After a couple of recent Napoleonic games to try and build interest in General d'Armee at my club, I decided to paint a new French battalion. There was a time when I use to enjoy painting French infantry battalions but that was when I was painting little 12 man units in 20mm. I'm not so keen on them now because 28mm battalions take a lot longer to complete because of the level of detail required.
The thing is though... they look great when they're done. For my most recent battalions I've been including a mounted chef de battalion and that just makes them look even nicer. It really adds to the overall look.
Normally for the French id give the figures a dark wash and follow that with extra coats of very thin white. I gives a very nice effect but it also takes more time. With these guys I opted for flat paints with a flesh wash for the skin areas. I'm happy with them.
The figures are mainly Perry plastics. Both officers and the eagle guard are metal as too are the two last voltigeurs. They were leger flankers but I sculpted new coat cuffs for them because I was short a couple of plastic voltigeurs.
Anyway, this is just a quick post. I have to cook dinner so I have to leave and get the salad made before cooking up some sizzling porterhouse steaks.
Goodbye.
I agree, the French can be a pain to paint, but they always do look great once completed (mind you, I don't know which is worse, the British have so much white (lace and cross belts) that I often think the French are easier!)
ReplyDeleteYour Perry examples here are a fine example - nice work indeed. I too have a number of battalions where a mounted officer has been added for some variety - I think I started doing it one time I inherited a batch of Front Rank figures and there were not quite enough to make 8 battalions, but there were a few mounted infantry officers in the mix, and they were used to make up the numbers, so to speak. Necessity being the mother of invention, and all that, I actually really liked the results!
I've not painted many British Napoleonic's. One of the main reason being because I hated painting with over red for all that lace. I did a few for the War of 1812 but that's about it. I'm going to do a regiment of dragoons next and them move on to more Prussian stuff (nice and easy).
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