TomF - ACW Confederate Infantry - A Flocking Situation

I have enjoyed following the Analogue Hobby Challenge for 5 or 6 years now, always in awe of the productivity and artistic talent of the participants. Three years ago I made an anemic attempt at participating in the annual challenge myself.

When Curt posted the opportunity to participate in this challenge, I decided to sign up in order, in part, to thank all the participants of the annual challenge and hopefully contribute to providing a means of distraction from the depressing news of the pandemic.

For my first post, I have eight American Civil War confederate infantry (Perry Miniatures - plastic).  I painted these in mid-March for a game of Sharpe Practice that, unfortunately, was cancelled once my University colleagues and I were told we had convert all of our face-to-face courses to an online format.

While these figures were painted pre-challenge, they sat on my painting table without flock/vegetation since I had to cancel the game they were to participate in.  As far as the painting of these figures go, I used a gray primer then applied a black wash followed by several rounds of dry brushing with lighter shades of gray.  Quick and easy ... the Perry plastics really lend themselves to this technique.

Over the past weekend, I put static grass and other vegetation on the bases.

Below is a picture of the 28mm ACW figures that I have painted over the last couple of years.  As you can see, I have a bad habit of not finishing the basing of painted figures.

Given how well the 8 figures featured in this post turned out, I may be inspired to finish basing the rest of them over the next month or so.

But up next, I have a batch of AWI figures that I'm hoping to finish painting by the end of the week to share with you.

Thanks for viewing.

Introducing Myself - SimonG

While the circumstances might be extreme I'm glad to have a chance to join you all for the first time in a painting challenges having followed Challenge X with great interest for the past several months.

I am a returnee to the hobby after a 40 year break. Back in the late 70s and early 80s I was a teenaged member of the York Wargames Society and fielded an extensive LoTR army based around Minifigs D&D figures predominantly. I still recall fondly my massed ranks of pig faced orcs all painted in vibrant shades of enamel blue!

Wind forward the clock and now mostly retired and with time on my hands my wife encouraged me to find something new to do so here I am again!

Casting around for an area to focus I settled on the Hundred Years War, and most specifically the period around the emergence of La Pucelle d'Orleans with 28mm miniatures primarily from Perry (plastic and metal) with some Front Rank. Over the past three months I've worked through a French army all mounted on Impetus bases and am coming to the end of that before moving to the English.

Here's the last piece I worked on before the challenge -- a stand of Knights led by Jacques de Chabannes, Lord of La Palice -- home designed and laser printed banners and hand painted Tabard (don't look too closely 😆)

Funny thing is I've been putting off doing the mounted figures as I was worrying about painting horses -- turns out I actually love doing them -- they're so characterful and varied and I now find myself clipping pictures of different horses to act as references whenever I find them, the dark horse with the standard bearer is actually based off a Brooke rescue working horse on a calendar attached to our Fridge!

Anyway my first Challenge proper job is a stand of French crossbowmen using older Perry sculpts from Wargames Foundry. At first glance these are pretty unprepossessing with plenty of flash and mould lines. Thank god for MitreFast for attaching the separate crossbows and hands! Also my first time with adding bow strings which turned out to be fun.

But once you get the undercoat on they're actually really characterful (some great 'taches) and with lots of detail so should paint up nicely!

Going forward I apologise in advance for a lack of period variety but I can promise civilians, donkeys, carts, lots of archers and maybe some scenery