Sharpe Bayonet

Obligatory Sharpe reference. A mix of Wargames Atlantic and Perry bits and a Victrix hand for Sweet William, although the arm needs more work.

 

French unit for Silver Bayonet

Unemployment gives me a lot of time on my hands, so time to dig through the sprues and start the long planned French unit.

Using the sprues I have, I can do basic types like (back row) infantry (x2) and sapper from Perry, guardsman from Victrix with a lift to his shins and posture corrected with a Perry head. Front row is the officer from a Victrix sprue with a Perry head and a doctor and investigator from Perry sprues. I also have a light cavalry man still on the sprue and plans for a vivandiere, but I’ll have to either buy one or use the Becky Sharpe from Black Pyramid Games.

The investigator is one I’m not happy with I have to say, but it’ll do for now.

The sprues used were:

French Infantry Command 1807-14 FN250/260 from Perry

French Battalion FN250 from Perry 

And a French in Great Coats sprue with no ID from Victrix.

All said and done I could have cobbled a guardsman and an officer very easily from the Perry command sprue. I just fancied distinguishing them a bit more. Plus the coat allowed the guardsman’s height to be altered very easily (not that the Victrix are short, I wanted the guardsman to be big). 

But two sprues would be more than enough for a starter unit. Just the command sprue would be enough if you didn’t want more dynamic infantry poses, as they all appear to be shouldered muskets.

Various Silver Bayonet WIP

The supernatural investigator is converted from the Perry Royal Navy Landing Party (getting good use out of those). The Navy rosette was removed from his top hat and with his tasseled military boots cut back and turned into riding boots with greenstuff, with the right paint again, he’s something of a dandy adventurer. 

The final clue marker is almost done, still quite pleased with these.

And a Living Armour, an animated  suit of armour as per the random encounter table. It’s a Perry War of the Roses knight with his face carved out. Still some work to do on that one.

And goblins WIP, in this case Reaper Gremlins that I think fit the job quite nicely. I want my fairy foes to be quite slight, and they are bloody tiny.

 

The Dark Watch WIP

 So, a really productive month for me… hampered only by the freezing temperatures which means I can’t go outside and varnish.

But, lots of unfinished bits. Starting with the Dark Watch, my Highland regiment themed warband for the Silver Bayonet.

Some goblins and wolves as well in that shot. But L-R, my officer, a highlander, two infantrymen and a supernatural investigator. 

Victrix Highlanders, the (classed as for the rules) infantrymen are pretty much straight from the sprue, the highlander has a two handed sword from a Fireforge medieval sprue of some flavour over one shoulder. The piping on the flank company epaulettes was a bit inconsistent between poses, so I just filled them in and went with solid black. I also got some Blackwatch kilt decals for the kilts, but they were an epic faff, so I went back to the brush, opting for the Hebridean tartan (for reasons).

The Dark Watch was apparently an alternative name for the Blackwatch in their very early days and suits the theme very well. But I needed a pioneer (a sapper for the rules), so converted one from the sprue, using some bathing brass sheet to form the basis of the apron and greenstuff for details.

For variety, he got a head from the Warlord Games 95th Rifles sprue, that looked the part. The axe head is from one of the GW Nightgaunts that were cheap with one of those part works GW do now and then.

The officer is from the Perry Miniatures Royal Navy Landing Party, which also provided the doctor and the supernatural investigator. With the naval rosette removed from his hat and a suitable paint job, he passes for an infantry officer sans bling. Dressed down seems appropriate for covert missions hunting monsters.

More WIP on the daVinci tank

 

Life as ever takes it’s toll and my six month in job is still leaving me pretty dead at the end of a day, so progress is sooooo slow... but hey...

I have, however, discovered the joys of those makeup ring lights and that has helped my painting no end... next, I need to work on converting the tank commander...

Paint WIP

After a few botched attempts to get my head around the contrast paints flesh range, I returned to the tank. Aiming for a linen/leather covered wooden shell effect. I had tried to carve in some tears and dings, exposed wood beneath, but getting that right was a little beyond me for some reason so I moved on and made good . The repair work is again not perfect, and in fact I’ve kept a couple of marks and tried to go with that.

 

The Water Carrier

So this is a thing and I love it... no idea if it will be playable as it would be way over powered I assume, but it’ll make a fun project... may just end up as scenery.

This is weird kit, snap fit and clockwork apparently, but I’m leaving all the gubbins out as they are handy medieval cogs that would have been cool with the water mill, but hey... I’ve removed the outer lettering for the on/off switch (to be filled) and some arrows on the cap (the purpose of which is beyond me), the cap itself rests on the clockwork mechanism inside, so that will need raising a little to allow for the view slot. Not sure how I’ll have them get in and out, will need to think of a hatch on the main shell or have the cap hinged somehow. In my head there is a horse or something in there, so that would need to be a factor. It’s smaller than the real thing would be, but looks ok alongside minis. I’m seriously thinking of an interior... 

Size Comparisons

 Ok, so I do love the Bloody Miniatures range. Lovely sculpts. But... I’m torn on the size. They work with some figures, not so much with others... they make Angel Blake look more childlike which I like, but she’s nude which is wrong on sooo many levels. The old woman is minute and looks odd, but the blacksmith just looks stout and solid. The bishop looks small, but he did against the Mantic ghouls anyway. The Cardinal is shortish, but not terribly so... but the Warlord cavalry men are tiny, even against a Warlord plastic infantry (which is the witch hunter base figure.

Decisions, decisions... sigh...

Phantasmagoria

Like many I’m sure, I got the first two issues of Mortal Realms part work from Games Workshop, the shitty Sigmarines aside, I was definitely going in on the spooky stuff offered by the Nightgaunts. These were the banshees from issue 2, but I didn’t go full grim dark and just wanted floaty sheet types, so the bodies and the overly done bases went in the bits tray...

The observant amongst you will notice they are only two of the set of four that comes with the set (of course I got two issues at that price)... I had tried converting some to get some variety, but that wasn’t very successful and mistakes were made. In fact the one travelling through the gravestone was the only successful bit of fiddling I did, wish I’d done that with the others rather than having the ground contact thing on the others. The tail end of the sheet through the stone is from one of the bodies, that one was quite badly cut up by the conversion efforts, but quite pleased that I managed to Frankenstein him back together with some greenstuff. 

Revenants (well zombies but hey...)

OK, so finally got a photo session and so here are the zombies from a while back... not sure my camera is at it's best anymore, it doesn't remember the date or settings when it's turned off... but hey, better pics than I've been managing....

So... Mantic zombies with a variety of g/s to just 17thC them up a bit...

base figures with a bit of g/s to vary clothing and poses a wee bit...

and as an equal opportunities necromancer some lady corpses... g/s for boobs, although one has a boob ripped off as I couldn't get them even. She also has a missing hand, as it seemed unlikely that so many would be carrying around a fresh hand for snacking, so lopped off and a bit of wire for bone and g/s for flesh...

EM4 ships and X-Wing

So, I’m picking up the occasional ship for X-Wing still when cheap, with 2nd edition now out it’s easier to get the cards than the models, so a bit of creative licence might be in the offing. So I picked up the spruce of plastic ships from EM4 Miniatures. I’m mainly trying to get a small Scum & Villainy selection, so a bit of a ragtag feel would not go amiss. As you can see, some could work for smaller stuff like the M3-A Interceptor (the pic below is the best comparison I could find online and puts the M3-A at about the length of the Y-Wing engine), or with a bit work a Kihraxz fighter. The more true to scale A-Wing is comparable, and the scaleable Snowspeeder from the Hoth ERTL kits suggest a possible source of Scum speeders for Ground Assault as well. The unpainted X-Wing from the same Hoth kits will eventually make some decent Z-95 Headhunters.

diving back in...

So, I’ve been slowly getting a groove on, greenstuffed a load of zombies into the 17th century. I had them kind of half done from a few years back, but finished them off and slapped some paint on them. Not my best, but a) not bad for two plus years absence and 2) I hate doing rank and file and wanted to get them out of the way. Now, my laptop is dead so no fancy pics at the moment as I’m using my phone and no light tent, so a quick “painted something honest” shot below. Basing still to be sorted and will see to doing a photo session later...

Next up then is back to building... saw these online (Blotz.co.uk) and figured a change to the 4ground buildings would be good. The mill is interesting as with my fetish for interiors I’m looking forward to doing some workings in there. 

What is interesting is that the timbers are cut separately and stand proud... normally I’d do that myself with balsa, but may have to see if I can get a rough timber texture on them. The barn is simple enough, an extension floor is available, but I reckon I can do that myself. So far, so good, reckon I won’t go wrong to get a couple more if needed.

Giraffey paints something shocker...

SW Starship Miniature Battles A-Wings repainted (on account of the FFG ones being the wrong scale) - 3 for Green Squadron and 1 for the Prototype. By a happy coincidence, I noticed the that the green visible on the main hull goes 1, 2, 3 - so that helps with assigning callsigns.

And alongside the FFG X-Wing just to illustrate the scale.

the Apostle WIP

A little WIP, undecided on hair (again), also need to get some different heads...

As I had the idea for him, he became affectionately known as John Wootton in my head, although I quite like the nickname The Apostle as well... I had thought of Red Right Hand as well, but that fits more of a organisation, so will save that for my Church hunters.

The body is from the Warlord Pike & Shotte infantry sprue, arms and boots from the command sprue (Warlord is currently offering the sprues for half price if anyone is interested - or were last time I looked anyway). The head is of course another Hasslefree one.

Snatch Land Rover

A terrible picture, but not much to see anyway. I took advantage of the Model Zone liquidation sale and treated myself to the Airfix 1/48 Land Rover Patrol box set for £15. One of which of course, will (should) work perfectly alongside my very old (15 years plus) white metal Lanny. Of course, it's scaled correctly and as you can see from the picture, lines up frame wise quite nicely, but it's probably about 20 years older in design times. According to the bumpf it's been used since the 90's so I could fudge that into the mishmash of the UNIT timeline without too much trouble. I may pick up another set so I can have two armoured hard tops for the troops and the older soft top can be a command/scout vehicle. Ideally, I'd have got a Bedford 3-ton truck, but they go for a bomb as diecasts on eBay.

The second Lanny in the Airfix patrol kit is the WMIK, which is probably a bit too hardcore for fudging into the UNIT fluff as is. I may try and UNIT it yet, but somewhere in the back of my head I keep thinking it may work as a more realistic basis for the SAS Force Panther...

Dredd 3D

actually finished these a while back, but was hoping to get the Lawmasters done, but not realise the month is really storming past...

I suspect that one will have to end up as Dredd, as the other guy is left handed...

hopefully, some transport will be forthcoming for these chaps - and I do have an idea for the Ma-Ma Clan...

Urban Judges WIP

conversion WIP... still a bit to do, some cleaning up, couple of superglue splurges, but on the whole I'm quite chuffed...

buggered about with Mantic Corporation Marines, cut down GW Cadian pattern Las Pistols, GW Chaos Militia shotgun, press mold of a Mongoose Dredd (as my original plan to use clix dredd heads was ruined by the fact they were mahoosive), greenstuffed shoulder pads and badges...

I gave up on holsters, they don't really stand out in the film, but they bloody did to fit that Lawgiver on the mini, so skipped it completely (hence g/s pouch where a pouch was removed) especially as the Judge with the shotgun doesn't even have a holstered Lawgiver in the film, so he got the grenades, obviously some kind of support role.