Showing posts with label Cafe Storme. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cafe Storme. Show all posts

Friday 15 September 2023

Irish Warband

 Irish sea raiders were pillaging the coast of Saxon Britain long before the Vikings arrived, they later opposed the Viking incursions into Ireland and continued fighting alongside anyone who would pay them until well after the Normans appeared on the scene.  So a useful addition to any Dark Ages collection, sadly nobody ever made 54mm toys soldiers depicting Kerns or Gallowglass, so I gave them my own twist:

In the centre is a modern metal figure of an Irish Chieftain made by Del Prado, he needed a warband to follow him and that kickstarted this little project.  Irish warriors are depicted wearing predominantly ochre cloth (wool dyed with urine) so I used this colour liberally to pull the figures together as a unit.

They also used a hotchpotch of  weaponry and armour, when they had them, so this allows considerable licence when selecting figures and converting them, the chap centre front is throwing a dart, a uniquely Irish weapon of the period.

Wealthier warriors and sub-chieftains were better armed and armoured than the hoi-polloi so I've included a few of these.  They won't win any prizes for historical accuracy but were fun to paint and being of Irish heritage myself I have a certain fondness for them.

Sunday 20 August 2023

The perennial problem of basing. It's boring I know!

I collect old toy soldiers, I wargame with 54mm toy soldiers, and I have got too much stuff.  Like everyone else I have too many collections, too many projects on the go and to be perfectly honest it's all become a bit of a mess.....actually it's a lot of a mess.

To impose some semblance of order on the wargame bit I plan to review what I've already got then for each period create initial core armies of 100 foot, 20 mounted and 2 guns.  These numbers were suggested by H G Wells as sufficient for a game, and this seems eminently sensible to me, when I reach the required numbers I will stop and move on to something else.  That's the plan, in so much as there is a plan.  Anyway it's the only plan I've got so with this in mind I broke out my Celts:

Here is the current foot contingent........and already we have a problem.  

I have sufficient toy soldiers to make up the requisite number of foot, the mounted are based, undercoated and awaiting paint, there are also enough bits waiting to be assembled into 2 war chariots. The figures hail from a number of manufacturers including Italieri, HaT, Cafe Storme and Expeditionary Force.

I started this project by painting up units of foot, then got bored and moved on to something else.  Then several superbly made units came up for sale and I couldn't resist the opportunity to jump start the project again.  The problem is integrating my existing figures on the smaller bright green bases above with the new acquisitions on larger flocked bases.

I always base my toy soldiers individually.  Here my old ones are on 2p coins while the new acquisitions are on flocked poker chips, so there is a noticeable size difference.  I don't get worked up about frontages and larger bases are fine for irregular troops but I do care about the overall appearance and want them all to look roughly similar as this pulls them together visually as a unit, also the new ones look like they are running across someone's carpet!

So what to do about this?  I don't think the new additions will give up their poker chips easily but I could probably scrape some of the plush flock back, at the same time fixing the older figures to washers which would give them a similar base size.  have I just answered my own question or can you think of a better solution?  All suggestions gratefully received.

Saturday 20 May 2023

Plastic Warrior 2023 - Conversions

 Apart from collecting old toy soldiers and gaming I also like to convert and paint figures, sadly I don't get enough time for this part of the hobby but it gives me a great appreciation for the work of other people.  Here are some I picked up at the show which will be gracing the games on my table at some point in the future.

These British cavalry and the German infantry below are the work of Eric Kemp, owner of Helmet Models and well known converter of plastic figures.  The riders are made from Armies in Plastic mounted of horses from various makers, they will form a reconnaissance unit, shame there were only three, if there had been more I'd have bought the lot.

Not sure what part these will play but it never hurts to have the odd vignette for table dressing and I just couldn't resist this pair, the dog and motorcycle are metal castings.

Eric's painting style is very distinctive, especially the faces, I've picked up some of his figures before and you can tell it's his work the moment you see them.  I bought a dozen of these, enough for a Sturmer unit, the kneeling officer is a metal casting.

Another modeller with a very distinctive style is Vince Mattocks, who made these knights from the Hundred Years War, again I'm a great fan of his work and pick them up whenever I can. 

The donor figures will be easily identified by most collectors and have had only minor changes but enough to give them a unique character of their own.  

Vince is very knowledgeable of this period, all the coats of arms and liveries are accurate, which saves me an awful lot of work.  Helpfully he also writes the name of the knight portrayed under the base and signs it.

I don't know who made these, the Roman sling thrower was made in Russia (but I can't remember who by) and isn't a conversion but I might use him as a pattern to make some more, the mounted Roman can take command of a Legion I've been working on and the French standard bearer will join the ranks of the 7 Years War collection.

Peter Bergner came over from Germany with a box full of these Cafe Storme figures, beautiful sculpts by military artist Eugene Leliepvre, they were oddments and damaged, so came cheap as chips and just what I wanted for a number of conversion I have in mind.

That's all for this year.