From PeterD Anglo-Dutch Wars Dutch Ships

I had these painted up a week ago and planned to post this soon after my English squadron but you know how it goes....

With COVID19 my university lectures got moved to Zoom lectures which took a lot more time planning than my normal stand in front os white board blather on and do examples lectures.  Maybe it's not such a bad thing long term, but my oldometer may be limiting my ability to learn new tricks.  Lectures are now over but I've got two take home final exams to prep a bunch of term projects to mark.  

I've got the following ships ready for posting.  And we will sail on to the sea of Arcania and the Five (yes FIVE) Admiralties that co-existed in  the Dutch Republic until 1795 (when they lost their fleet to French Hussards).  I expect that our Dutch friends will be watching for my inevitable mistakes as I navigate these shoals.

Leading the squadron is the Speigel from the Admiralty of Amsterdam.  She was built in 1663 carried 70 guns and was DeRuyter's flagship for the squadron that DeRuyter took to West Africa and North America just before the start of the Second Dutch War.  She was in thick of the fighting on the first two days of he Four Days' Battle and got sent home in a badly damaged state after the second day. I've given her a (probably) anachronistic triple-X Amsterdam flag at her mainmast.

Next in line is the Noorderkwartier from the Admiralty of the Noorderkwartier (North Quarter) aka the Admiralty of West Friesland based in Hoorn.  She carried 60 guns and was brand new when she served as part of the squadron that DeRuyter took to West Africa and America.   She fought in the Second and Third Wars.  I've given her a West Friesland flag (blue with lions) at her mainmast.

Last we hav two ketches (I think these would be hoeckers in Dutch) Zwolle and Goede Hoop from the Admiralty of the Maas (Rotterdam).  The Goede Hoop was made into a fireship.

The ships are once again Tumbling Die 1/2400 and very nice when assembled.

There was a fair bit of rivalry between the various Admiralties and Dutch fleets tended to have scads of "flag offices" as each Admiralty wanted to make sure that their men got roles.  And of course, the actual squadrons were made up of ships from several Admiralties not serrated into regional fleets.  Quite apart from his tactical brilliance, DeRuyter's other major plus was that he was so well respected that all the factions shut up and listened to him. 

You can see the variety of flags used in the stern view.  I have to touch up some around the edges with finalize black marker.

I've played a little fast and loose on the flags.  The 5 admiralties typically used combinations of the Princes' flag (sideways tricolour) and Triple Princes flag (same thing only  3 times as many stripes) as ensign and jack.  I'm substituting regional flags for each of the five admiralties, some which probably weren't used in the seventeenth century.

From MikeV: Another week, another knight

I've taken a liking to these mounted Men at Arms. Admittedly, I'm not churning them out at anything more than a snail's pace but I guess the reason is there for all to see. As usual, the figure is from Front Rank's excellent Hundred Years War 28mm range.  The pictures have been taken with a low exposure setting on purpose as the caparison detailing seemed to come out better this way, so I apologise if certain other parts of the figure are a bit darker than would normally be expected.

I have to say I really enjoyed painting this figure but painting the rampant lions on the right (dexter) side of the figure was a pain in the beginning as they are essentially mirror images of the ones on the left which were the first ones to be painted.  Once I got the hang of it, it was fine though.

I am cross posting this one on the The Analogue Hobbies Quarantine Challenge.

Hope you like it and take care y'all.

From GregB: More 10mm Bavarians for FPW

More 10mm Bavarians, ready to invade France in some Franco-Prussian War action. Castings from Pendraken.

Yet more 10mm Franco-Prussian war figures coming off of the painting desk this past weekend.  Here are five bases of Bavarian infantry - the castings are all from Pendraken. Not much to say beyond repeating what I have said before - 10mm is great, and Pendraken provides the best 10mm stuff I have come across.

This basing can work for a number of rule systems, but I intend to use them for "1871".

In the basic "1871" rules, each base would be a battalion.  So this would represent a reinforced regiment.

I love the bright cornflower blue of the Bavarian uniforms from this period.

Happily Pendraken also sell flags...it's a one-stop shop!

There are four bases of regular infantry, and one base of Jagers.  The Pendraken castings are all outstanding, but I was particularly blown away from the Jagers, which somehow managed to have the marksmanship cords and plume on the helmets on 10mm castings. My brush skills were not the strongest in terms of picking out those details, but wow - just great stuff.

As with all of my recent 10mm FPW work, these figures are part of the build up to do the Battle of Wissembourg.  A division of Bavarians took part in that engagement, and with this lot completed I have now finished painting the initial Bavarian contingent in the OOB for that scenario.

Attempted close-up on the Jagers.

Tremendous sculpts from Pendraken.

The French are already completed, and now that the Bavarians are finished, it is time to focus on finishing the rest of the Prussian contingent for the game. That will involve another eight batteries of artillery, a few more command bases, and another 12 or so infantry bases.  This will take some time to finish, particularly as I still get distracted by other projects and scales, but the Quarantine Challenge is helping me to focus, that's for sure!

Bavarian division massed on my shelf, awaiting the order to move out!

Thanks for looking everyone - I hope you are safe and healthy, wherever you are.

GregB

From MattT: Slow trickle of volunteers, VBCW

Not much progress to report this week. I did manage to muster a few more recruits to bolster my workers militia. Usual mix of manufacturers.

The group shot is starting to look more like a mob you wouldnt want to mess with. Cant wait for their first outing on the table. Hopefully it will be soon enough and that they dont disintegrate at the first sound of gunfire.

Stay safe Matt

From ClarenceH: Kosha 1885

Ok, it's not painted models, but I spent last weekend developing the map for my fictional campaign...

It's based on a treasure trove of very real survey maps at 1:250,000 scale of the Sudan tucked away on the Library of Congress website. If you're into this period and unaware of these, head over there now to take a look. There are hundreds of maps covering all of Egypt and the Sudan. Most have three versions filed in different years with the oldest being 1911.

More details on my blog.

I'm still working out the kinks in my painting scheme for the Cameron Highlanders, but I'll have more models up soon.

From TeemuL: Cavalry Charge! (92 points)

Now I return to my last post on Challenge X, where I posted my first ever Napoleonics. I have now finished the whole Italeri box of 20mm Prussian Cavalry. From Italeri web site:

"On October 16th, 1813, general Yorck led his Prussian Dragoons in a desperate charge against the positions defended by Marshal Marmont's French troops during the assault of Mockern, a village near Leipzig. It's one of the main phases of the famous “battle of the nations” that radically changed the alliances and boundaries in Napoleonic Europe. The Prussian light horsemen are represented with their headgear protected by oilcloth, as customarily worn during military campaigns"

Most of the horses are running, some walking. I didn't mix them on the bases, and it might not look nice, if mixed in a unit.

I painted them by paying attention to the painting guide on the box, black boots and hat, grey trousers and bright blue jacket with white gloves, belts etc. I have no idea if they are historically accurate or not or do they represent some real unit or not. The flag has yellow borders and something blue on the white field.

I started the basing, but after finishing the three small bases I run out of the stuff and had to change to different one for the big base.

There are five different types of horses and riders (plus command), so I used three different colors on horses to create some variety.

Close up of the small flag and horn blower

I have a bit mixed feeling on these. They are superbly quick and easy to paint compared to current GW range for example and they are very cheap (17 mounted figures for less than 10 euros). But I still might want even smaller miniatures to create even bigger forces and battles. So even though these are painted to tabletop level, they might end up spending rest of their lives in cabinet. Anyway, I guess I'll buy some more Prussian Cavalry in this scale in the future, just to create a bigger force (and have separate units for walking and running horses).

One of the horses charged very fast and dropped a rider. Or did he took a bullet? Vacuum cleaning might be related to disappearance as well...

12 mounted 20mm is 96 points, but since one of the riders is missing, the total is 92 points. These are Fresh miniatures bought this year and they Reinforce (and complete, for now) my Prussian "army", which I started at the end of Challenge X.

U: 0 (total 3)
N: 0 (total 1)
W: 0 (total 1)

N: 12 (total 12)

R: 12 (total 12)
Points:
92 points for miniatures (total 142)

From Minion Teemu:
I'm sorry to hear about your vacuum accident and problems with basing material, but the bright blue colors should cheer you up!

From SanderS: Leia calling for EVAC by Balloon! (70 points)

Hoi,

Well I said it before and I will say it again: I am going to try to finish the Challenge Island Tour from the last Challenge and to do this I need to take a Balloon ride to Douglas' Shallows.

If you want to know what I am jabbering on about, follow this LINK to Curt's explanation of the business. As I need to enter a female figure to appease the Goddess of Airtravel, in the only air-service still operating now, I just had to paint Princess Leia.  The figure is horrible and I wasn't able to get her face as well as I'd like but I am happy with the overall appearance of both her and Luke Skywalker and Heinrich Solo.

My client wants all his figures fitted out for Tatooine and thus I had to find a different camo scheme for Han's Endor coat, well that turned out to be a German WW2 like Wüste-tarnung, hence the "Heinrich" Solo.

They are facing off against what must be my favourite Imperial troops: the new and shiny Shore Troopers. 

The Shore Troopers have squad markings on their right upper sleeve/ armour. I have painted my clients Scout squad as Shore troopers already and they have all red upper-arm pads, so I now wanted to use something else this on these to differentiate. At first I used red over yellow bands. In walks Arthur (my eldest son) and goes: Dad, are there Germans in Star Wars as well? Because the sleeve directly beneath the coloured markings was near black and so a German flag was showing on the right arm. Well that was quickly turned into light green.

The terrain is made with my very own 3D printer (Ender 3 pro) using a free STL from Thingiverse. I tried out the kitchen towel-whiteglu-water mixture thing to get the tarpaulins, they add that nice extra bit of colour and mystery to the scenery: who put them over the parts? Why? And will they come back for the parts?

Anyway 10 figures in 40mm should net me 70 points. Even though these figures will leave my home soon for their original owner I am very happy with how they turned out.