Painting Progress and Partizan Preparation

Real life got a bit busy last week and hobby time was reduced, but things are looking up a bit now, and I have made a little progress painting (very) little metal men.   Having acquired a few packs of Baccus 6mm figures for the Italian 'Risorgimento'  period at Salute back in April, I've now painted the two packs of infantry - Piedmontese and Austrians. 

The Baccus infantry packs comprise 96 figures each, and I have organised them into units of 24 figures, hence 4 units from each pack. I have based them as specified by Neil Thomas in his excellent Wargaming 19th Century Europe book - that is 4 bases per unit, each base 20mm by 30mm, with two bases representing the 'main body' of the unit and the other two bases the 'skirmish line' which would be out at the front doing the shooting.  

Four units 1859 Austrian Infantry

 

Painting was quite easy, more or less following the guide provided on the Baccus website - 'keep it simple, stupid' is definitely the way forward and suits me fine!  

Photographing them is a bit fiendish, though - being so small you have to get quite close, and then every tiny blemish shows up!  But but they will never be so closely scrutinised on the table, nor are they meant to be.. There is an interesting effect where the (still drying) PVA glue on the bases has picked-up the light, making it look like there are bits of white material scattered across them. Admittedly I was in a bit of a hurry to get on with this blog post!   

I've given them  my usual 'old school' plain green bases for now, keeping it simple again, though I admit I wonder if the small scale of the figures means that the thickness of the figure bases makes them look a bit pronounced - rather as if  each figure is  standing on a 12-inch high step!  Step forward Baccus again, with a basing guide on their website which I am giving some consideration to. So maybe these units are not quite finished yet..  Many thanks to Chris aka Nundanket of Horse and Musket Gaming fame for pointing me towards these useful guides, and you can see lots of his nicely-painted 6mm figures on his blog - albeit I think he prefers Heroics and Ros figures! 

and opposing Piedmontese ( 1 pack of 96 figures )

 

Another thing these troops still need is some nice flags - yet again Chris nudged me in the right direciton by pointing out that Baccus will happily sell me pre-printed flags. I wasn't looking forward to trying to paint flags in 6mm scale as yet, so that looks a good idea - they seem to be a bit over £2 for 24 flags, which is enough for an entire table-top army of infantry, I'm sure! So plenty of scope for expansion.. 

 Quite conveniently I see that I should be able to acquire some of those flags in only a few days time, as I am aiming to visit The Other Partizan  wargames show at Newark on Sunday -  and Baccus will be there, looking to sell stuff..  So hopefully that's a win-win, and a massive £4 sale for them..

I'm looking forward to the show, just having a quick scan of the promised games there are lots of interesting ones - Anschluss Wargames 'Small Town in Italy' WW2 in 10mm, for example;  The Bodkins  28mm Seven Years War game 'Prussian Glory' ; Chesterfield Old Boys   28mm War of Spanish Succession ;    The Hustle Club  20mm Italian/Greek war 1941;  League of Extraordinary Kriegspielers 28mm  Lutzen, 1632;   Northants Battlefields Society 'Edgecote Made Easy' ( billed as ECW, so a slight time-shift? ) ; and Simon 'To the Strongest' Miller's venture into the Spanish Succession aka Louis Quatorze's Warses.   Plus several  D-Day/Normandy  related games, and a Market Garden  one, all highly appropriate for this anniversary year.  'And many, many more..'  Plus  of course,  many traders - I may be in the market for some scenery to suit Italy, 1943/44,  some more 6mm 1859 figures,  and  Alexander and Darius for my somewhat neglected 20mm DBA Macedonians and  Persians, perhaps?  Plus the inevitable impulse buys - there's always a tempting book or two! 

Anyone else going? Or is that a daft question?!  I'd be happy to chat with anyone who reads/follows/comments on this blog. it would be great to  put some more faces to names..  I've borrowed the floorplan (above)  from the Partizan website (hopefully they won't mind as I am giving them a free plug!) - I reckon the space just inside and to the left of the main entrance might be a good spot. So I may just lurk about there, (sort of between Empress Miniatures and Colonel Bill's/Last Valley stands), at about 1pm, if you'd like to say hello ( and if  no-one  turns up  I will  look like a proper Charlie!).  

Finally a quick pic - one of the things that happened last week was a visit to that London for  HMS Belfast,  which was a bit of a bonus having become an IWM member for recent visits to Duxford. I last set foot aboard the Belfast as a kid in about 1973.. and it was rather good! Maybe I will devote a post to it sometime soon. Meanwhile a taster: 

Right, where's that Partizan shopping list? And have I got some flock for those 6mm bases? If you are going along on Sunday, it'd be great to chat, if not then I'll try to take a few photos and post here. In the meantime keep well, everyone.