Jingle Bells, jingle bells!

Ho ho ho hooooooooooooooooooo (again)

Just my version of Christmas Jingle balls:

Merry Christmas, Sander

Listening t the Top 2000 on the radio

Indian Winter?

Hello everyone!

While the snow is falling outside, yet again, I bring you pictures of some troops from warmer climates. Wellington's Sepoys recreated and produced in white metal by mr Uwe Wild and friends:

Cheers Sander,

Listening to "Christmas with Bert and Ernie"

Ho ho hooooooo!

Hello people,

It's greenies all round today. I've finished more of the little green menaces which have been lurking on my shelves for ages now.

So here we go:

                                              First off is my shaman Gurkslub, front and back

I don't know where his name came from it just happened on me, just like the notion that some of the ribs he carries on his person should be chilli peppers... Gobblifornication...urgh yuk! Never mind that!

                                               Now for some much beloved squighoppers!
                                                    

                And squig herders, I chose these squigs to be Tiger squigs bred on a purple variant of Mad Caps...

                                                           I think they worked out quite well ;-)

Hope you like them as much as I do! Cheers Sander

Listening to: "Wishmaster" by Nightwish

Holiday Update

Hello hello!

Finally the Christmas holiday has arrived! Man have I deserved this 2 week break from work, even if I say so myself. Well anyway it gave me some time to finish yet another regiment of HäT Chasseurs into a regiment Légère. I really do love these guys. Also I finally managed to put together and paint up some of my Night Goblins for WH Fantasy. Now these latter are just meant for gaming so they will be painted in a very basic way. The musician and banner bearer of this 40 Gobbo unit are still unfinished but the rest are as good as they will get.

Enjoy Sander!

Listening to: "The Light Fantastic" a Terry Pratchett Audiobook read by Tony Robinson

CBT game!

Hoi There,

Yesterday I fought two great games of Classic Battletech. For these games I used my First Aragon Borderers, Federated Suns regiment for the first time and did really well. While the first game technically ended in a draw I was left in possession of the field. The second game was a protraction of the first two games, we played in 2 against 2 teams first games were 1 on 1 and then the second and final game was in pairs. This end-game resulted in Albert-Martijn and me winning the battle by rescuing the governor and keeping the enemy (The Draconis Combine) from capturing a bridge.

Some photos:

Cheers Sander

Some advertising!

Hoi,

Ages ago I bought a couple of Reaper carrier cases for transporting my armies. They have served me dutifully for the last 7 years but some time ago the foam trays they came with started to show signs of ageing. Glue came un-glued, compartments got loose from the tray-base, all in all time to be replaced.

At the Crisis of 2008 I obtained some trays from http://wwww.krmulticase.co.uk/ which replaced my most damaged old ones. These trays were designed to take single figures based on regular GW single 20mm figure bases, be it round or square. Then this year most of the other old ones died on me and I needed more replacement. this time suited for my system of 4 troops put together on a 40mm x 40mm base. So I perused the KR website and thought I'd found the right size and ordered 8 trays from them on-line to be picked up at this year's Crisis. When I arrived to pick them up at the KR stall, Daryl from KR presented me with an humongous cardboard box containing my order. While I had taken o good look at the size of the compartments I had forgotten to check the size of the trays themselves!

Heavily doubting whether their excellent large trays would fit my Reaperbags, I stood and tried to work out what to do. Daryl came to the rescue by selling me just one big tray to check whether it'd fit the bag and if so I'd always be able to order more. So that is what I did, I checked when at home and I needed half size trays for the bags. I mailed Daryl the specifications and low and behold I could get 6 trays with dice and a new ruler (I don't NEED any of the latter persé but you gamers know how it goes: we're like magpies when in proximity to nice shiny dice) for a very reasonable price!

The picture below shows 4 of the trays, the ruler and dice. Two trays are made ready for use, 4 more I need to still work on. 

The material is first rate and far sturdier then any other stuff I know. Daryl and Co. can also make you trays after your own specifications but if you check their site you'll find more different sorts of trays then you can think up yourself. Also if you play FoW they offer trays for that game as well.

So a very big thank you to Daryl and the guys at KR!




Cheers Sander!

Listening to: "Beyond Hell, above Heaven" by Volbeat

Misc. Updates

Hoi!

Recently I have been trying to clear my desk of some loose ends (mainly CBT stuff) and have alo finished the French Late War (WW1) Cavalry form HäT. More pictures of the latter will be up in the HäT ETS pages shortly.

First up are two Swiftwind scoutcars for my First Aragon Borderers. I have more of these which I will paint up in several other faction paint schemes

Next in line are some Fuel trucks which can be used as targets or scenery. Hence the general army green paintjob.

One of the lovely new HäT French WW1 Cavalry troopers.

Cheers Sander

Listening to "Over the Hills and Far Away, soundtrack of the Sharpe Series" by various.

Newest testshots

Hoi,

Some days ago the latest HäT testsprues came in and I was elated to see they were of the 3 great new WW1 cavalry sets, Turks, Brits and French. Well the British cavalry are finished and here's the first picture. More will be featured at the HäT site.

Cheers Sander

Listening to: "Best if SOAD" by System of a Down

Farewell to you Spanish Ladies...

Hoi,

As promised here's a picture of the next 1:72 metal figure of a 18th century lady in dress gown. I like to think of her as a Spanish lady attending a ball.
The picture doesn't really bring out the quality of the figure itself, mainly due to the fact I had to use a flash and am not a very good photographer...

The second picture for this update is of my version of Art Miniaturen's Scottish Highlanders, the Black Watch. First I did a tartan very similar to the 42nds but since it was a simplification it didn't look the part. Therefore I added a small blue square to the pattern (which is not historically accurate) but that did make the scheme more believable.

Cheers Sander

Listening to "Icky Thumb" by White STripes

A Lady in the Cold

As winter is almost upon us I thought this figure would be appropriate.

I am not at all happy with all the flesh-parts, will try to improve on those. The base, which is not very visible in this picture, was made by putting some brick-card onto a GW base and adding some snow-looking stuff.

Cheers Sander

Listening to "The Idle Prentice" by Gin Lane

Inaugural Battles

Hoi Folks!

Last holiday I played some lovely games with my buddy Koen on the new gaming table. The first was a nice The Great War game using Russians against Germans in 1914. The Russians had to evacuate their guns and the Germans had to destroy them. The Russians managed to haul off the guns but their army was destroyed utterly while doing this so we finished on a draw.

Next we played a Black Powder Napoleonic game which was also nice, but I forgot to take pictures until the last turn in which all was over but the mopping up. Set in the days just before Waterloo the Allies needed to withdraw from the French Avant Garde. I played the French needless to say: the Allies won.

Greetings Sander

Listening to: "Beyond Hell, above Heaven"  from Volbeat

New Blog added!

Hoi!

Finally work has started on the "Big Project"! Wanna know more? Check:

http://salamanca1812.blogspot.com/

Cheers Sander

Listening to: all my music on shuffle

DUZI 2010!

Hoi!

Last Saturday I visited the DUZI fair in Wesel, Germany together with my mate Koen. On the way over, all went well and we had a great car ride singing classic rock ballads and generally making fun. Then disaster struck: we neared the bridge over the Rhine just in front of Wesel to discover it was blocked for maintenance!
So we tried to find another crossing nearby, but hellooo it's the Rhine you know! That's a mighty big river so crossings are not thick-spread! We kinda felt like all those armies who were stopped from conquering the lands beyond the Rhine like the Germans in Roman times and so on must have felt. Needless to say we got lost in the, beautiful German countryside.

Finally a nice postman told us we had to drive over to Xanten were we could cross the Rhine and get to Wesel, another hours worth of driving... So we did this and, due to my misdirections, got lost in Xanten, again, and even passed the Archaeological park (see picture below).

Eventually we found Wesel and the DUZI figures fair were a great time was had by us both.I especially liked meeting up with old and new friends.I kept a tight grip on my wallet and only obtained the stuff you can see on the picture to the right.I could have purchased more, because there was more then enough to my liking there but I always ask myself 3 questions:
- Do I really need this?
- Will I have time to paint it?
- Will I then actually use it?

And most of the times the answer is a triple 'no'. I do have a long held tradition at the DUZI of buying at least one Freebooter miniature just because they are such excellent little sculpts.

So what exactly did I buy?

- new Italeri stone building
- Zvezda Russian Hussars
- Zvezda heavy Russian Guard artillery (I am thinking of painting these as Prussians)
- a series of each of the 4 Indian Regiments used by Wellington to win India for Britain by Uwe Wildt and friends. http://historyin172.blogspot.com/
- some Bruno Arnal conversion heads
- 2 Freebooter mini's: Goblin Cook and Goblin Duel
- some lovely 18th century Ladies in ball dresses by http://www.dddhk.com/

Afterwards we still had some time to visit the Preussen Museum (Prussia Museum) in Wesel's old Cittadel http://www.preussenmuseum.de/  where I bought a cd with some Marching songs from Old Fritz's days.

Cheers Sander


Listening to: Preussische Armee Märsche des 18. Jahrhunderts

WIP: Napoleonic Italians Final Part

Hoi Everyone!

Here are the pictures showing the finished Italians.

I have done up the facings with GW red gore and Valejo Red. All black items like the hats and cartridge boxes were done in Valejo Black with a highlight. All pompoms have been coloured in two's: yellow, purple, white and light blue.The backpacks and coat-rolls were highlighted.

Finally I added an extra layer of ivory and pale sand to the small clothes and trousers respectively and painted all belts Valejo foundation white. Then the buttons were done with a small black dot followed by some Valejo silver.

And hey presto: Italians!

Cheers Sander



Listening to "Immersion" by Pendulum, or possibly the other way round...

More AWI Black Powder

Hello All!

As promised  here are some more pictures of our BP AWI game.

Enjoy Sander!


Listening to: "Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace" by the Offspring

WIP Italians Part III

Oy you!

Another short WIP update.

The next phase in the process consists of the trousers being covered with two layers of Valejo Pale Sand. The facings, waistcoats and turn-backs received a layer of Valejo Ivory.

The backpacks have greatcoats on them which received a first layer of Valejo Dark Grey Blue (V904) I will later highlight them... a bit ;-)
The cuffs and collar got a basecoat of Cavalry brown in order to receive GW Red Gore and finally Valejo Red in subsequent phases.

Cheers Sander


Listening to: "Bullet in a Bible" by GREENDAY

Black Powder AWI Game

Hello again!

Yes yes, another update today! Last Saturday Pijlie and I played a Black Powder game at the DUCOSIM games-fair in Amersfoort (http://www.ducosim.nl/nieuw/wiki.php?id=42).

We played a game loosely based on Freeman's Farm (a battle from the American War of Independence) which we used to practice for our impending Southern Campaign.

Here some pictures:

The table showing Pijlie's excellent terrain. Most of the armies were also his, with my current workload I have not been able to paint more troops then one infantry and one cavalry brigade.

My Scottish and Line regiment try to flush out some skirmishers in order to get to the regulars next. This turned out to be a bit of a hitch. The skirmishers actually functioned as a speed bump for pretty much all the game.

Before the game we diced for each unit to see in what turn they'd enter the game. Unfortunately most of my army would turn up from turn 4, my opponent had most of his troops by turn 3. Even though I fine-tuned my plan of attack to this situation, and wohay this was the first battle ever in which my plan actually worked, I was a bit apprehensive when on my left flank a large division of Militia appeared. Part of which can be seen below.

Fortunately for me the militia proved to be as unreliable as their real world counterparts, and they didn't do much besides walking away for the entire game.

Pijlie had these brilliant Continental Light Dragoons trying to threaten my right flank but a devastating charge from my Grenadiers saw to them and sent them packing.

Unit of the match are the American skirmisher who kept me from overrunning the American left flank earlier in the game:

More pictures will follow soon.

Cheers Sander

Listening to: "Yann Tiersen" by my wife on piano ;-)

WIP Italians Part II

Dear People,

Today's update brings you the following two steps in my Italian Napoleonic WIP. Here you can see that I painted all trousers, facings, turnbacks and belts with GW's Snakebite leather. This forms the basis for the next layers which will be Valejo Ivory and Pale sand.

Below you can see that I painted the backpacks Valejo Hull Red as a basecoat for the eventual colour which will be Valejo Light Brown.

Cheers Sander

Listening to:  "10.000 Days" by Tool

WIP: Napoleonic Italian Infantry

Hoi Everyone!

A while ago I accepted a commission work consisting of 3 batteries of Napoleonic Italian Artillery and one infantry regiment. The artillery is finished, as you have been able to read elsewhere in this blog, and now I am busy with the infantry. I promised to do a Work In Progress shoot so here it is!

The first picture shows the figures mounted on painting aids. My client has handily supplied the figures with short ends of steel wire in one foot so they can be fitted to these wooden rods for painting. He also does incredible conversions, a small indication of this are the pompons and sword added to these HäT figures.

Close up showing the NCO with fanion staff and sword/ bayonet combi added.

Here are the figures based with a black base coat out of an army painter spray can. I used to spray with a Games Workshop spray can, but the nozzle of the army painter can is better, besides at the moment I strongly dislike sponsoring Games Workshop.

The first stage of my painting process is to put a layer of Bestial Brown on all area's of bare flesh. I then start with the colour that covers the largest part of the uniform, in this case the coat is painted with Andrea Colour AC-38. Followed by a highlight made by adding some Valejo Deep Yellow (V70915) to the green.

More next time,

Cheers Sander

Listening to: "Tragic Kingdom" by No Doubt, what can I say? Nostalgia!

Of Jade Falcons and Blood Spirits

Hoi People!

The city of Groningen, in the North of the Netherlands, has been my home for 7 years and so I still have great friends over there. From last Monday 'till yesterday I have visited them and played 2 super games of classic battletech. My Jade Falcons had to recon Blood Spirit forces and then, in the second battle, had to break through their defences. I succeeded in the first objective but failed in the last.

As these pictures show the battles were pretty intense. My gaming buddy and me have devised a fast-play system and so the games excelled in speed and slaughter.

What I love is that we have also devised elaborate background stories and since our pilots gain experience points with each game they are evolving characters and make for a fun game.

Cheers Sander


Listening to: "Icky Thumb" by the White Stripes, simply brilliant.

Testshots

Hoi Folks!

Today I bring you an intermezzo from my commission work. I have told you already that I received some of Zvezda´s new Cuirassiers and below are some pictures of my version of the 8th regiment. These are for a friend of mine, hence the lack of wargames bases.

Next up is my painted version of the HäT Russian WW1 Putilov gun and crew testshots. The uniforms turned out a little too brown and should be more greenish but I kinda like them this way. Being a testshot something is always wrong and this time it's the size of the gun. It looks a bit too small, I suppose this will be corrected in due time.

Cheers Sander

Listening to: "Best of John Foggerty" guess by who!