Over Open Sights

Tommies marching, firing and a Vickers team.

 

 It is really sad that Footsore Miniatures seem to have permanently retired these lovely sculpts from Paul Hicks. Sometime ago they were withdrawn as the chaps from Footsore said that the moulds needed work....two years later, they still appear  on the website but are still labelled "unavailable". No doubt they are more excited and interested in pursuing  their new ranges.

These three packs (the Battalion Command pack, Command pack and the Lewis gunners) are destined for their "forever home" far away and will be based by their owner. There are three more packs to paint (Tommies advancing, Tommies firing and a Vickers team) and these will follow shortly. It is a pleasure to revisit these figures again without swapping heads! This may be the last time.......

 Half term holidays are here and that means some time away from screens and the accompanying headaches and eyestrain that go with teaching via video link. Having finished off the Berkshire Yeomanry and before returning to some commission work, I hit the lead pile and pulled out a Great War Miniatures early WW1 British Cavalry officer minus right arm, a Great War Miniatures early WW1 British Cavalry bugler that had been discarded due to a miscast rear leg on the horse and from the lowest layer of archaeological deposit, a Renegade WW1 mounted British Cavalry officer without horse. The greenstuff rectified the miscast horse's leg and a spare Footsore horse was located and appropriated. The "bits box" yielded a couple of plastic right arms (Perry, I think) and the Renegade figure had his pistol toting tight arm replaced and the GWM figure was made whole. All three were then given Woodbine Wolseley heads. A neat little job to get me back into the swing of things. Four days later and we have Brigadier Godwin, his Brigade-Major and a HQ bugler.

Currently out of production, these Paul Hicks sculpted figures are the best early WW1 kilted troops in 28mm. Footsore Miniatures tell me that they will be returning later this year.

Finished! A week to spare before the demo game at Newbury. So.... what do we have? A unit of Sharifian Regulars supported by an Irregular Arab lewis gun team (all from Brigade Games). A number of odds and sods that may be utilised as dismounted armoured car or Light Patrol car crews. These may or may not be used so I didn't spend a lot of time on these and got them done pretty quickly not really worrying about the end result as they may never make it onto the table. The exception is the Lewis team which form the first two figures of a unit of Queen's Westminster Rifles that I need to do eventually (hence they sport unit patches). Finally a small number of "Supression Markers" that are needed for the Setting The East Ablaze ruleset. These are GWM casualty figures. Done!

The one thing I have gained from this speed painting excercise over the past five or six weeks is some experience using the base coat-wash-hightlight technique. I dabbled with this about a year ago as I searched for a way to speed up painting for my own tabletop collection given that most of my time is taken up painting up commissions "properly". I am quite pleased with some of the results given the time constraints. I am less pleased with others. I have learned quite a bit using this technique. Bring on the game itself. If you are at Newbury, please pop by and say "Hello". Just look for the game being put on by "Adrian Shepherd and Friends". I wonder if Adrian has finished the Crusader Castle......?

I took some time to experiment with speeding up the painting process for my own collection of Tabletop Tommies given that I don't have a lot of time to devote to painting my own figures. I decided that I would cut cards with the Devil and have a go at a basecoat-wash-highlight technique. I have not done this before. Needless to say that this speed painting technique is NOT something I will be offering to my paying clients!

Finally, after three and a half years lurking about the "to complete" section of the painting shelf, I give you the mounted figures for the QODY project. There are some Footsore "BUF/Yeomanry" troopers in these, some British Lancer figures and the Hotchkiss gunner is a conversion from a Great War Miniatures British Cavalry trooper.