Colouring in

Much to my wife's bemusement, I have settled down in front of whatever medieval documentary she has chosen over the last week or so (apart from the evening where mini-Rab #2 had to go and get his leg x-rayed after over-exuberant bubble-chasing - don't ask!) complete with painting tray. To be fair, it is quite a while since I did any and am rather in the grip of a painting frenzy. Well, frenzied by my standards: I've painted seven figures in the last ten days! This takes my annual total to.... nine.

I was going to split them between two or three posts, just to make me feel like I'm achieving some blogging as well, but that seemed a bit naff, especially as they're all for my chivalric gaming: SBH, Goblinquest and what I hope will be a workable set of house rules to play Dux Brit but with knights in shining armour and goblins.

So, to the "hastily snapped on my phone up against an impromptu background of polystyrene" pictures! First up, a couple more of the old Citadel, now Foundry Feudal knights I picked up from Meyer over on the LAF.

I was pleased with the face of the green chap and the blue and white quartering looks pretty good in the lead.

Here is a group shot of all my knights completed so far, most of which have appeared on here at some point already:

I also painted up the first four of my Curtey's Miniatures spearmen as retainers for the central knight above, the one with the yellow and blue quartering and red cadence mark:

There are four more of these to come, with mail shirts so they should paint up even quicker. I have to admit I'd already started this quartet, blocking out their gambesons and getting the bloody fiddly spears to stay on. Have a gratuitous close-up at my first attempt to do eyes using a micro pen, just to make you feel better about your own brushwork:

Joking aside, I'm pretty pleased with their faces - I can recommend Curtey's as being really nice to paint.

And then, all ready to be oppressed and witness at first hand the violence inherent in the system, my peasant. I'm actually ludicrously proud of the way he turned out, especially his face, even though it has acquired a rather peculiar orange tinge in the photo. Very odd, considering that the other colours are almost spot on with how they look in Real Life (tm)...

I love this figure. He has a great "Get orf moi laaand" look about him.

So, there you go. More recruits for my medieval-themed madness. Oh, and I also received a luvverly, heavy box of resin buildings from PMC Games, full of thatched huts, a blacksmith, a church and other stuff. They're still in their bubblewrap but will form the basis of my next post. Also in the near future, I've got involved in playtesting "Blood on the Sands", a Roman gladiator game by Furt over on the LAF which, on a first readthrough, looks excellent.

Happy geeking,
Rab

Henry, 1st Lord Scrope of Masham

Henry, 1st Lord Scrope of Masham, was born on 29 September, 1312, in Masham, England. Henry figured prominently in all the wars of Edward the Third, and in 1350, was summoned to parliament as Baron Scrope of Masham. He fought at Crecy, Poitiers and Najera. He died on the 31st July 1932. The Scropes of Masham were a cadet branch of the Scropes of Bolton family, hence the use of the white difference or cadence mark over the Scrope arms of azure, a bend or.

Anyway, scene set (real history, by the way, fact fans!), I actually chose Henry as he had a nice simple coat of arms, and I was able to download his flag (free, gratis, and for nothing) from the rather excellent krigspil.dk website. If you want a flag for pretty much any period, then check them out before spending any money.





I based these on a 30mm un-lipped base (i.e. a slightly larger version of the bases like those sold by GW), which handily is within a gnat's crotchet of the same thickness as my standard bases for the rest of the army. I think I'll base all my commanders like this. If I'd planned ahead a little better, I'd have put the banner-bearer on the other side of him so that I could stretch the flag out to the right and it wouldn't look (to the casual or uninformed viewer) like I'd painted his bend or going the wrong way!

The main reason I did him now, as opposed to later, is that I've been finding it rather more difficult than expected to get nice horse-flesh colours on the mounts of my hobilars. However, the English summer is doing its rainy best, so I'm off for another attempt.

Archers

Managed to find a few moments (i.e. it was raining) and got these fellows polished off this afternoon. As mentioned before, the green and white livery is that worn by troops raised by the Black Prince.




Next up, some hobilars:


I also came across an article in the paper today, mentioning a website www.medievalsoldier.org which carries a database of the soldiers who fought for England against the French between 1369 and 1453.

TTFN

Smile - you're on camera!

Here are the two photos I failed to upload the other day. Unbloodied and unbowed, I struggled with HTML for the first time until I understood what was going wrong.

So, from the back and front, ladies and gentlemen I give you some English nobles. Dressed to kill and ready to fight for God, England..... and if a ransom or two should come their way then, well, it would be rude not to :)

I have done a bit of tidying up (particularly on the cadence mark on knight second from left) since taking these shots; that electronic eye is pretty unforgiving of a slipped brushstroke, eh?

Second time lucky?

I tried to put this picture in my previous post, but no joy; maybe I was doing something wrong? Anyway, I've got a couple of those knights already painted (gold star for me!):

Edit: okay, I've got the picture uploaded but it only accepts the uncropped picture.

The painting is under way

Not being a great photographer, the pictures I'm going to post mightn't be the best (any tips that don't involve buying fancy kit would be gratefully received).  I did promise to share, though, so here goes:

A mixture of undercoated Corvus Belli foot knights, along with a monk and trumpeter from the command packs. I've used GW's 'Chaos Black' spray undercoat, more from habit than anything else.

I love the detail on these figures and, at about 34p/fig, perfectly reasonable to my mind.

Swelling the ranks

Although I mainly play fantasy games (Bloodbowl, Elfball and occasionally Aeronautica Imperialis) because that's what the locals play, I'm a historical gamer at heart. I just love the medieval period in particular - all that chivalry, heraldry, castles, courtly love, peasants being kept in their place... And of course, lots of Frenchy-bashing ;)

The rules that I've settled upon are called Impetus, by Dadi and Piombo. They're for large-element based miniatures, so each unit can be a mini diorama. I've never quite got the hang of more than simple basing, but I'm hoping to work on that as I get stuck in to {drum roll} my major project for 2009!

This will be to paint, base (and get to play with, dammit) two 300pt armies (one English, one French) for the Hundred Years War. I figure if I do both sides then my gaming buddies have no excuse not to give some proper historical gaming a go. I'm going to use Corvus Belli miniatures throughout, except for one base of welsh spearmen from Feudal Castings (an idea I nicked from Jet's top-notch 'Geektactica' blog) and the final figures arrived last night, which was a real geeky pick-me-up after an incredibly long day teaching followed by parents' evening.

Now all that remains is to paint all couple of hundred figures! Oh, and to make my task 'easier', I've never painted anything smaller than 28mm figs before; the gallery I plan to put on here may end as more of a reassurance than inspiration ("At least my painting looks better than this guy's - what is he painting with, a toothbrush?").