I was going great guns with my latest British peninsula regiment but last night I discovered my 2 pots of coat d'arms medium and light grey have solidified and are now useless. V odd as none of the others are affected and the tops were on etc. Yet another thing on the shopping list for the forthcoming Colours show.

I am doing all sorts of different things at one time at the moment. Making more plant bases for my Darkest Africa project, painting two ladies, a gunbearer and a scout again for Darkest Africa, rebasing and touching up some Foundry Late Romans I have. Busy busy busy...

Today I have been mostly cleaning up umpteen 28mm Summerians, about 6 x16 man pike blocks, 6 x 5 man auxilia groups, 4 battlecars and a straddlecar plus assorted officers, standard wavers and a man with a horn. Tomorrow I undercoat them. Next weekend I repeat the exercise.

yesterday I finished off some musketeer Miniatures arabs, Artizan moors and Black Tree muslims - 44 pairs of eyes, face and hands in fact :dizzy: Today I have to do the same with 28 Perries Muslims and thought I was about done with the infantry but got another 30 Atrizan in the post this wekk as they are so lovely (along with 6 of those arab irreg WW1 cavalry :wave: )

550+ metal castings that arrived today. Very pleased with the castings. All Spanish, in circa 1780 uniform + a sculpt wearing 'Corra de Pluma', I made this figure specifically for my friend. They are all now bagged and put away until mid 2010 when they will re-appear on the paintbench. Not sure whether this will be my last mould! Now back to those 1770's Austrian cuirassier officers and staff. After these I will be preparing an 8 figure unit of Spanish Carabiniers which served in New Orleans region. John

John Your last mould – ever? 1:1 house painting going ok – hardly interesting though. Finished off the Mahdist painting (for now) – two last figures… Basing going well, if slowly – should finish by end Sept if not sooner. Took me ages to work out the colours to get the look I was after. I have some more castings in stock for the future. Hope to also finish off my small contingent of British over next couple of months to draw this project to a close at least for now.

I'm giving the ECW a short rest to crack on with the AWI Brits that I've been meaning to do for ages (2 foot regiments with interesting backpack motifs) and some more Isabelinos for the First Carlist War. Valleyboy has tweaked my interest in the First Crusade as well, so I've bought some sample Perry figures to play around with. I'm aiming to squeeze in a few Iroquois too over the next month or so. Timmo, please tell us more about your basing colours for the Sudan stuff..

Timmo, I have a lead mountain higher than most! sufficient to replace the collection already painted! The castings I require to complete the Austrians and Spanish both infantry and cavalry are now in stock. When these are painted I doubt I will need any more armies. I will then concentrate on sculpting one-off figures, participating in the New Spain campaign and complete another hobby related project. John

Giles Sudan basing colours… my research was based on your friends Legitarius' blog, picture libraries, the recent Four Feathers movie and my girlfriends own images of the area when she lived in North Africa (PhD research). Like any area really ground colour varies so as I always do: I pretend I'm making a film and work with the notion of if it looks right (even though it might not be) than that's fine for me. For example my rocks are much lighter than I think they really should be but I like them like that. I really didn't want the bases to look like the beach at Swanage etc and wanted a dry desolate look. I'd read a report of an attack of the Beja being 'wraith like' so the whole way through the Sudan project I've painted them with very minimal muted hues and tones and quite dark. I think I only use about 6 different paints on them so I wanted to maintain this with minimal very hot, dry and dusty looking bases that contrast well making the figures look even darker and more menacing. Not sure if I've managed that as they are still just toy soldiers! Anyway that's the idea, the realisation: As I base on steel I use oil not water based paint for fear of rust. It also means I don't need to bother protecting the base with varnish as I think the Humbrol enamel is hard enough wearing and of course it dries very matt. Once the figures are stuck down bases are built up with filler and covered in fine grit and very small rocks from realistic Modeling. Then I mix two Humbrol colours, white and M94 brown yellow. I mix this very pale to a sort of taupe colour and with lots and lots of thinners I flood this over the bases. The thinner helps the grit sock up the paint so you don't really have to paint every last bit of base as it capillaries through the grit soaking and colouring as it goes. A lighter version of this mix is dry brushed over but not too contrasty as I want the figures not the base to be the centre of focus. All that took about 10 hours to discover. And seemed a waste of energy at the time but it proved to be worthwhile. I suspect I'll look as the possibility of adding some scruby stuff from ripped up horsehair or similar - but I've yet to see if it looks convincing or not. I've also done a rub of Beja and riflemen hiding behind rocks that I made from foam and filler. This way I seriously cut down on the number of castings needed for my small force. Thus far, nine units for TDLIUE – as I'm aiming it as a skirmish kind of game and might adapt some Peter Pig Sudan patrols scenarios. I've played some biggish games with my card armies so had an idea of how long a game might take and what space was needed. Sorry I went on a bit…

Back to 10mm Celts :( hopefully when all my current ebay auctions finish I will be able to buy something else probably 10mm WW2 poles and some more 28mm Russians.

I am back to painting after not doing it for well over a year. Fielding a Byzantine Army

Saxons.

Tomorrow I hope to finish the last 2 figures for my first 26 Austrian Cuirassier regiment. One of my previous posts was incorrect, it should have been--- 'Gorra de Pluma' I think! John

Nothing tonight, very tired from day out to Germany.

Recovering bicycles?