Wednesday, October 25, 2006
ACW Project: The First Confederate Brigade
(Click image to see larger version in a new window)
As promised, here's the first complete Confederate brigade consisting of 252 figures. Actually, if looked at from the point-of-view of individual castings, then it's only 42 (the horse and rider are separate castings), but that doesn't sound as impressive, does it.
It's rather hard to get a decent picture of the entire brigade deployed in a single line as it's too long so I decided to go with two lines. Even doing that requires pulling back quite a ways so a lot of detail is lost (the figures look much nicer in person, if I do say so myself.) It does make me think twice about the so-called "three foot rule" that's defined as painting the detail on the figures that can only be seen from three feet away. I may try painting a strip or two to that standard and see how they compare to what I've been doing so far. If the figures with less painted detail don't look that much different, I may start to skip things like canteen straps, cartridge box belts and the like. (I could probably knock out a brigade in a couple evenings in that case!)
Still haven't made up my mind about posting pics of the Viking figures, but there's no time to do anything about that now as it's nearly 4:30 AM and I really should try to get some sleep.
Until next time...
# posted by Patrick Lewis @ Wednesday, October 25, 2006 
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Patrick,
Your confederate brigade looks really impressive. Nice work! I've never painted anything smaller than 15mm figures. What is the the best thing about painting 10mm? And the most trying? Anyway, I can't wait to view more of your work.
Enjoy the day,
Stokes Schwartz
Your confederate brigade looks really impressive. Nice work! I've never painted anything smaller than 15mm figures. What is the the best thing about painting 10mm? And the most trying? Anyway, I can't wait to view more of your work.
Enjoy the day,
Stokes Schwartz
Thanks, Stokes!
The best thing and the most trying thing about painting 10mm figures...Hmmm...good questions.
I think the best thing about painting these Old Glory figures is that the infantry are cast in a strip. True, this isn't as flexible as individual figures when it comes to basing, but it sure is a lot easier to deal with one casting with 5 figures on it instead of 5 individual castings. (Its amazing how much time can be spent just handling the figures and how fiddly that can be.)
Painting a strip of figures is pretty simple, too. I can take a fairly large brush and paint uniform coats by just making an initial fast pass across the whole strip and then spread out the paint and not worry too much about covering detail. (This is particularly true when painting the Union ACW figures.)
The most challenging thing is probably painting the detail on an individual figure on the strip without accidently getting paint in the wrong spot on an adjacent figure, but this is something that happens less frequently once you get used to it.
Related to this, too, is figuring out the sequence in which things are going to be painted. For instance, with the ACW figures I started out painting the hats before I finished painting the muskets and I often found that when I finally did paint the muskets, I would occasionally get some of the musket color on the hat as these two items are often joined. Once I started painting the muskets first and then the hats, this happened far less often. (I'm sure there are other things like this I've figured out through experience.)
Thanks for the questions, Stokes, as it's interesting for me to reflect on things like that (but it may bore others to tears!.)
Patrick
The best thing and the most trying thing about painting 10mm figures...Hmmm...good questions.
I think the best thing about painting these Old Glory figures is that the infantry are cast in a strip. True, this isn't as flexible as individual figures when it comes to basing, but it sure is a lot easier to deal with one casting with 5 figures on it instead of 5 individual castings. (Its amazing how much time can be spent just handling the figures and how fiddly that can be.)
Painting a strip of figures is pretty simple, too. I can take a fairly large brush and paint uniform coats by just making an initial fast pass across the whole strip and then spread out the paint and not worry too much about covering detail. (This is particularly true when painting the Union ACW figures.)
The most challenging thing is probably painting the detail on an individual figure on the strip without accidently getting paint in the wrong spot on an adjacent figure, but this is something that happens less frequently once you get used to it.
Related to this, too, is figuring out the sequence in which things are going to be painted. For instance, with the ACW figures I started out painting the hats before I finished painting the muskets and I often found that when I finally did paint the muskets, I would occasionally get some of the musket color on the hat as these two items are often joined. Once I started painting the muskets first and then the hats, this happened far less often. (I'm sure there are other things like this I've figured out through experience.)
Thanks for the questions, Stokes, as it's interesting for me to reflect on things like that (but it may bore others to tears!.)
Patrick
I'm way late, but Jeff Hudelson pointed me at your blog to find pictures of 10mm ACW, as I've just acquired a set of them and am trying to figure out what to do with them. Would love to see more of them!
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