AHPCV 28mm Italian Wars Pike and Shot

I posted these a while back on the Challenge, but they never made it over on the Admiral's blog.  Anyway, I have 12 28mm pike and shot figures for my Italian Wars project.  These are 12 pikemen to complete my unit of French pike and 4 Italian arquebusiers to finish a unit of Italian shot.  They are again Perry plastics using (mostly) the European Mercenaries set, but with the odd body parts from the plastic Foot Knight set.

Here are the 12 new figures on their ownsome.  This project is still a learning experience for me as I experiment with mixing and matching body parts, with the period and weaponry and with painting for the period.  While I still have things to learn, I am happy with the results.

Here is the finished unit of 12 Italian Arquebusiers, 8 of which have been posted before and the 4 new ones.

And here is the finished unit of 16 French pikes, 8 old, 8 new, nothing borrowed but all in blue.  The foot Knights provided front rankers on one of the new stands.  I tried to get a halberd for one but it turned out the arms I chose needed the Lucerne hammer instead (or the Bec du Corbin if you are a 1970s Tunnels and Trolls veteran like myself).  Regardless it’s still a long stick with nasty sharp bits on the end!  I do wish the thing was less fiddly as I noted the business end needs regluing already.

And all with the experimentation theme, this brings me to the flags.  There are the “pay some else” flagmen and DIY flagmen, and I definitely fall into the latter category – being too cheap and too impatient to order off for stuff that I figure I can knock up at home.  These flags are fabric and their creation involved the input of my better half, who is a quilter and sewer and far more fabric savvy than I.   I also had to borrow her quilting tools, albeit under supervision to make sure I didn't muck anything up.  Plus she was intrigued by the Challenge and wanted to see how to make a go of it.  In the end we're pretty happy with the results. The basic sequence was as follows.

1. Get PDFs of the flags you want in the correct scale.  The two French flags are from the Perry plastic kit inserts and thus already scaled, so I scanned the sheet into a PDF.  The Italian flag I found on the web and resized based on eyeball judgement as to what looked right.  Of course you need to make sure that you have both the obverse and reverse sides with a common fold line where the flagpole goes.
2.     I set up two letter-sized sheets of flags and then printed them on an Avery printable fabric product that says it could be used iron on transfers or as appliqued.
3.     My first attempt was ironing the flags onto plain white cloth, linen in my case based on what scraps I was able to beg from the quilt stash.  This worked great but gave a thick and rigid flag that couldn’t be shaped into anything other than a flat board shape.  I gained a new respect for the qualities of the Greek linthothorax!
4.      Second attempt was trying to iron the transfers to them selves, folding at the fold line and going at it with the iron.  This was an epic fail!  Fail number one was that the damn thing wouldn’t glue to itself.  Fail two was that we could not think of a way of putting a metal or plastic pole in place without potentially ruining my wife’s good iron.  Even I am smart enough not to try and bodge it through.
5.  So third try saw me take the printed fabric flag, fold it over a pole and glue if down with craft glue.   The approach needs further fiddling but I like the results as it gives flags with a fabric feel that can be moulded and shaped realistically.  I do need to go back and fix the joins, especially on the blue Fleur de Lys flag for the pikes. 

 I am not sure the photos do the flags justice so will try and get better pics on my own blog in good time.  The end flags have good colours, don't have the glossy sheen of the Perry inserts and can be folded and curled.  Best of all up close they are a real fabric grain and weave - my wife was really impressed with that.  Also they feel like cloth!

28mm Italian Wars Foot

I have a set of twelve 28mm infantry from the Italian Wars period.  These are made up of figures from the Perry brothers’ Plastic boxed set of European Mercenaries 1450-1500 with additional metal heads from the Italian and Tudor head sets.

I did up test sets of 2 half sized units so that I could get comfortable with the parts and making up the figures, and let’s face it limit the damage of the inevitable F*ck ups.  There are another 8 pike men to be primed, so it will be a unit of 16.  There will be 12 arquebusiers, and I have 2 more completed and 6 about ½ way done.  There is a standard bearer in the pike block, but his flag will wait until the unit is done.

These were very nice figures to put together, with tons of options available.  So far the only mess up on my part was putting the drummers arms on one of the torsos from the command stand.  I realized too late that this was the standard bearer’s torso so I now have a very well armoured drummer!   Obviously his mother loved him and made sure that he would be well looked after.

The arquebusiers have been painted up as Italians using 2 plastic heads, 2 metal Italian heads (the barbutas with cheek plates and the roll of fabric) and two Tudor heads (in soft caps).  I really like the “shot” arms, as there’s a nice mix of firing, prepping and loading poses. They will likely end up as Venetians, as Venice was involved in the thick of things all through Wars.   Also they were the only Italian State left independent when the Wars wound up.

The pikes are painted as generic Europeans, but I’ll likely field these as French.  All of the bits come from the Mercenaries box except for the metal Tudor cap on the well-protected drummer. The pike arms all come in marching position, which is a mixed blessing as some lowered pikes would be nice.  However, there are quite a variety of poses and arm choices and the overall effect is of a unit marching together but not quite in step.  Painting these up I could detect some real personalities – the chap in the quilted jacket and kettle hat looks grimly determined and one of the back rankers has a distinct hangdog slouch.  Meanwhile the chap in front of the sad sack looks way too happy and I picture him singing about the 98,000^thbottle of beer on the wall (this may partly explain the looks of his erst while comrades).

 

I left a blank space in my flocking at the back, where I will add unit labels to each base.

I’ve kept with the theme colours idea, using scarlet as the theme for the shot and blue for the pike.  While there weren’t uniforms as such, liveried units weren’t unknown and Michael Mallet’s book on the Condoterri states that mercenary unit were often paid in part with bolts of fabric.  That gives me enough license for the unit colours as I picture the cloth bolts being farmed out between various seamstresses and camp followers to create a variety of tops in a common colour.

I had a lot of fun researching and painting these figures.  There’s a lot of  resource material available either on line or in your local public library.  Just get images related to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Renaissance Italian artists.  The colours in the art of the period really pop and I want to get the same effect on table.  The Perry figures are a little early that the classic Italian Wars period so don’t have the full blown over the top Landsknecht slashing and Plunderhosen.  But I tried to mimic some slashing effects in paint – some of the quilted arms can be painted up as slashed sleeves in particular.

 

The arquebuisers better get their shot off and then scamper back to Venice!

Curt and I have been bashing about what to do with the Italian Wars and I’ve been hemming and hawing between “Pike and Shotte” and “Lion Rampant”.  In the end I decided to base them for P&S in blocks of four since I expect to have enough figures to do larger battles than LR can handle.  AARs in the blogosphere also indicate that LR works fine with multi-unit bases.  P&S uses 4 foot on a 40mm square base, and I’ve used the 45 by 40mm bases by Renedra that the Perry’s supply, but turned them 90 degrees so they have a 40mm frontage.

AHPCV 28mm Andalusian Archers

So in between singing sea shanties and rinsing the salt from my shorts (see the comments on Miles’ earlier post), I completed a unit of 12 Andalusian archers for my El Cid era armies.  These are Gripping Beast figures and are old friends.  Others seem to have issues with some Beastie Boys figs, but I like theses ones.  The one slight quibble is the bows are trick to attach to some figures.  However, good poses and clothing and they paint up nicely IMHO.

Over time I have waffled between giving my Ancient/Medieval units “uniforms”, sometimes opting for a Heinz 57 variety and others going for common clothes.  For recent units I am tending to unit “theme” colours, such as the red theme for these archers.  I’ve used three different shades for the tunics, or neutrals with red turbans.  On the theme I can vary to trims, sashes and turbans and accessories.   It may not be historical, but it makes the units far easier to group together during set up and take down.

Not Dead Yet

It's been six weeks since my last post on the admiral, but I've not been silent in the blogosphere.  I've been posting away http://thepaintingchallenge.blogspot.ca, where you find me as PeterD.  With midterms going on I've been lax in reposting here but will catch up shortly I hope.

I've been focusing on Italian Wars units using Perry Plastics, and it looks like I'm focusing on an Italian Condottiere army with French opponents.

AHPCV Hot Round Andalusian Naffatah with Nasty Sticky Flaming Goop

'Curt's Analogue Hobbies painting Challenge had one of it's theme bonus rounds due on Saturday, and I got my sh*t together and offered up these guys as my submission.  And darn it wouldn't you know that AlanD submitted the same figures.  I feel the socialite who has turned up at the fancy ball to find someone else in the same dress!

For the hot round I have a set of 6 Andalusian Naffatah 'Fire troops' in 28mm using figures from the Perry Crusades range.  These are very nice figures and ones I had wanted for a while, so I was happy that the Hot round gave me a rationale for acquiring them.  They were painted with my normal artist acrylics with heavy use of washes.  They have been based simply on washers for now, but I will likely revisit the basing later.

Naft was the Arabic equivalent of Greek Fire, and was delivered by a number of different ways.  Four of these figures hurl ceramic grenades while two use hand held syphons or flame throwers if you will.  WAB classified these trops Naft is "Nasty, sticky, flaming goop" (NSFG) which I think sums things up nicely.  I have another set of 6 Naffatah using Gripping Beast figures but much prefer the Perry figures, or maybe it's my paint job is better on these ones.

I really enjoyed painting these guys, and they made a nice change from the more troublesome Hat figures that I had been working on earlier.  These is nice movement, especially in the dude with the staff sling.  I am also amused by the range of clothing that in which the manufacturers dress their Naffath.  Gripping Beast's are wrapped up with cloths across their faces, while two of the Perry figures and going topless and shoeless.  Personally if I was working with NSFG, I'd want to be covered up but in clothes that I could get out of quickly is the spam hit the fan.  The chainmail coif worn by one of the syphoners seems like a recipe for disaster to me!

Oh yes and in keeping with the NSFG theme, I would like to note that the figures were stuck to their bases using a Hot Glue Gun which I figure is the modern crafting equivalent of Nasty Sticky Flaming Goop!

AHPCV Moorish Horse Archers

OK, it has been several weeks since my last posting.  Part of this was due to illness, part due to a hectic time at work (relatively speaking, my work life is still way simpler than it used to be) and part due to problems with this @#$%&* unit!!

Anyway we have an 8 man unit of 28mm Berber Light Cavalry mercenaries to fight alongside my Andalusians.  The figures are by Hat and produced in a hard plastic, and as such as a little "lighter" than metal 28s.    But the effect isn't bad if one keeps the figures in separate units.  And as I noted on a prior posting, the horses have a very nice fine boned Arab look to them.  The plastics don't paint up as well as metals since the detail is not as clearly defined.  While the plastic is harder than Airfix or Ecsi it lacks the crisp details of the Perry or Victrix plastics.

Anyway I ran into two issue with these guys, both of them originating between the seat cushion and the paint brush.  Issue one was I decided to go with a black primer since there was to be a lot of white on the figures, and I thought it might bring some crispness.  This worked really well with the horses, as the leaving a thin line of black primer gave a very good shading effect and highlighted details.  But it work less well on the riders since it required a lot of second coats with lighter colours (like whites, creams and yellows).  And before anyone asks, I am a "fix the riders on the horses and paint them both as one casting" kinda guy.  Therefore the idea of priming the horses in black and the riders in white isn't gonna fly.

Issue two came when I decided to go for a "Berber Indigo" colour on some of the cloaks and head wear.  Great idea, but an Epic Fail on initial execution.  I used a "primary blue" acrylic with Black washes, and the end result was aptly described by my better half as "too shiny".  So I got grumpy and sick for a while and contemplated binning the lot, but fortunately thought better of it after a while.

One of the advantages of working on campus is that there are neat resources available, like an on site fine art supply store that gives me a staff discount.  So I pottered off to chat up the store manager for ideas.  Her solution for Berber Indigo was a mix of Ultramarine Blue and Carbon Black, plus an optional dab of Dioxazine Purple.  Those are the names given to the Artists Acrylics shades that I work with, but I am sure that GW and other modelling lines have similar shades available with gaddawful names at three times the price (end of rant).  It turned out that my Purple had been binned a while back so I went with the Black and Blue mix but it greatly improved the figures and I rather like the effect.  It also got the approval of my at home colour conscious quilter.  I don't what the visual equivalent of "perfect pitch" is, but she's got it.

The flag is free handed based on Moorish tile designs plus artistic (sic) license.

I am not super enthused by the photos, they came out very dark and I had to play with the exposure and thus messed up the colours a bit.  But these guys are off my to finish list and on the blog roll!

AHPCV Curt Geld Socrates

So for this year's painting challenge, Curt has required that we paint up a 28mm entry figure of for this year's theme - Antihero.  Here's my entry figures - Socrates (the philosopher not the brilliant Brazilian footballer).   He's a metal figure by Reaper from their Chronoscope range.  I found them in December while off marking Actuarial exams in Santa Monica CA, at Aero Hobbies and Games.  It's a great little shop and I enjoyed my poke around.

So let's look at what an Antihero is, and no it is not the opposite of a hero so the semi-obvious choices of villain and heroine are out.  An Antihero is a character who is cast in the main role and sometimes acts as the villain, but who lacks heroic attributes.  Clint Eastwood's "Man With No Name" and Harry Flashman are prototypical antiheroes.

So why Socrates - in some ways I dunno really it just came to me.  But let's follow this through, is Socrates the obvious choice of hero.  Well, actually he's mostly portrayed as a old codger who asks a lot of probing questions.  Depending on who you read he could also be considered vain, curmudgeonly and having atrocious personal hygiene (think Oscar from the Odd Couple).  He doesn't fit the traditional heroic model, but I figure that he can be placed in a hero's role for two reasons.

• He fought in the Athenian Phalanx in at least three actions Potidaea, Amphipolis and Delium.  If you're up on your Thucydides, the first was an Athenian victory but the others were big defeats.  He also apparently saved Alcibiades' life at Potidaea (OK maybe that's not a plus as an Athenian). My first ancients army was ancient Greeks and the idea of the citizen Hoplite was part of the appeal.  And yes this is the one army where citizen soldiers actually meant people you study in history class!
• For being put on trial and executed for ...well basically for being a crotchety old fart who questioned Athenian politics and morality.  But the official charges were impiety and corrupting the youth!  According to his pupils Plato and Xenophon (yes the Anabasis guy), he did have the option to escape but refused and drank the hemlock instead.

Oh yeah, and he played a darn critical role in the history of Philosophy but I am not qualified to comment there.  Instead I refer the reader to the following education video by some prominent philosophy scholars.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_WRFJwGsbY

Enough historical babble, let's deal with the figure.  The reaper figure was cleanly cast, is on the large 28mm side and was nice to paint.  I opted for basic colours without much ornamentation on the clothing, as I figured that Socrates was a pretty basic guy clothes wise, but tried to bring out details with shading, washes and highlights.  There is a lot of layered folds in the clothing, arising from a clock over top of a tunic which took some figuring out.  I was amused that I actually got to use my "Linen" colour to paint his linen tunic and the "Parchment" tube to paint the parchment scroll.

I liked the base to the figure - it's a slotta type base with a circular well that extends almost out to the edge of the base.  I filled the well with white craft glue and a mix of kitty litter, sand and model railway ballast to give some ground textures.