French light artillery & crew

This project has been a slow burner as I began work on the crew some time ago, I abandoned the unit for a while as I wasn't sure how best to convert the master gunner but inspiration has since provided the result.

Here are the conversions bar one member who I neglected to photograph prior to basing;

Left to right, the chap with the breech was perhaps the simplest conversion; I added green stuff to his arms to give more voluminous sleeves typical of the early 1500's and did a head swap from a Wargames Foundry Landsknecht (also Perry sculpted), he wears the red & yellow livery of Louis XII.

The master gunner wears a woollen base coat in national colours, the base coat was added after the figure was prepared; I filed away about 1-2mm off the torso and created a GS fill between the legs, allowed it to dry and then sculpted the coat on top. The filing / cutting in the gap between the arms and body was quite fiddly but I think it's turned out OK.

After this photograph was taken I added a few more things to the painting. Master gunners were much in demand and were spread throughout the French armies of the period, serving wherever they were sent, I thought I'd add a red and yellow Bishop's mitre livery badge of the city of Therouanne to demonstrate his allegiance to his current role.

To further mark him as a master gunner with the experience of a long siege I painted small powder burns and marks on the front of his base coat, hand and sleeve, a little touch but it adds to the character.

Finally, the chap with the sponge was perhaps the most difficult sculpt, the puffed sleeves are quite hard to get right in terms of how much volume there is in the material and how much I can emphasise the fold in each pull of material. The head is a plastic Ansar head with added GS cloth hat, I've had so much use out of that box of plastics, they're a veritable hive for conversion and head swaps in particular, very expressive.

I also built up the breastplate a bit and altered it to look like a Maximilian style breast plate in the latest fashion.

In contrast to the other light culverin I painted the wood and iron work of the gun in red. There are various examples of gun frames whether natural or painted in different colours. German pieces for example tended to be black with red ironwork, the latter a protective layer to prevent rust as is shown here.

This now concludes my work on the conversion of both of the Perry light guns, here they are in defensive position on the outskirts of a ruined village - the fencing and gabions are from Renedra with a few bits added and the ruined building is from 4ground - they do a nice version of this with red daub which I must get some day.

Here they are alongside a larger gun on a section of Therouanne's walls;

I think I'll eventually get the bombard and convert the crew in this manner to add to my Tudors, pieces of that nature though dated were still being put to use well into the 1520's. This work has also served to remind me that my Tudors are bereft of artillery at present so I shall get to that too.

Bye for now

Stuart