What we need is a little leadership!

The Command for Brigade Chemineau

 And we got some!  2 more bases of Brigade Commanders that is!  Both bases pictured here are painted by Dave Taylor once again.  Lending his hand to ensure the British will be crushed under the hooves of the finest cavalry in the world!

Cavalry Command from Boyer and Curto's Cavalry Divisions

 Dave grabbed these guys from me one evening and finished them off in a week before turning them back over to myself.  I got the based up and ready to roll the other night.  The gears are turning and the painting is steadily moving along!

The beginnings of the 3rd Hussars

 Hmm, I am seeing a pattern here.  The 3rd Hussars are in full swing as far as painting goes.  Again, Dave threw in with the victors and painted up the horses, leaving the blue gray of the 3rd to my discretion.  The trooper is not done yet but it gives you an idea of the uniform.

1st Battalion of the 69th Ligne

And I just had to put this guy in there.  My last battalion of infantry for the project.  I think his facial expression sums it all up! I love his snarling look.

Tonight I finished up the flesh tones on all of the infantry and Foy's command base.  Not up to my normal standard but definitely good enough for the table top.  The tiny black lines are in place for the eyes.  And things are progressing nicely!  All in all, for my portion of this project I have 36 models on my painting table.  And 8 more working days to go.  As much as I may stress in the final days.  I love this stuff!

More to come!
B

Operation Paint Cavalry is under way

The past couple of weeks have been very exciting for me both personally and hobby related. I recently undertook the largest cavalry painting project in my hobby existence. Yes, I know some people will laugh at the fact that I am only painting 26 cavalry and some mounted officers but I really had some bad experiences painting and playing with cavalry units so I have managed to avoid them up until this point. I was working on assembling the 26 dragoons this past week and I started painting them this weekend. Hopefully I will have at least 6-12 dragoons ready to dip before I go to bed with the rest falling into line by next weekend. In between painting backpacks and some casualties I was painting up the horses. Here are some pictures of my progress as of a few minutes before posting this article. Enjoy.

 The pictures above are of my brigade commander. Commanders are Perry Miniatures and the base was supplied by Dragon Forge Designs.

 8 of my horses are done and based. I have another 8 that need highlighting and another 8 that need to be dull coated and highlighted.

Here are the elite 15th Dragoons. I have found no evidence that they wore their bearskins in the Peninsula and more than likely they didn't but they look cool. Sometimes cool trumps historical accuracy. :)

Campbell's Staff

Last (British) post I mentioned that my Divisional Command stand would be next up. Joe jumped in with a good look at his progress, only seven fusiliers and his cavalry to go for him, and they're looking great too. So, we're now back to the Brits for a post or two.

As I've mentioned earlier, there aren't a lot of British Staff Officer models out there. That's why this stand sports only one truly British model who (for our purposes) represents the First Division commander at Salamanca, Major-General Henry Campbell. The model is from the Perry's British range (as Major-General Kempt).

The remaining models are from French packs from the Perrys, most of them modified in some way to make them look more British (or German).

I hope you like them, and that they serve us well on the field of battle.

For those of you who might be wondering, the dog is from Warlord Games' Celt Mastiffs pack, from their Hail Caesar range. I spotted a dog just like it on a table at Salute last year, asked the guy at the table where it was from, then dashed off to the Warlord stand to buy a pack of my very own. The pack has been sitting on my desk since April last year, just waiting for an opportunity like this. While I haven't read anything that suggested (or even hinted) Campbell had a dog, I thought it would make a great addition to the base.

You can take a look at the table (Alternative Worcester 1651) that inspired the purchase of the dogs here. And if you look closely, you might be able to spot the dog in the pics.

Cheers
Dave

The British Commanders stand ready.

Well it seems to have been a month since our last update! Who'd have thought it?

In our little group, however, we've had quite a bit of turmoil in our lives. 

Joe spent the last five weeks of 2011 in Vietnam. Brien bought a new house (his first) and all the joy that comes with that. My wife gave birth to our second child, which has certainly changed the dynamic of the household. And two members have been going through some medical dramas of their own.

Throughout it all we've been plugging away at our modeling tasks. Joe has been working on some cavalry, Alex has finished off some Rifles, and Jamie is about to start of the 24th Regiment of Foot.

I've been able to squeeze in a few hours here and there finishing off the command stands for the British. As I've mentioned before, a few of these models are actually from the Perry British range, but most of them are from other Perry ranges (including a few Frenchies). Some minor conversion work covered up of the uniform inconsistencies but I know there are a few still visible. Hopefully you can look past those and enjoy the simple stories in each vignette.

1st Brigade - Fermor and Von Lowe.

2nd Brigade - Wheatley.

3rd Brigade - Van DeLeur.

4th Brigade - LeMarchant.

Next post, Campbell's Divisional Command.

Cheers
Dave

PS. Only three months to go!

Commanders starting to take shape

My order of Perry Miniatures "staff officer" models came in early this week. In an attempt to regain a bit of sanity (following the birth of my second daughter), I quickly cobbled together a few command base vignettes. I still haven't set my lights back up after our Thanksgiving party, so these were shot on the fly with my phone, my apologies for the lack of crisp detail. 

First Brigade Commanders: Here we have Von Lowe (mounted) and Femor (mounting up), the joint commanders of our First Brigade in the battle. In reality they each commanded a brigade as part of the Guards Division. I'll be adding a horseholder to this vignette, keeping Femor's horse steady while he mounts up.

Second Brigade Commander: On the right is Wheatley, commander of another brigade in the Guards Division (this one including two Highlander regiments - the 42nd and 79th). On his base are to ADCs, one handing off a packet of orders to the other (mounted). I've already switched out the original headwear of these three models, giving two of them the ubiquitous bicorne, whilst the other sports a shake that marks him out as an officer of a Light Infantry company seconded to Wheatley's staff.

Third Brigade Commander: And finally, for the moment, we have Van DeLeur (mounted) on the left, looking through his telescope towards a threat indicated by another staff officer on foot. Next to them sits an officer of the Royal Horse Artillery waiting to guide the fire of the batteries accompanying this brigade from the Light Division.

As most of these models are from Perry ranges other than the British, there are a few changes I need to make to their uniforms. Primarily it's the head swaps (done), followed by adding officer sashes, sword belts, and the occasional altered jacket style.

Until next time!

Cheers
Dave

You can never find a good staff officer when you need him.

There are quite a few nice models out there to represent various British Generals (and other ranks) and quite a few of those lovely models are from Alan and Michael Perry. One thing I have noticed, however, is there is an alarming absence of handy Staff Officers and ADCs to assist the commanders in the execution of their commands. Amongst the Perry French range you can find more packs of commanders, staff officers, hangers on than you can find artillery pieces! Not so for our poor British officers. Seems like Wellington was forced to write down his own orders and ride them off himself to his various sub-commanders. Surely not.

Anyway, this has inspired me to place an order for a variety of command packs from various ranges that I can then tweak a bit with head swaps and greenstuffed accoutrements to create some cool bases for the four Brigade commanders and one Divisional Commander I'll be painting up for our Guns of April game at Adepticon next year. I love the two officers at the table writing orders in the pack above. They'll no doubt make it on to the Division commander's base.

I love the horse holder, pointing officer, and rider about to leave with orders from this Dutch-Belgian pack above. They'll probably be spread across a few bases.

And Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Weimer (above center) will be on a base with the ADC mounting up next to him, suitably adapted to a "British in the Peninsula" style.

Oh, and the order will have a box of the new Perry Hussars in it, to be painted up as the 1st Hussars of the KGL.

I'm looking forward to getting started on all this over winter : )

Cheers
Dave