Workbench of misfit stock figures. I can be a sucker for cheap, but appealing, commercial figure kits. There's not a figure shown that I paid more than five dollars for. Even the poor Poste Militaire/Elite French Infantryman from the Franco Prussian War, bought at a toy soldier flea market for five bucks.

The grey army is slooowly dwindling. This fella is from New Hope Design, Prussian jeager 1813. I've had this figure for at least 15 years, and finally put color on him. The casting was about as bad as his ugly mug. Still a pleasure to paint and had fun putting some weather on him.

Here's another oldie. This one is a US Cavalry Officer from the 1880's in dress uniform produced be Squadron/Rubin. Simple but attractive.

Keeping the brushes wet.

Here's a little nod to Emanuel Leutzes "Washington Crossing the Delaware". The figure was produced by Cavalier Miniatures. I picked it up several years ago off eBay for cheap. Not the sculpting standards of today, but makes for an attractive display piece. You will see more of these from me, while I try to thin the stock figure herd.

Le Cimier's Napoleon

Last post for 2013. I round it off with a kit I've always wanted to paint, Le Cimier's Napoleon. What a classic! It took years of searching and waiting for one on ebay, but well worth it. A pleasure to paint. All acrylics. Happy New Year!

The Bishop

What a brilliant sculpture by Castle Miniatures. The piece really painted itself. Especially the face, what wonderful character! The toughest part was of course the mitre. I had to first carve, file and sand the original detail off. I then applied a coat of putty (carve, file and sand again) to give a smooth surface to paint on. Thankfully, I had some really good reference images to go by. The bust was a pleasure to paint and I hope I did it justice.

Trumpeter, Grenadier a Cheval Painted!

I painted this piece just in time for the MFCA Show. What a workout! I flung a lot of paint on this guy. I hope I did the figure justice. It is now proudly displayed in my cabinet.

Trumpeter, Grenadier a Cheval, 1805

Another monster finds it's way on to my bench! This figure I've admired for some time. Mike Blank did a wonderful job posing and sculpting this fella. The scale is 120mm and is a massive chunk of resin. I had to do some surface filling...More than I cared to do. I made my own cords using Duro (green stuff) because the cords supplied were too stiff, and I don't have the patience to heat and manipulate finiky bits. My plan is to paint it in sections, starting from top to bottom. Unfortunately, this guy will see more of the cabinet than the workbench. It's one of those projects that has to be picked at.

Carl Reid's 1st Regt., 11th N.Y. Fire Zouave 75mm

This was a monster to paint! I swear, the flag took longer to paint than the figure. The figure is from Carl Reid Sculptures and depicts a standard bearer of the 11th New York Fire Zouaves, 1861. I wasn't sure about the "super hero" pose at first, but it grew on me fast. It got me to thinking about poses in general. How else could this pose have been done, yet be interesting enough to build and paint? I couldn't think of one...Carl, simply did a wonderful job with this sculpt. The face is lean and tough looking, fitting the subject perfectly. The bare arms were screaming for tattoos, popular with the street toughs who filled the Fire Zouave ranks. I have some more work to do with the ground and mounting the piece to a base.

"Turkenlouis"

A classic Puchala figure in the queue to be painted. I bought this fella a few years ago because the subject and pose is so elegant, it's just screaming to have color. The subject I'm not familiar with, but the title is Ludwig Wilhelm I, Margrave of Baden. Anyway, he's been primed.

MMSI 2012 Auction Figure

The figure is a Hecker Goros 54mm Bavarian Officer, 1690's. Painted with acrylics. The Chicago Show is always a great time and I was more than happy to donate this piece to the club's show auction. I'm not sure what it sold for, but I hope somebody went home happy and the club made a dollar or two to help support this wonderful event.

War Photographer-Vietnam War, 1971

This bust is modeled after an image of famed Vietnam War photojournalist, Larry Burrows (1926-1971). Burrows captured many popular images of the war, from 1962 till his death. He and three fellow photographers were killed when their helicopter was shot down over Loas, covering Operation Lam Son 719 in February, 1971. The bust is a monster at 1/10 scale, and is offered through LIFE MINIATURES. I was commissioned to paint him black and white. It's painted with acrylics. I used pretty much the same palette that was used in my Airborne figure earlier this year. The construction of eyeglasses was a bit intimidating at first, but really wasn't as hard as one would think. It took a lot of "eye-balling" and checking of proportions, but a fairly quick project. I simply used clear plastic card and carefully carved out the lenses. Built up putty to make the frame and re-sculpted the hair around the ears. I hope I did this beautiful bust justice.

Capa Figure Prep and Paint

Here's one method I went about preping the figure for primer. After giving the figure a good wash and has dried, I cover/mask the area's to be glued later on, with painters tape. The tape doesn't leave any residue, but is sticky enough to hold while priming. As for paint colors, I used practically all the gray's, warm and cold tones, in my stash, including an ink and pastel.

505th PIR 82nd AIRBORNE painted!

This figure was a blast to paint. Having never painted a figure in black and white, it was really refreshing to do a subject out of my norm. I used almost every shade of grey in my stock of acrylics on this one, from drab warm greys to cold bluish tones. I'll post more pics once the dust settles on my current project. Thanks for visiting.

Up next is Historic Art Miniatures 70mm 82nd Airborne based on the image by famed photographer Robert Capa. It will be painted in black and white. Stay tuned.

More "True Grit" pics.

Here's more pics of Rooster. Attaching the reins to his mouth was much easier than planned. I replaced the thick ones supplied with strips cut from sheet tin.

It's funny how whenever I was working on this, that movie was being shown on TV. AMC played this movie a lot during the theatre release of Jeff Bridges' version... Of which, I havn't seen yet.

"Fill your hands you S.O.B.!"

Here's one of several projects finished over the winter. It's Andrea's take of John Wayne's classic film 'True Grit'.

The horse was painted in oils and the figure and gear acrylics.

Not the most enjoyable stock kit I've ever worked on. While the casting of the pieces were very nice and clean, the engineering was not very helpful when painting, particularly for the horse. The metal pins casted into the front two legs is a great idea but they leave only 1/4" from the bottom of the hoof to play with! Good luck trying to paint something that heavy and have it clamped into your vise. The remedy I had was to epoxy a length of brass rod to the pins and blue tack to the vice.

I don't model many mounted metal kits but this is something I will consider in the future.

I picked this up on ebay last month. It's a pewter 54mm figure of a Prussian Artillery Officer, 1790's, apparently sculpted by Roger Saunders. I love the pose and character of the face, it's just itching to be painted. But alas, destined to be part of the grey army or in the cabinet to admire and study.

"Attention Ladies...The Blouse Man is on the premises"

Here's the finished piece. I've added some paper cups and a discarded cardboard box. For some reason I had a hard time figuring out on what to use for a box, until Gary suggested using index card. Well, duh on my part! It worked perfect and was just the right thickness. I just so happen to know a little about boxes and their construction so it was an easy build.

I took some pics with the flash and w/out to show the contrast in the fleshtones. I also added a little more mud and splashes to her lower half. Any more would, in my opinion, take away from the overall paint job. I'm sure I'll get a yes or nay on this overal from my peers but I'm still in the camp of "less is more".

Thanks to Gary for the tips! And especially thanks to my mentor and right hand man on these off-the-wall projects. Of whom, I'm sure, have not heard the last of.

Hippie Chick-Work In Progress

Here's a new subject for me! It's EVD's Hippie girl. This chick is 90mm in scale...all white metal. Because of the large scale and weight, I had to paint this beauty in sections. It came in four pieces and each, I swear, weighed just as much as one 54mm!
The stars and stripes weren't that difficult to paint (everything acrylic) once I got into a rhythm. And the hippie radical, Abbie Hoffman on the back of her jacket, was a one shot deal and turned out better than planned. This is still a work in progress. I need to finish her belt buckle and other touch ups. The grounds of Woodstock was needless to say a messy place, so I'll add some "trash" here and there.

Sorry for the washed out look. There's much more contrast than shown. I'll try better next time. Thanks for looking anyway.

I would like to thank my benefactor and spiritual advisor on this project. It's always a fascinating and challenging trip when we work together;)

I added some tunes to the play list. So listen up, tune out and get down...errr something like that.