the early 1980s. 

I think this may have been 1983 and the magazine cost 85 pence!

This was a period of history  that I new nothing about  but was something to be admired from afar as pictures just kept popping up in the magazine of Peter Gilder's Italian Wars figures. I knew then that someday it would be something that I wanted to do, its just a period so full of colour.

Thus a wargaming seed was planted but that early seed remained dormant for many years I'm afraid.

The seed began to germinate a few years later when I bought a Gladiator Games 15mm Italian Wars army - this was more than 20 years ago but really sprang to life around 10 years ago when I saw pictures of Artizan Design's Landsknecht figures somewhere on the net and I began to acquire units gradually. It sprouted further when I discovered James Roach's blog http://olicanalad.blogspot.com/ around the same time and this coupled with a visit to Eureka Miniatures in Melbourne where I bought some Gendarmes gave it further impetus.

These days I paint maybe a few units a year, it really is a very slow burn project. More recently Ken Reilly (of this parish!) and his blog https://yarkshiregamer.blogspot.com/ deserves credit for his resuscitation efforts in breathing life into the project once again! Cheers Ken

So to date I think I have about 2 shelves worth of troops but I have promised myself that late 2022 is the year that I intend to make it the main focus of my collecting and painting.

So where does this take me up to?

I said it was a slow burn project didn't I? Quite true but I have never before attempted to finish a unit by candlelight!

What happened?  

I've been guilty of posting lovely pictures of the NZ sunshine here down under to you who are up over while you suffer in snow haven't I?

I reckon some of you have been getting your own back and casting spells or some other voodoo practice or something -the end result was that we had a cyclone rip through here on the weekend. (Nothing serious I would add and nothing anywhere near as bad as many of you elsewhere are used to coping with!)

It was however enough to knock out the power so I could't quite finish my basing or take pictures of my 7th Project P entry and was absent from last Sunday's postings. The picture above is a testament to my effort to finish the basing as the light faded! In the end it failed as the power never returned in time for me to upload pictures anyway 

Having proffered my excuse for my absence last weekend I'll now get on with it ! This is my 7th unit and so P is for Polished  - When I chose Polished I thought I was being clever and keeping my options open -as this would give me the choice of painting up some 15mm Napoleonic French Cuirassiers or alternative some gleaming Italian Wars Gendarmes

I'm pleased to say the Steelfist Gendarmes got ahead in the painting queue 

They actually took more time to paint that I'd anticipated as I ended up painting more horse armour than just leaving them as polished steel

Lovely to paint, but somewhat fiddly for my hamfisted fingers to put together - the heads, plumes, weapon arm and scabbards need attaching.

A couple more views

They are a little on the expensive side but well worth it I think and there is quite a variation in the figures

I've used a few transfers here

The standard is from Flags of War - 100YW range

This one from Pete's Flags available on eBay

This is my favourite horse armour model

By my reckoning that's 120 points and my 7th unit and Squirrel,  and I promise I'll not be so long winded in my next post.

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Beautiful work Kerry. I started my long road on an Italian Wars collection a few years ago, and agree with you that is it as much a labour of love as it is sheer blood, sweat and tears. So much puff-and-slash, so many plumes and painted frippery. Nonetheless, it's all worth it as we can clearly see here. I have a bunch of Steel Fist gendarmes waiting on my desk, and, like you, I've been daunted by all the possible options for assembly. Nonetheless, your work has inspired me to get them assembled and moved higher up the queue. Thank you!  I particularly like that you've eschewed just making them plain steel and have pulled out the stops with painting pretty much all the armour - they look absolutely superb because of it.

Again, stunning work.

- Curt

From SimonG: Two Young Magicians Up to No Good! (60 points)

Quite a change of scene from the tragedy of the Jewish revolt my offering for this week is a brace of Black Rose War figures -- Dukas and Bella plus their "familars"

I think we can all recognise the inspiration for Dukas and the story that is being told here -- truly "a really, really bad idea"!

Surely another broom will get the job done sooner!

And we made it to LV426 via Lady Sarah's Star Yacht courtesy of young Bella and her magical cat

These are all Ludus Magnus Studios Black Rose Wars 40mm figures -- although as they are all on the small side (15mm for the cat, 20mm for Dukas and 28mm for Bella and the broom) I'll count them as 28mm on average. They are all plastic castings and pretty nicely detailed. It's a pity the two poses are so similar but the two characters are very distinct.

In particular it's clever how the Disney features have been reinterpreted in Dukas the young devling -- his name is of course a reference to the music featured in Fantasia.

My favourite is probably the cat -- painting a ginger was quite a challenge and I'm pleased with how it came out, and with the books he is sitting on.

With our quick stop on LV426 we get away promptly before the whole place floods and pop next door to Arrakis and back to First Century Judea.

My math suggests 60 points for this week -- 20 for the four 28mm figures and 20 each for the stop on LV426 and the ride with Lady Sarah.

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Such wonderfully whimsical figures Simon, and your brushwork has really done them justice. I too really like the cat, but I think Bella is my favourite - her calm, contemplative face is so well rendered and I very much admire the rich blue of her dress. Lovely work. 

- Curt

Sunday, and We're One Month Out...

Yep, pretty sobering isn't it? We're officially one month away from the end of Challenge XII. This is the time where we take a collective breath, gird our loins, and prepare to dash to the finish. We're a little under 30,000 points from our group target, so c'mon Team XII, let's get 'er done!  

Today:

- Simon has some Magic to show us;

- Kerry treats us to wonderful gallopers from two colourful periods;

- And Millsy has something brewing from orbit...

...and with more to come!

Enjoy your Sunday everyone!

- Curt

From TeemuL: Alien [LV426] (55 points)

We quickly move to LV426, a much rumoured place, but we are disappointed. More of these black and green aliens...

This is Broodlord, largish genestealerish alien beast, painted with familiar colours. Not much to say, anything new, at least.

Happily we encounter a Dame with no Name, who helps us aboard the Sarah's Star Yacht and our way back to Great Abyssal, from where we travel inwards and step to the nearby planet Krypton. Dame with no name is a metal miniature from Knuckleduster Miniatures. I got her from YourModelBox some time ago. I like the mini, but of course she might have more practical clothes.

I'd like to score this monster as a 54mm miniature, so 10 points and 20 for planet LV426. Western girl is 28mm so 5 points and another 20 for Star Yacht. 55 in total.

From Millsy:

Another wonderful addition to your collection of not-Tyranids Teemu. The more I see of this black/green/yellow scheme the more I like it.

Large and horrifying as it is, it doesn't seem to be phasing the Dame with no Name in the slightest. She's suitably dusty, weathered and has clearly seen some stuff so, this is probably just another opponent who thinks it is more badass than it really is. I suspect this particular Broodlord is about to get a swift introduction to messers Smith and Wesson. Nice work!

From TobiasK: Carts and witchcraft (80 points)

I painted up more medieval / fantasy miniatures for this week's entry.

As an addition to Piers the Ploughman, I chose two carts from 1st Corps. Lovely miniatures, which can be used as mission objectives or simply as scatter terrain.

Because I was in the mood to paint, I added some witchcraft to this week's entry. Witches Coven by Warmonger Miniatures, to be precise.

Group shot:

That's it for this week. I hope everybody has a great time painting!

Bookkeeping:

2 x vehicle (28mm) = 40 pts (@Millsy: I assume a cart counts as a vehicle.)

8 x miniatures (28mm) = 40 pts

Total: 80 pts

From Millsy:

Great looking carts and livestock you have here Tobias, but for me the pick of the bunch are the witches and the cauldron. Fit to grace the stage in a certain Scottish play, these will do equally well on the table I'm sure. Warmonger do some great stuff and I'm pleased to see their kit getting some love.

I'm not sure if it was deliberate, but I like the way you've carried the purple and green from the witches' garb into the colour of their brew. I can only imagine what kind of punch that must pack given the colour!

80 points it is. Nice work mate!

From DarrellH, Spanish Sword and Buckler/Rodeleros - Army of Gonzalo de Córdoba, "El Gran Capitán" (130 points)

Apologies to everyone for the delay in getting this, my second post together. Things at my end have been tough of late and I'm going through some quite severe mental health problems. Not dissimilar to last year only more intense. Mental Health struggles combined with the great varnishing disaster (see my previous post) which saw me switching from a prepped and primed Late Roman army back to raw metal has delayed me somewhat. It's been slow going.....

The Sword and Buckler/Rodeleros are actually the first four bases of Sword and buckler that will sit at the front of a rather large pike block! (Ken aka Yarkshire Gamer would be proud!) 

Yep, I have quite a way to go before that comes into being so for now I've plonked them all together as one unit. A unit that, for the time being, could be used for Swordpoint, Hail Caesar etc.

24 x 5 would be a whopping 120 points by my calculation.

From Millsy:

Oh man, I don't know where to start with these Darrell. Everything about them absolutely floats my boat from the choice of subject matter, to the colour palette and the wonderfully smooth blends and transitions.

I know you are struggling mate, but if this is what you are capable of when not at your best then serious kudos to you! Thanks for sharing that you are in a hard place at the moment, it takes guts to say it and I can only hope that being open about it and knowing that the whole Challenge crew is behind you makes some small positive impact on your state of mind and path to recovery.

120 points by your calculation plus 5 for the flag and another 5 for the wonderful shields from me. Amazing. Just utterly amazing work. More please!

From TeemuL: Iona Starkiller meets DAK halftracks [Sarah's Star Yacht] [Arrakis] (85 points)

After clearing Terra, we feel we have some unfinished businesses and decide to make a stop on Arrakis, a bit of desert spice to our journey.  We first climb up to the middle ring using the nearby Great Abyssal and then Iona Starkiller (moving away from the Challenge Star?) offers us ride on Sarah's Star Yacht.

Iona Starkiller is a metal 28mm miniature from Hasslefree, I got her through YourModelBox a year or two ago. She is a nice fit for Sarah's Star Yacht, but I could have used her on Lune as well. But Starpriest wouldn't have allowed me to use (maximize my points) Sarah's Yacht. I believe she could be a capable captain or first officer in a Stargrave crew, I just don't have the rules or the crew, but the possibility is here.

I decided to go with bright and nice, which was accomplished with a limited selection of Contrast paints. Jewels here and there are a nice touch, they break the areas and allowed me to go wild with colours. Bright and light blue looks very futuristic as a hair colour, so I chose it. She has an advanced hair dress, but I didn't want to paint it, I would have ruined it. In the far future you can buy hair dress thingies which match your hair colour, I think...

The base is simple sand glued on base, washed with Reikland Flesh Shade and drybrushed with light grey. Generic enough to fit various landscapes or more urbanic areas.

Arrakis is not what we hoped or dreamed, these DAK halftracks are not very welcome sight, so we don't stay for long.

This is another small entry to clear a box. Some time ago there was a discount in my FLGS (they have pretty much always something in discount, making room in the storage and so on) and I picked up these Sfd. Kz. 10/4s with no game purpose, I have found that I rather enjoy painting vehicles in this scale. They are, however, a great entry for desert planet, so I painted them for Arrakis. They are part resin, part metal with quite a lot of parts and no bases. Here they are on mdf base (not glued) to demonstrate their nice camouflage colour. My intensive research on correct colours was limited to box cover, but I'm pretty certain these look exactly the way they were  30th February 1942 just after sunrise, west of Cairo...

I sprayed them Army Painter Fur Brown, then quite heavy overbrush with Citadel XV-88 followed by a heavy drybrush of Kislev Flesh and softer drybrush of Zandri Dust before a final drybrush of Ushabti Bone. The original brown is barely seen, only little areas here and there. Uniforms on the box look greenish, but might be greenish grey. I decided to paint them green using Warboss Green with Moot Green highlights. Greys and black on tires, tracks, guns and windshields. They were painted almost in one evening, but I dropped two of them while painting, had to glue them and continue on next day. Like I said, I really like to paint vehicles in this scale, especially these which have no complex camo pattern. And when these are 8 point a piece, their ROI is rather high compared to 28mm vehicles.

I was thinking of basing them, but since there were no bases on the box, I did not. Scenery base, similar to motor torpedo boats earlier, popped in my mind, but I decided not - there was a small hint of some FoW enthusiasm in our small gaming group, but we of course need to figure out the rules, period, scale and other things, but if I'm lucky, I might be able to use these on games and then base them properly. We will see. They look rather good on that plain mdf...

The voyage so far

Iona is 28mm miniature, 5 points and 20 for the Star Yacht.

Halftracks are 15mm vehicles, so worth 8 points a piece, total of 32. There is also 8 crew members, but each of them is basically a half figure, so worth only 1 point per individual making it 8 points and total of 40, plus 20 for Arrakis.

Total of 85 points.

My personal Squirrel count: 11 or 12?

- 20mm Napoleonic

- 28mm Sludge

- 28mm Pulp

- 28mm Warhammer 40000 Xenos

- 28mm General (including Gloranthan) Fantasy

- 1:300 Cruel Seas

- 6mm Epic Imperial Fists

- 28mm ADD Boardgame

- 28mm Runewars Waiqar

- 28mm Blood Bowl

- 28mm Simians?

- 15mm Mid War Germans

From Millsy:

Another wonderful entry from you Teemu and a tribute to your ability to switch focus without sacrificing quality of the end result.

I love the dynamic pose of Iona Starkiller and the blue hair you've given her really makes her pop. I'm sure she will stand out in any crowd on the table. Great looking HTs too, the combo of XV-88 followed by Zandri Dust seems pretty popular amongst a lot of YouTube channels I watch and I can understand why.

Another 85 points well earned!