Something Different - Historical Figures

[bailey03]

For the occasional change of pace from the gaming figures I like to work on some larger scale (54mm) historical figures. Lately I've been into Napoleonic figures. Lots of colorful uniforms and details to paint. Here are two I've been working on.

The first is a Polish Lancer. For some reason I really like these guys' uniforms. This one is in campaign dress so he's weighted down with equipment. In addition to what you see here he still needs a carbine hanging off the saddle, a saber, and all the reins for the horse.


The second figure is an Officer of the Navy Guard. This one is a little less complicated but still quite fun to paint. I love his pose. He has this haughty look I think is perfect for an 1800's military officer.


Everything is done in acrylic. Mostly Reaper, but also some Vallejo, GW, and Andrea paints.

[SotonShades]

those are both stunning More like it please!

[Bigred]

OMG - those are amazing.

I would love to hear you give us few more pictures and some info on how it's painted.

Beautiful.

[bailey03]

Thanks, SotonShades and Bigred.

I think I'm limited in how many pictures I can do per post, so I may have to break up my explanations. I'm working with acrylics. Most of my paints are Reaper Master series. They're a little bit thinned down to start so they work well for glazing, layering thin coats to help blend the colors. I supplement that with some GW washes and shades, Vallejo Model Air metallics paints, and the red paint set from Andrea. Basically I just pick and choose the colors and brands that work for me. As I mentioned in the original post these are both 54mm models, so almost twice the size of the standard GW, Privateer, etc figure. As a result I've got more room to work with. I buy a lot from companies like Pegaso and Andrea. They do mostly historical but Andrea has their Warlord Sage series of 54mm fantasy figures and Dark Nova for sci-fi (in case anyone is interested). There's also the Draconia line from Ares Mythologic, there's Nocturna models, etc. It can be interesting to try out different scales no matter what your area is.

Okay, so the lancer was a big project. Lots of pieces and most of them needed to be assembled at various stages of the painting process, otherwise it was going to make accessing certain details very difficult. For holding larger figures I use a jeweler's vise (search amazon, they're pretty cheap). Great for 54mm and monstrous size 28mm scale figures, warjacks, etc. You can see the figure sitting in one below and the makeshift holder I have to keep the vise upright.


I started with the face mostly because if I screw that up I'll probably end up stripping the figure... so why waste time elsewhere? I tried to work on the reds, whites, and blues together so the shadow to highlight range worked together. I decided to use a dark purple (burgundy wine) to shade both the reds and the blues. You can see the figure start to come together in these three pictures.

In the third I decided the highlights on the blue didn't go quite far enough, they were getting washed out next to the bright white straps. So you can see I took it a few steps further.

I approached the horse much the same way. I started with the saddle so the red/white/blues would be consistent with the rider. Then moved on to the horse's skin. The horse was pretty heavy and I was worried about it falling out of the vise. So I used the saddle bags as a place to hold on to the figure and steady it as I painted. That's why I left them unpainted.

[bailey03]

Here's another Napoleonic that I finished a little while back. Again started with the face. Also did a little bit of the detail work. I was experimenting with the yellow lace. Please excuse the poor picture quality, this was with my phone.


From there I moved onto the coat and pants. For the greens I ended up using Reaper's Midnight Blue to shade, just to give it a little more visual interest than using a dark green. From there it was Highlands Moss, Pale Lichen, and then I mixed in just a little bit of Misty Grey for the final highlights.


And here's the finished figure. I added the gun, went over the metals with some GW washes. When I was priming the figure I accidentally broke off and lost the sword knot, so I had to make a new one of those. I used some instant mold and the sword from the Lancer, then filled it with green stuff. It's a one sided mold, but sculpting the rest was easy.

[bailey03]

Update on the Navy Guard figure. Decided to take on the challenge of painting his coat. It's supposed to be a dark blue, a color that has given me trouble in the past. Whenever I tried to highlight it using a lighter shade of blue my dark blue would turn into a medium blue. For this figure I really wanted it to stay a dark blue but still have enough shadow to highlight range so it didn't look flat. So, taking some advice from others, I mixed in a medium grey with my dark blue instead. This lightened up the mix while at the same time desaturating the color. I think the end result is exactly what I was going for.



I also changed the red so it's a more historically accurate shade. The lace and other details are still a work in progress.

[Vent]

Stunning work throughout the miniatures. Very detailed and great to look at!

[bailey03]

Thanks, Vent. Here's an update on two of the figures. Still working on the Navy Guard Officer.


And, aside from a few minor details, I'm just about done with the Polish Lancer

[energongoodie]

O_O

[bailey03]

I wrapped up work on the Officer of the Navy Guard. Here's how he turned out...



And since his face is a little hard to see, here's a close up