Military Miniatures

The wooden pole supporting the Lancer’s saddle has now been completed. The base colour of the wooden pole was Vallejo Burnt Umber diluted very thinly and applied in a number of thin coats. Then highlights were put on by dry brushing of light grey to emphasise the wood grain.

All my previous models tended to have greenish bases so I decided that this time I would make the base stonier and earthier in colour.
The Lancer’s base was given an initial grey wash made up of 50% black and 50% white. Then dry brushed coats of Burnt Umber followed by Vallejo Deep Green were applied in random areas.

To finish off, more light grey was dry brushed onto the base, but this time it was concentrated in rocky areas. As a finishing touch some static green grass was applied to the area where the pole uprights met the ground.

Now the Lancer’s saddle was glued in its final position on the pole, and the French Lancer was put on the base for the photograph.

The saddle cloth (sheepskin) has been given a number of dilute washes of white. I added a minute bit of yellow to some of the washes to give a little colour variation and to prevent the Lancer’s saddle from looking too flat. For me, Vallejo acrylics are the easiest paints to use and control). It is important to use very dilute paint otherwise the detail of the saddlecloth would be lost.
As I am painting the Lancer as a Lancer and not as a Trumpeter, the saddle cloth is white with red saw tooth trim.

The stirrups were then painted silver, the stirrup straps and the straps around the saddle were done in brown.
Finally a thin strip of lead was painted brown, glued to the right hand side of the saddle and then bent over the top of the saddle to represent the girth.

Now the saddle is resting on the pole. For reference, the undercoated French Lancer has been temporarily placed next to it.

My next project is a 54mm metal kit from Andrea, kit number S7-F25, and it is called “French Lancer 1812″. It is a mini diorama of a figure standing in front of a wooden pole which supports the Lancer’s saddle.
This model of a French Lancer comes in two options. The figure can be made either as a Lancer holding a lance in his right hand, or as a Trumpeter holding a trumpet.
At the time of writing this blog, I have decided to go for the Lancer version. Also, I will make it “straight out of the box”, that is with no changes. Once it is completed, I intend to keep it nice and clean, and have no intention to weather it or portray the figure ‘dirtied by battle’.

The uniform colours of each option in the kit are quite different, but the version I have chosen will have grey trousers with leather reinforcement, green jacket, red front and facings.

To start the model I washed all the parts in hot water, dried and undercoated them in white primer, and then carried out a ‘dry fit’ to see how well everything fitted together.

As can be seen from the picture above, the central join of the saddle is very uneven and will need a lot of filling to hide it.

Using ‘Miliput’ I filled the joint line and then, before the putty had set, carved some details into the Milliput in order to blend in the repair with the rest of the saddle.
Once the Miliput was dry the saddle was then sprayed with undercoat.

This picture above shows the saddle resting on the pole and ready for painting.

The diorama of the Spanish and French Grenadiers fighting “somewhere in the Peninsular Wars” is completed.

I made the base out of plaster and whilst the surface was still wet a knife was used to form ruts from a passing gun or ammunition wagon into the ground. The plaster was pushed around to leave a slightly uneaven and raised surface randomly on the base. These raised parts were to become rocks.
And, just as the diorama base was setting, I inserted some dyed sisal string to suggest grasses.
A minute amount of plaster was put on the boot of the Spanish Grenadier to suggest a clod of mud.

The diorama base was given a thin wash of PVA glue and then sawdust, which had been dyed a variety of greens and browns, was scattered onto the surface. Where rocks and stones were to protrude from the soil (the raised sections of the plaster mentioned earlier) I did not put any PVA. These areas were given a number of different dry brushes in tones of grey to suggest rocks.

Just past the end of the Spanish Grenadier’s sword scabbard you will see a spent cannon ball sunk into the earth.

To add further interest and variations to the diorama ground I added a number of scale leaves from oaks, maples, cherry trees etc to the ground.

In fact, if you look at the foot of the French Grenadier you can see an oak leaf stuck to the sole of his right boot!

The leaves, the rocks, wheel ruts, grasses and the cannon ball all add interest to the diorama and are well worth the small effort needed to produce them.

Both the Spanish Grenadier and the French Grenadier were drybrushed with ochre, green and brown to simulate dirt on their boots, trousers and the French Greatcoat.