Wednesday 29 June 2016

Works in progress


I've presently got a couple of projects running concurrently and as it's been two months since my last post I thought I'd say a quick hello and give an update and a look at what's on the workbench.

First up we have an unexpected return of attention to my early Tudor army - thought I'd give a clue above.

This was not quite intentional, over the last couple of years I have made attempts at sculpting various renaissance bits on to the  Perry WOTR plastic bodies, effectively using them as sculpting dollies, the progress of which can be seen in past posts. I've had mixed results but generally tend to have something on the go to keep my hand in - there's a lot that doesn't make it !

The base coat, very much a key characteristic of the early Tudor army and to a lesser extent that of their French counterparts had frustratingly eluded me, I'd had reasonable results but I just wasn't happy with them, until;

 

I can't quite summarise how it happened, just practice and many failed attempts which in turn drove me to keep trying. This was about 3 weeks ago and now I've finally found a technique which yields a good result I've had a steady flow of bodies in various stages of completion on the workbench, the very latest of which (as of today) is this chap;


I shall continue to putty push basecoats for the foreseeable. I shelved a notion to re-base my Tudor collection some time ago but have returned to the idea as a vehicle to integrate some figures of this appearance with the others to help lift the units into the early 16th century, there may even be a few that end up weeded out and make their way to eBay. I also had a few more nobles that I was keen to represent before I called a halt to begin my French army so it's win win. More on this soon.

If you can't wait for that long, I tend to post figure by figure updates for critique on this Lead Adventure Forum thread which incidentally also shows my various sculpting projects over the last 2 years;


All is not lost for Louis however as green stuff takes time to dry and the brushwork needs to be equally exercised so I've also been steadily building a unit of Landsknechts in French service, here's a preview;



In addition, I also have a side project of some early WW2 British which are in various stages of completion though I must admit that with the latest sculpting breakthrough I have very much been focused on the Renaissance, this blog is back in business !

Bye for now

Stuart




7 comments:

  1. Stuart,
    As wonderful as usual, but I would love to know how you paint the faces of your figures as it is so different from mainstream wargaming figures.

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    1. Thanks Robbie, have a look at my Landsknecht painting guide, I've dedicated a post to painting faces there;

      www.paintinglandsknechts.blogspot.com

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  2. These look fantastic Stuart - seriously when are you going to sculpt some up from scratch?

    I agree with you that they will really help lift the more WOTR style figures from your collection into the 1510s and 1520s when mixed in with them. The basecoat seems to have been pretty much ubiquitous when you look at some early 16th century sources. I reckon I have used about 10 packs of the TAG Papal guards so far as they are wearing a version of the coat, have open hands and are really easy to headswap.

    I am eagerly awaiting your own range of early 16th century basecoated sculpts!

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  3. More nice sculpts, and some glorious landsknechts! Always happy to see new landsknechts on your blog and for what its worth, I've found your landsknecht painting blog very helpful, clear and user friendly .
    Best Iain

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  4. Looking very nice, excellent as always.

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