First 18 figures painted as a test in batches of 6. I'm starting these with a flat brown drybrush over the black undercoat in order to establish some depth to the skin tones and horses before building it up. Trying to capture the patches on the wild horses, the colourful use of feathers and beads as well as introducing warpaint to both man and horse. I'm sure I'll become more confident as things progress and I get more of a feel for tribal design and shield design but not a bad start I feel? I cant call these finished yet as may get further highlights to horse muscle tone etc and I think a nice satin varnish finish would also help to bring out the colours but of course this is going to be Mark's choice.
Edit: photos look a little flat on reflection so added the better quality video here which hopefully gives a better representation. I can see more highlights are required to the horses and maybe skin tones but it's early days yet.
And by way of inspiration a look at the old Peter Gilder 'Pony Wars' collection is highly recommended.
Hi Lee
ReplyDeleteI think it is very brave of you to take on a commission to paint American indians. Not only the skin tones of the indians themselves, but also the war paint. Then the colourful horses, with their own decorations. Its hard to see from the photos what they look like as individuals. But they certainly work in mass - from "wargame distance".
It is interesting that you use Peter Guilder painting method as a guide. I was fortunate to visit his wargames centre three times. I was blown away by the sight of his Napoleonic armies, particularly the personality figures I had seen in the magazines. But it was soon obvious that they were not meant to be viewed at eye level. He used an artistic style, which looked great on the table. But rather strange at eye level. This allowed him to paint large quantities of figures quite quickly.
I read your link, which I have not seen before. I did not use, or even see, his pony wars figures. But I did play his colonial wars as a break from Napoleonics. Great game with gatling guns and even a steam boat. Masses of "fuzzy wuzzies" would appear out of the sand, be mowed down by the gallant British and Indian troops, and then disappear. Only to reappear again somewhere else. Eventually the relief column would run short of ammunition and be overrun. Great fun to play, at least once. Not sure how I would feel about playing it regularly!
I will follow your project with interest.
regards
Paul
Hello Paul, it's good to hear from you. Although I never got to meet Peter Gilder or attend the Wargames Holiday Centre I was like most at that time seriously impressed by his collection of model soldiers. I know that he used a lot of painters who could paint in his specific style but was obviously a very talented painted himself and used to give demonstrations? Through this blog I have discovered that quite a lot of his early work - pre Hinchliffe - is still about in private collections. It was when he moved onto the Connoisseur range that I really got into his design and sculpting, brilliant!
DeleteAll the best,
Lee.
Great start, the splashes of colour really help the figures against all the horse flesh. I can see this being quite a pleasurable commission for you after doing so much rank and file Epic in the last job.
ReplyDeleteHello Norm. Yes. I'm enjoying myself with this commission and I hope that it will show in the results :)
DeleteTake care,
Lee
Very nice Lee. I see some of the horses have paint patterns on them. Are there any particular “rules” for that? I seem to vaguely recall some warriors would put their hands on the horse and then paint over that - to leave a negative outline of their hand. I’m not sure if tribal convention meant painting certain items was acceptable/good/virtuous whereas depicting certain other items might be taboo/unacceptable/bad luck. Anyhow, it looks like you’ve made a decent start. Keep it up - this looks like this is going to be a marathon rather than a sprint.. 😉
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Geoff
Not seen the negative vesion of the hand print - see this link for some more ideas on horse paint, includes some way down a piece explaining the meanings: https://www.notesfromthefrontier.com/post/indian-warhorse-paint
DeleteMaybe I’m just confused… 🤔🤷♂️ I know the native Americans used hand prints on their horses. I suspect I may have conflated this with early artwork by primitive man (there are many examples of “negative” hands painted on cave walls all over the world). That’s my excuse anyway 😉
DeleteGeoff/Rob. So far I'm just going by internet images. Osprey references and the PG Pony wars images. I'm leaving everything unvarnished at this stage as research continues so may add further detail as I find it! I tried a hand print but in 20mm scale it really does not work :) What I can do is something more impressionistic possibly? Horse link very useful for breed information, cheers, I'm working in batches of 6 so more variety will be added. This is a planned 10 month project so the end result should be quite impressive.
DeleteCheers,
Lee.
Great start to the project I would have suggested looking at PG’s collection for inspiration, I don’t think you could find anything better as a guide.
ReplyDeleteThanks Graham :) PG's collection is really useful.
DeleteLee.
These are turning out really well, albeit I'd probably gloss varnish them if they were mine - being smaller figures they will look less bright than PG's collection and gloss would overcome this. I would go for more lighter coloured ponies as they show up the war paint better - see 28th PG photo; I also get the impression that the PG collection features more lighter coloured ponies. If you want some inspiration try this link: https://horseyhooves.com/native-american-horse-breeds/
ReplyDeleteGreat link, thank you, I'll be trying out a few of those shades for sure. This is testing my horse painting skills as I'm so used to Napoleonics etc. Just painted some lighter horses that turned out quite well, they will feature in the next blog post.
DeleteCheers
Lee.
Oh my, you should be pleased with them as well, they look terrific as they are. I'd be well chuffed to have them!
ReplyDeleteThanks Ray, it's getting a feel for something completely new!
DeleteLee.
Hi Lee, saw your announcement on TMP re the Epic commission and just dropping a line to hope everything is okay. No need to respond to this or to publish to your blog, just sending thoughts. Kind regards Norm.
ReplyDeleteThanks Norm. I have some things going on that will impact upon my painting time so took the decision to call it a day on the Epics as it was getting quite pressurised. We are parting on good terms though and I'm doing what I can to help find Tony a painter to complete the project. This means that I can generally ease things back as I had intended to do anyway as I approach my 66th Birthday. Main thing is that I still really enjoy the painting :) Thank you for your kind thoughts.
DeleteCheers,
Lee.