Paint Table Sunday: Back from a break, reading a wargames magazine over lunch, new temptations and devil dogs

I haven't been painting for  around two months now, largely because the Old Bat has taken a turn for the worse with her Long Covid and Charlotte has been unwell too, so I have spent a lot of time running around after them, going to pick up prescriptions, take the Bat for blood tests, doing domestic stuff, gardening (ugh) and cooking with some work fitted around all that. Latterly it has been the Tour de France on TV as well. Really, however, I have just not felt like it. We had that very hot weather which made painting impossible and then it got very grey and dark and I really need good light to paint as I cannot manage it under artificial light at all. Mainly, however, I was in that situation where the figures I had started on my workbench (to use an inappropriately artisanal term which makes it sounds like I could actually make something) were really only just started. I find nothing more demotivating than having a load of figures which are a long, long way from being finished.

Today, however, I actually sat down and did an hour's painting. It was all base coat stuff and I was struggling with my eyesight again but I will try to do a bit every day; as I have done in the past. I have Lucid Eye Atlanteans, Crooked Dice V aliens and some of the new Wargames Atlantic Afghans on the go. Now, since I got the latter, Perry have announced their own plastic Afghans as well but I will just get those too. With Afghans you need as many different figures as possible. More interestingly, Wargames Atlantic have announced plastic mounted Afghans which I will need for my The Men Who Would be Kings force (as I have actually painted my British starter force). I suspect the Afghans will be quicker to paint than the others.

In the past, my far from eagerly awaited pieces, Reading Wargames Magazines Over Lunch, have described a succession of meals in London, usually in what would otherwise be non productive gaps in my work schedule between meetings. No such luxury these days, as I haven't been to London since 28th February, so it was a rather unexciting tuna salad (the only fish I eat, along with smoked salmon) in the garden as I am on yet another gentle fitness programme. 

A long time ago as photographed by Sophie...

This one is working quite well, mainly because I do not have the Old Bat bullying me into running which I can no longer do, due to bad knee and hip joints (caused by doing too much road running in my twenties and thirties). Instead, I spotted something on Facebook called the Conqueror Challenge where someone (in New Zealand, where there is little to do) organises set walk routes which you do virtually. So you choose your target walk (I chose the ninety mile Hadrian's Wall) and you go out and walk (or run or cycle) whenever you want and put the total down (I've worked out how to do this on my phone or, rather Charlotte did).  You pay £28 per challenge and then have a homepage you can plot your progress on. The Old Bat thinks that paying someone else so you can walk is insanity but it is working and I have been doing it for three months now. I completed Hadrian's Wall and am now doing the 280 mile Grand Canyon (as I have visited there). You can even see where you have got to, virtually, on Streetview. The Streetview views of the Canyon are not very interesting. It's a rocky canyon with a river at the bottom. That's it. Even Up North looks more interesting than that.

They even send you a very blingy medal when you finish so you do get something for your money. When I started, in June, I struggled to walk a mile and a half and was puffed and had chest pains but a month ago I walked six and a half miles home from Epsom hospital after my latest eye injection. You aren't allowed to drive after the injection and the Old Bat is still too ill to drive me, so the fact I could walk that far (in thirty four degree heat) shows how far I have come. No more breathlessness and no chest pains! I have to admit that accompanying wine and food for the Tour may have had a somewhat retrograde effect in the last two weeks, though, so I did another six and a half mile walk today.

Wargames Illustrated have been giving away a lot of Warlord Games figures. I can't bear to throw them away but I don't want most (any?) of them. There must be lots of wargamers with piles of these things. It's like accumulating Salute figures or free plastic rubbish from cereal packets in the sixties. The idea, of course, is that you look at your freebie and then go out and buy more. The opposite has been true of me, I am afraid. I looked at a set of Warlord Napoleonic cavalry and was so unimpressed by the poor sculpting and lack of crispness in moulding I vowed never to buy any Warlord plastics again. Victrix they are not. Anyway, last month the give away was a set of rules for Warlord's new French bread pizza naval wargame, Victory at Sea, which I have no interest in, having seen the ridiculous bases the models are on. Maybe it's not selling very well. Despite being interested in warships and having built many an Airfix ship model in the past I have no interest in naval wargaming. I just see an article in a wargames magazine on naval wargaming and my brain goes into power-saving mode. Yawn. So I didn't bother reading the rules showcase on the rules or another article about eighteenth century naval wargaming. I don't scan over the articles in Miniature Wargaming because the type is now so small I struggle to read it even with my reading glasses. I have to really want to read it to strain my eyes that much. Surely most wargamers are old like me and have eyesight that has deteriorated? Perhaps not. My father in law is 92 and doesn't use glasses for anything.

There was quite an interesting article on how wargames manufacturers are coping with the Chinese Virus but I was surprised, given Baccus employ seven staff, to discover, according to the article, that Warlord employ 103 people. One thing that occurred to me, regarding all the lockdown stuff, was how many rules writers were producing new solo versions of their games. I think I wouldn't buy a set now if it didn't have some solo rules as, realistically, I am not going to be able to organise my own games for multiple players. None of my close friends are interested in wargaming (possibly because most of them are women). I am still too nervous about the Chinese Virus, seeing what it has done to the Old Bat, to venture over to the Shed, despite Eric's kind invitations. Will things return to normal and solo players be forgotten again or will the Chinese keep churning out deadly viruses every year in their bat infested labs until they have achieved the crushing economic dominance they are seeking in their, no doubt, forty year plan?

Starlux 54mm (cicra 1970)

I always look at the figure reviews in magazines and in the August issue I discovered that the new Plastic Soldier Company 15mm ancients figures are made of that new plastic resin which gives them bendy spears, No thanks. I had enough of that with my Airfix figures. Presumably, if they used hard plastic the spears would all break off, which demonstrates, once more, how inferior 15 mm is as a scale for model soldiers because the material you make them from seriously distorts the look of the figures (metal ones have fat spear syndrome, of course). Also, in the review section were the new Victrix French Imperial Guard lancers, How lovely are these? I would love a box of them! My father bought me a Starlux, painted 54 mm figure of a Dutch lancer (sorry, it's a better uniform than the Polish ones) when we went to Paris when I was small (I still have it).

 But I saw an early painted example (above) of the Vixtrix models which just made me realise that I can't paint Napoleonics any more. Does unattainable quality painting of this level actually put people off from buying? It did me.  I couldn't even begin to approach this level of painting. Just trying would stress me out. Thinking about the stress I have experienced here in Chez Sick over the last months I realise that one of the reasons I haven't been painting is that I often find painting figures stressful, not relaxing, when things don't go the way I want them too.

The theme of much of the magazine was command and control which writers all seem to think isn't considered very much in wargames magazines but actually seems to come up quite regularly. This is of great import to the gamer (rather than painter, like me) end of the hobby who love to bang on about it all the time. I remember many tedious discussions about it when I went to Guildford Wargames Club (an old school sort of club) which I no longer go to, partly because of the stress of driving down the A3 on a Monday night in an eighty mile an hour traffic jam. I didn't read any of these command and control articles as they are probably designed for all those people who used to write orders on paper or have courier models to deliver orders. They tend to not care if their wargames table are covered in counters (which I hate). 

There was one article I actually bought the magazine for. I recently picked up Dragon Rampant, as it was reduced, and this article by Daniel Mersey, the rules' author, included all the statistics for the Copplestone Barbarica range of 18mm fantasy figures. Well, the name Barbarica is fairly recent, they weren't called that when they first came out (18mm Fantasy was the catchy name Mr Copplestone devised) and I bought a lot of them. Having been rude about 15/18mm figures in my last (and this) post I am quite excited now about organising some armies for these rules, as they require small forces. I painted some of these about nine years ago (above) and have some others underway (if I can still manage to paint them!). They are very small.

Now, of course, I shouldn't buy any more figures but I did buy into the Kickstarter for Hot and Dangerous figures which are, essentially, 28mm models of attractive ladies in historical uniforms (what can be their appeal?). They are reasonably historical and not too pin-up like, compared with some I have seen, perhaps because, they have a lady designer. They are a Polish firm, I believe. Certainly some will go on eBay but I just hope I can paint them to the standard they deserve.

A major temptation are the Perry brothers announcement of plastic Franco-Prussian War figures. Will this mean metal ones as well? I bought some Franco Prussian figures from Eagles of Empire some time ago but they were, perhaps, a little too idiosyncratic in style for me.

However, this week Eagle of Empires announced a new range of First Schleswig War figures. Now some years ago Matt Golding, of Waterloo to Mons, started to produce his own range of (25mm) figures for this but the range went into limbo, so I might be very interested in these, depending on what the figures look like. Early examples look good.

Good news is that North Star have put their 1864 range back up on their website so I will order some more Danes to finish my first unit.

Two rants this week. One wargames related and one not.

Now, last time I derided the people who hijack new products launches with demands for information on forthcoming pet projects or different scales. This time I have recently seen examples of ridiculously inappropriate ranges in plastic. Some time ago Victrix launched a page on the internet where people could make requests as to what they would like the firm to do next. As ever, some of the answers amazed me. Now I see Victrix as what I would call a rank and file supplier. You buy lots of boxes of core troops in plastic from them and then fill out the more unusual items with metals. Making plastic figures is expensive so you need to be on to a sure seller to make money hence, no doubt, their focus on Napoleonics and Ancients/Dark Ages. Some of the suggestions are very sensible such as Biblical or Bronze Age figures where, rather like the Dark Ages, the number of different troop types needed is quite limited. It didn't take long for the first request for Dynastic Chinese to come in, then Renaissance Poles, fourteenth century Koreans, War of 1812, Bannockburn period, Spanish Civil War etc. Then there was a suggestion for Ancient civilians. And how much diversity will plastic enable you to do on these? Think, man, think. Then there were the people who said 'I know such and such a company already make them in plastic but yours would be better' (ACW and WW2). Then, of course, you had people suggesting plastic forts and dice. One woman suggested female figures including such future best sellers as RAF female supply pilots. Really? A plastic sprue of these? Calm down dear.  Wargames Atlantic, who are even more a rank and file supplier, have also just launched a similar poll to equally inappropriate answers.

This is how I see all dogs.

Speaking of which, one of Wargames Atlantic's recent sets was of Dark Age Irish, which would be quite useful for Vikings in Ireland type games. However they include no less than six warhounds in the set. I have noticed a plethora of doggy models coming out recently. Were war dogs really that common? I  have to confess (and I know some of my readers really like them) that I hate dogs. Not just dislike but hate the stinking, filthy, barking, biting, disease carrying, aggressive carnivores. I cannot for the life of me understand how people can bear to have them in their homes. It's just medieval! Would you keep a sheep or a pig in your house? Ugh! No doubt this is all made worse by recent encounters on my walks by these bounding, yapping creatures jumping up at me when I am trying to walk, quietly. "Oh he is just being friendly' cry the owners, who are totally unable to keep them under control. No he isn't. He is a dog. He is seeing if he wants to eat me. Last year more than 3000 people in Britain needed surgery after dog attacks, Another 5000 had to go to hospital but didn't need surgery. Imagine if wargamers were injuring this many people. Wargaming would soon be banned as inciting violence. Before Lockdown, my lovely former girlfriend K suggested she drive over to see me. That would be splendid, I thought. "Oh I'll be bringing our dog. He is very friendly!" Sorry K, you can't come, I replied. When someone says friendly dog I just have visions of them licking your face. Just disgusting! You make friends with people, not dogs. Grr! I shall now see how many friends on Facebook I lose.

Today's music is Rick Wakeman's new album (as it is Rick Wakeman you can no doubt still call it an album) The Red Planet. This is very much in his The Six Wives of Henry VIII and Criminal Record  (my favourite) mode, although perhaps there is a little too much guitar for me.  The first non classical record I bought (or rather John Palmer at school bought it for me as he worked in Our Price in Kingston and got a staff discount) was Wakeman's White Rock which I then spent ages seeking out on CD as it wasn't released in the UK until comparatively recently, so I had to buy a Japanese import at great expense.

Today's wallpaper is William-Adolphe Bougereau's Biblis (1884). During his lifetime (1825-1905) Bougereau was considered one of the world's greatest painters but he fell out of favour at the beginning of the twentieth century, along with most other classicist painters, and was not really rediscovered until the nineteen eighties. Biblis (or Byblis), the legendary daughter of Miletus of Crete, is here depicted in despair, as her twin brother had just fled her amorous advances. Naughty!

Paint Table Saturday: Danes and an off the wall SF project

I haven't posted for six weeks or so as I hadn't painted anything but this has changed this week when I finished my 1864 2nd Schleswig War Danish infantry, so I can have another Paint Table Saturday post today. 

Not surprisingly, given my glacial painting rate, I started these twelve figures in October 2015 but had real trouble finding uniform information about them. I started off painting them dark blue until a helpful Danish reader pointed out that actually only the jackets were blue and they were all wearing greatcoats which were almost black. I took this to mean very, very dark  blue but, in fact, the coats were very, very dark grey. Having painted them all blue I gave up on them for a bit and only sporadically went back to them. Over the last few months they have had much more attention and I finished them on Tuesday.  The backdrop, which enhances them considerably, is a painting by the nineteenth century Danish painter LA Ring, who painted some wonderful Danish landscapes.

The Little Hornblowerr in Hans Christian Andersen Boulevard, Copenhagen

These are a set of figures that I bought when they first came out, before I had seen the TV series 1864, which inspired them, of course. There is rather more information about the uniforms now, so that I could even do an accurate company flag. Unfortunately, North Star have temporarily taken the range off their website while they are running at a reduced staff level but I hope they get some more soon. They are even promising more figures for the range and I do have some Danish dragoons started. I used to travel to Copenhagen quite regularly (to the extent that I acquired a lady friend from the Danish Treasury) and remember a statue of a soldier in this uniform near to the Tivoli Gardens and Dansk Industri, where I was working at the time.

I also had a distant member of the family's Swedish branch, Lieutenant Johann Frederik Nielsen (1831-1886), who was in the Danish army at the time of the 1864 war.  One think I vacillated over for years was how to paint the bases. The beginning of the war took place in cold, snowy weather but by the end of the war the weather was unseasonably bright and sunny. Having read lots of depressing stuff about all the ways doing snowy bases didn't work. I abandoned my plans to have snow bases (which would meant a snow board too, of course) and went for mud with the sort of yellow grass you get after the snow has melted and a semi-frosty effect on the earth.

So what are my current three projects, now? Well I have put the Romans on the back burner again as they are going to take forever. Doing the black undercoat for the metal armour on the figures will take an age but every time I use some black I will paint one. So the next ones I work on will be the Lucid Eye Savage Core Atlanteans. 

I had started the seven figures they do but then spotted a new one I hand't got. I added some more character figures frm the range which were relatively new so then had a group of five extra on order. These are lovely figures to paint so I will keep them to hand. I have now based the extra Atlantean so need to get him to the same initial stage as the other figures and then I can do all eight together.

In the second row are five figures I said I wouldn't get because they are made in China (it looks like the poor Old Bat may not fully recover from the Chinese Virus, according to her doctors). Unfortunately, I caved in and am delighted I did, as the new Wargames Atlantic Afghans are lovely. It still took me over an hour to construct five, however, although they fit together very nicely. Somewhere I have some Perry metal Aghan figures I have undercoated so I will move these along together.

I had several girlfriends who were reptiloids underneath

The third group of figures is one of those insane impulse purchases I sometimes go in for. I am on the 7TV Facebook group (for some reason) even though I don't play the game (I may have the rules, somewhere) and someone showed some photos of some characters from the eighties TV miniseries V.  Now, I remember watching this in the summer of 1984 when ITV ran it against the opening of the Los Angeles Olympics, which the BBC had exclusive rights to.  Lo and behold, there it was on Amazon prime. I watched it again and quite enjoyed it. I noted a number of things. The special effects were pretty poor (but probably good for a TV show at the time). The accuracy of the aliens' blasters make Galactic Stormtroopers look like Stalingrad snipers (you would have to make it throw a one to hit). At this time, American actors had normal coloured teeth and not fluorescent white ones. Despite being resistance fighters, living in a series of secret bolt holes, they all had access to hairdressers able to blow dry their hair (even the men). Michael Ironside played a character appropriately called Ham. The best thing about it, of course, was Jane Badler in a cardboard scenery chewing performance as Diana; one of the best female SF villains ever (up there with Jacqueline Pearce's Servalan in Blakes Seven). So to find I could get a little model of her was enough for me to order all eight figures Crooked Dice make. They are promising more fairly shortly. More on this bizarre project as it develops but my initial main concern is finding the right shade of burnt orange! I am now watching the 2009 reboot but it is rather dreary so far, despite the presence of the luminous Morena Baccarin and, frankly, the special effects hadn't come on as much as they should have. At least the hair was more under control.

So, what has been making me grumpy? Well, everything in the news, so I won't talk about that (several more people unfriended on Facebook in the last six weeks or so). Mainly, though, lack of social distancing in supermarkets. Rules vary, so Tesco are very strict (move in one direction, no overtaking and one queue for checkouts). If the person in front takes five minutes to decide what soup to buy everyone has to stop moving.  Get a move on!  Pea and ham or Lentil and bacon. That's it! Move! Move! Move! Don't stop! Cattle prods!

In Waitrose, however, it is almost a free for all, with people taking no notice of the distance rules and shopping in couples or families. Why does it take two people to do the shopping? You both write a list and then one person does it. It's not a social activity, unless you are very, very sad. If you see an unmissable offer on Brain's faggots then ring up your wife (who is probably called Vera or Mavis) and ask how many packs you need to stock up on. Well, you won't see them in Waitrose as they don't sell them, of course. Iceland, Asda or Budgens, probably. Actually I'm surprised the perpetually offended haven't objected to the name yet. Also.keep to the edge of the aisle so people can pass you (if allowed) if your brain is so small that you cannot decide what soup to buy. Do not block the centre of the aisle!

Victrix 12mm WW2

My wargaming related grump relates to Mr Non Sequitur. They appear in every manufacturer's model release thread. Proud wargames company with excellent new product says 'here are our lovely new 12mm WW2 tanks'. They want them to be admired. They want people to talk about what other 12mm WW2 will be coming out. No. Mr Non Sequitur says "What about the Persians?" or "Why don't you make Samurai?" No! That is not what we are talking about! Or. proud manufacturer with new 28mm range they have spent ages developing says 'Here are our lovely new 28 mm figures'. Mr Non Sequitur. 'Can you do them in 15mm?' No! No! No! 15 mm is for people who eat Brain's faggots and have wives called Mavis. They are for people with no appreciation of the proportions of the human body! They are, with very few exceptions (Copplestone Barbarica range) aesthetically offensive. Do not even get me onto 10mm and 6mm. Hello, we have made figures where their heads are the equivalent of two feet tall. I expressed an interest in the 12mm figures on the Victrix Facebook page and all these people appeared saying 'wish they had been 15mm'. No, they are not, so Victrix can sell more figures and tanks not supplement already existing collections. Then all these people popped up saying 'buy these lovely metal 15mm equivalents instead.' Guess what? They all had really weird proportions like most 15mm metals.

Another rant, about plastics companies asking customers for what they want released, will be in the next post.

Keeping it Baltic, today's music is Swedish Composer Lars-Erik Larsson's (1908-1986) enjoyable symphonies one (1927) and two (1936). Larsson is little listened to outside of Sweden, which is a shame as he wrote some fine, melodic music.

Today's wallpaper is Erigone: daughter of Icarius by the French painter Georges-Marie-Julien Giradot (1856-1914). He quite often employed this tight framing on his subjects rather than a more distant full figure view. Apart from his mythological studies he produced many paintings of village life. In a complex plot, even by Greek mythological standards, Erigone ends up being deceived by Dionysus who seduced her after disguising himself as a bunch of grapes. Hmm. Anyway Erigone is Virgo of the Zodiac.

A quick visit to Salute 2018

Just back from a very short trip to Salute; I think I was in and out in just under two hours.  I arrived just after 11.00 am and the free giveaway figure had already run out, which was fine as I didn't want it.  Given  the theme this year was the centenary of the end of World War 1 I didn't see much in the way of WW 1 games (there were a couple of African set ones).  In fact the most Great War thing was this reproduction tank which, while being made from wood, can actually move under its own track power,  It has featured in a number of TV and film productions (including Wonder Woman, Eric the Shed informed me) but was a rather stunted, foreshortened thing; rather in the way that James Cameron sliced a big chunk out of the front of his Titanic reproduction. It's almost like an anime version of a tank. Still, it looked excellent from the front.

Compared with last year there were a number of games which caught my eye as regards scenery.  As ever the venue was stygian and you only had to look into the bridal show across the way to see the difference.  I liked this World War 2 Greek Island set game featuring the Battlegroup rules. They really caught the look of the scenery of the region. Extra marks for the seaplanes

More arid scenery was depicted in this big Crusades game by show organisers, the South London Warlords, using the Sword and Spear rules which I have never played but have heard good things about.

It was odd to see a Big Red Bat game which did not feature ancients but there were still plenty of pikes in this English Civil War game, witch was promoting his new For King and Parliament rules (shouldn't it be For King or Parliament).  Anyway, he was so busy I didn't get a chance to chat to him, this year.

I haven't given up on my American Civil War project but, again, ACW seemed thin on the ground this year.  Most impressive was this one featuring a fort and an ironclad.  Great water effect.

Another American set game but a different conflict was this one, featuring a fictitious battle in Florida in 1761, with the Spanish attacking a plantation.  A really nice board. this one.

Maybe I just go for boards with water on them as I also liked Dalauppror's Great Northern War clash, the Battle at Stäket, 1719, using The Pikeman's Lament.

Want

I have been lurking on the Gangs of Rome Facebook page and there are some nice figures by Footsore Miniatures, backed by a great range of Roman buildings by Sarissa Precision (except for the roofs - they really do need 3D Roman tiled finishes - buying tile effect plasticard for this is possible but always seems to be out of stock everywhere).  The Sarissa stand did have a Roman house with a proper roof and it looked fantastic.  I was most impressed by their Roman galley, however,  Some things work with laser cut MDF (like this) and some things don't (anything cylindrical).  In the end Gangs of Rome makes me feel a bit queasy as, basically, it is not a wargame but a murder game (I wouldn't play gangsters either).  I like my little soldiers to believe in a cause!  Even if they are French and therefore misled.

I was somewhat surprised to see the University of Wolverhampton trying to recruit students for their history courses.  I don't think I have seen such a thing before at a wargames show.  I do wonder if they hadn't quite done their research into the average age of wargamers properly.  They were probably expecting the place to be filled with the Warhammer generation.

The numbers were as high as ever, I think, the light was as bad and there were a lot of Fantasy and SF manufacturers with large and impressive stands.  For me the demonstration games were of a higher standard than last year.  The absence of the London Marathon registration (it is next week) made moving around Excel and getting something to eat and drink easier.  From my point of view, there were not many people selling scenics, other than the MDF giants,  Resin buildings seem to be dying out. There were still a fair number of small 3' x 3' type games, many of which looked like those little gardens you had to make at junior school using a roasting tin, moss, stones and a mirror for a pond.  My one, inevitably and somewhat controversially, had dinosaurs in it, when I think it was supposed to be an Easter garden.

I am sixth from left

I went to the bloggers meet up, which seemed smaller this year and met Eric the Shed, Alastair and Tamsin.  I also ran into another Shed regular, John, at Waterloo on the way back.  The picture is from Big Lee's blog.  He has some excellent photos here.

There was no Dave Thomas stand this year (rumoured he has stopped doing shows) so there was nowhere to get my metal Afghan cavalry as the Perry stand (which wasn't where it was supposed to be on the map) was just selling their plastics.  There were two sets of three-ups for new sets: Agincourt mounted knights and US WW 2 infantry, neither of which I am interested in, fortunately.  I resisted the new Napoleonic chasseurs as I had already bought some other figures.

I think I bought more figures than last year.  A set of Afghan foot from Empire, as they will go into an army I am painting at the moment.  Some LBM Carthaginian shield transfers, which were on my list. Two packs of Bicorne ECW firelock men to replace the historically inaccurate figures in my Tower Hamlets trained band,  What really wasn't on the list were a box of, and some command for, the Fireforge plastic Byzantine Infantry.  This is one of my earliest 28mm armies and I do, occasionally paint a few more for it. 

"You have things in your bag," cackled the Old Bat, accusingly, when I got home.  I showed her this picture of Eric the Shed's purchases.  "His poor wife!  Although he can buy as much as he wants as he can do DIY." she said.

Paint Table Saturday: time to focus

As regular readers know, focus in not one of the Legatus' strong points.  Some time ago, I decided to focus my figure painting by just keeping a small number of figures I was currently working on on my desk. I now have twenty plastic boxes of figures stacked up on my desk. Out on the actual workbench area I currently have: 1864 Danes, Afghans, Zulus, SF troopers and a few random character figures,  However, what I am going to concentrate on, until they are done, are the last four figures for my Carthaginian War Elephant. However, sometimes I put off finishing figures because there is a bit I can't face doing.  On the 1864 figures it is doing a snow base.  I have no idea how to do this and every time I read about a solution other people chime in and say 'you don't want to do it like that' and invariably offer up some solution that involved twelve separate ingredients and some tool I have never heard of.

My Carthaginian elephant crew pose a similar problem in the case of their shields.  Now, on most of the models of the Victrix elephants I have seen the shielsd are attached to the sides of the howdahs.  However, the arms for the crew have hands holding what is obviously the handle of a shield.  It would be odd to have them waving around hands holding a short length of rope, so I was planning to put the shields on the figures.  Then, however, I couldn't work out if there would be room in the howdah.  I have clipped them from the sprue to paint but left part of the sprue on to hold while I paint them.  So I can't see where there arms would be when stood in the howdah until I cut the sprue off.  Until then I can't decide where to put the shields.  

The other stressful thing is that the shields are domed and I have never tried to use Little Big Men transfers on domed shields.  Someone suggested using something called micro-sol but I have no idea where to buy it or how to use it.  Also I wonder whether that is for traditional waterslide transfers which the LBM ones aren't, as they have the backing paper on the front of the transfer, which also makes positioning them precisely, impossible. The LBM transfers are expensive and there are only the four on the sheet.  I also seem to recall, when using them on some Greeks in the past that about half got ruined when trying to put them on or they just fell off. You need a gloss surface for them, it seems.  Anyway more things to worry about before they are done.  At least I got the elephant drivers done this week so I have now painted four figures this year (as the elephants only count as one each).  I want to get some more Victrix Carthaginians but don't feel I can unless the elephants are finished and Salute is only a week away.  Can I paint four figures in two days?  I somehow doubt it.

For reasons I can't justify even to myself I put in an order for some more of the Raging Heroes SF women troopers.  Because of this I got the five I had already bought and painted the base coat on their faces.  Why?  I should be getting on with my Afghans of Zulus.  I did at least get the base coat down on all 12 figures in my next Zulu unit this week.  I have also based four of Iron Duke's Indian Mutiny British.  This is because I have around twenty about half done and I am looking to try to get one unit of figures finished in April.  Of all the ones in my twenty plastic boxes these are the furthest along.  Oh, and the Bunny Girls should be on their way too.

Also imminent, supposedly, is the Miniature War Gaming: The Movie DVD which I backed what seems like years ago.  Honestly, this film has taken longer to make than Cleopatra. No doubt designed as some sort of showreel for a bunch of budding filmmakers they seemed to have completely underestimated the time it would take to do everything. A lot of the delays seem to have been caused by things like getting rights to stock footage, as they insist on adding historical combat elements that really aren't necessary for a hobby film.  This is where I realised that they had ideas above their station (or, at least, their experience).  Now, given the parlous wargaming material on You Tube (I hope no one in MWTM slurps hot drinks like so many do when making YouTube videos) I am hoping for a professional job, although their website contains a worrying amount of SF and fantasy illustrations (says the person who has just ordered a load of SF lady warriors).  

Salute is a week today and I really don't have much of a list of things to get: some more Perry Afghan Cavalry and, perhaps some Savage Core simians but that is it.  Honest.  I might keep my eyes open for some more random scenic items, though.  I don't now if there is a wargames bloggers meet up this year and whether anyone has managed to coordinate it so that it doesn't clash with the Lead Adventures Forum one, as for the last few years they have both been at 1.00pm.  I wasn't feeling very well last year and didn't really enjoy it so hope I feel better this time.

We took Guy back to Oxford today and one of (the only) advantages of where he is living is that it has a parking space.  Oxford must be the most car unfriendly city in Britain.  There is nowhere to park (but an excellent park and ride service) and the wardens are relentless.  As a result, there are very few cars in the centre of the city which does, I admit, improve the place from my time, when crossing the High was a perilous operation. We walked into town and I made Guy and the Old Bat have lunch at The Nosebag, the only place I use to eat at College when I was there which is still operating.  It is just around the corner from the college accommodation annexe I was in in the second year and they used to do soup and a roll for about 60p. Today soup and (a really big bit of) bread is £5.00 but it is still good and the interior does not appear to have changed at all.  It reminded me of C, K, other C, B, J, other J, F, T, M, S, H (and maybe some other girls I have forgotten) as it was my go to place for a quick lunch or tea and scones.   We would talk about art, as I sought to get them to model for a charcoal drawing or two (looking at the list it worked on seven out of eleven of them).  It was up to them, of course, how much they chose to wear for these sessions. The advantage of the place was that it was only about a hundred yards from my room and my drawing materials. There was also a good shop selling old prints next door, where I got a lot of Arthur Rackham prints of his Ring series, and postcards of art nudes which helped, er, 'condition' them to an extent.

Nude (1915)

Today's appropriate wallpaper is a painting I saw in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston a few years ago. The painter, William Paxton (1869-1941), was an American impressionist who studied in Boston and Paris, under Jean-Léon Gérôme (of Police Verso fame).  Gérôme instilled a practice of the faithful modelling of the human form in Paxton; triumphantly achieved here in this beautifully lit study.

Today's music, given I am writing this late Friday night, is this hip and cool album To Sweden with Love (1964) by the Art Farmer quartet.  This is an arrangement of Swedish folk songs recorded in Stockholm when Farmer was touring the country. The cover is very mid sixties!  It was a present from H, a Swedish girl I knew at Oxford, who very much enjoyed soup and a roll.  She did not have that long hair with a fringe prototypical look expected of Swedish women at the time but she was, at least, a natural blonde.