Napoleonics in 40mm for Sharp Practice

Having decided to build up some 40mm forces for Sharp Practice after being tempted by an experiment, (see my last post) - it's now a month in since the first 40mm print (2 August), so a good place to pause and take stock of progress. I had always intended the forces to be small (so they would fit on my table) and limited. (ha!)

The French - two groups of Line infantry, two groups of Legere infantry, a group of Legere Carabinier,  two groups of Line Voltigeurs, an 8lb Foot Artillery piece and some Chasseurs a Cheval

My intention is to base them all up at the same time, for consistency, and then lightly dust lower legs with a dusty/earthy shade through the airbrush. So for the moment, they remain painted but not finished. (Also, I hate basing... )

With the basic French force completed I raided the Piano Wargames officers for some characters for jump off points, or story characters, and I added in Cantinieres and donkeys from Wargames Atlantic Digital.

Having completed the basic French force (81 points according to the Sharpulator...) I tried various mechanisms to create a viable 3d STL for Peninsular British. 

I tried digital sculptors, who quoted a ridiculous sum for a single figure, I tried mashing up various components from different vendors (the British Light Dragoon approximation below is mashed up from Wargames Atlantic Digital, Piano Miniatures and Kozak from Wargaming3d). 

In the end though, I bit the bullet, and taking advantage of the bulk packs of 40mm British from the Perrys, (at £22 for 10 x 40mm, they are cheaper than many 28mm!) 4 packs of Centre Company gives me 5 Line bases, and a Flank Company pack will give me light troops to add to the Riflemen and artillery from NapoloenicSTL files in Spain. 

The big disadvantage is they are all single pose, with separate heads. I have been trying to get some variation in colours just so they aren't quite as bland. 3 groups painted as of Today (3rd September), so I am aiming to have the force finished by next week.

Oh, and I have also managed to play a couple of games, General de Brigade, and Sikh Wars Black Powder. Not my favourite rule-sets, but a game is a game. 

Painting 40mm French - my technique

So having done the sample, here's the first batch of 40mm French Line troops. All up - maybe 4-5 hours. I don't flatter myself that anyone will want to copy my efforts, this is quick and dirty stuff, so this is perhaps more of an aide memoire when I next paint them.

1. - undercoat flat white, I just use an automotive primer. You want one that does dry matt though, or the contrast paints will slide off the thing.  

2. - flesh, I use Citadel Contrast Guilliman Flesh, to provide a nice light base for what comes after.

3. - white areas, Citadel Contrast Apothecary White, on roughly 50% of the figures I do the trousers white as well. If you're feeling adventurous, do some of the waistcoats in a different colour, blue, red or grey all work nicely, or a tan/fawn. You can also do some cartridge case covers in 'white' as well.

4. - the non-white trousers, almost anything you want, I like Citadel Contrast Skeleton Horde, Aggaros Dunes and Garagakh's Sewer, but you could go to town and do blue or red stripes on an Apothecary White base. I'm careful to get the line of the waistcoat right. 

5. - red, I quite like a slightly darker red, and it might seeem non intuitive to do it before the blue but it works better in my experience. Citadel Contrast Flesh Tearer Red, cuffs, collars, trim on the coat and on the Fusiliers, the shoulder boards. 

Ok, timing - 1 hour so far for 8 figures.

6. - blue, slightly thinned Citadel Contrast Leviadon Blue, trying to keep it neatish, you'll find on the Piano Fusiliers, that you can dab it in quite easily into the shoulder boards.

7. - pack Citadel Contrast Garagakh's Sewer, thin slightly if you want to show how rough the fur is.

9. - kit, for the greatcoats, variations of Citadel Contrast Space Wolves Grey, Citadel Contrast Basilicanum Grey, Citadel Contrast Skeleton Horde, and Citadel Contrast Darkoath Flesh. When you do the Basilicanum Grey this works well for the 'spats'. I do cooking utensils/pots and metal kit in Citadel Contrast Black Templar, as well as boots  at this stage and 'ceramics' using Darkoath or Citadel Contrast Gore-Grunta Fur. Wicker is either Citadel Contrast Skeleton Horde, or Gore-Grunta.

10. - hair, any Contrast browns, usually Aggaros Dunes, Garagakh's Sewer or similar.

11. - shako, Citadel Contrast Black Templar, avoid the fusilier's tuft.

12. - musket woodwork, Citadel Contrast Fyreslayer Flesh.

13. - bayonet scabbard, Citadel Contrast Contrast Wyldwood.

By now, you have reached the intermediate stage where most of the base colours are down, and it looks awful. But you're about to fix that. 

And so far, 2 hours 45 minutes... 

14. - get some bright red; personally, I use Vallejo 70.947 Dark Vermillion, touch up and neaten the Flesh Tearer, highlight the cuffs, collar etc. 

15. - white, I use Vallejo 70.951 White, Ivory also works well, especially if you are going to go back with a second pure white highlight. Touch up all the scrappy areas, collar edging, the cuff lace, turnbacks, belts etc. Also do the rosette on the shako, and the musket sling. I also do the white edging on the backpack.

16. - Tuft, I used Vallejo 70.851 Bright Orange, and I added the red dot to the shako rosette at this stage. 

17. - Citadel Contrast Black Templar for the gun metalwork. Tidy up cartridge pouch, boots and shako as required. 

Now the fun stuff...

Up to 4 hours 15 minutes

18. - flesh highlight, just nose, cheeks and knuckles Vallejo 70.315 Basic Skintone.  

19. - flesh wash, I used Citadel Reikland Fleshwash, but only on the face and ears.

At this point, you could choose to varnish before doing metals - 

20. -  metals, brass (I use Vallejo 70.878 Old Gold) for the attachment to the crossbelt, shako plate, pack buckles, chin scales, chest and cuff buttons, as well as the musket strap buckles. Gunmetal/silver (in my case, Vallejo 70.863 Gunmetal) applied to the musket furniture, barrel and bayonet, as well as the waistcoat buttons.

21. - metal wash. I always like to wash the metals to give them a bit of character, Citadel Agrax Earthshade over 'Brass' and Nuln Oil over  'Gunmetal'.

22. Optional.. if you want them looking like grizzled veterans, a thinned application of Citadel Apothecary White over the chin gives an excellent 'unshaven' effect. (You might want to go back and reinstate the lower lip if you get a bit overenthusiastic.) 

The result should look something like this, only better - because I'm not a great painter. 

French Line Infantry

Another Butterfly

So Martin asked me some time back if I could print him some 40mm Napoleonic artillery. He's been building up forces using the Perry 40mm Peninsular range.

I have the STL files from Piano Wargames for French, and some from Napoleonic STL for Britsh...  no problem. 

I had always intended; someday, to do the French in numbers to face the Austrians.  Bit then I thought I would scale up a sample figure or two. I used 125% which seems to get a height and stature that fits well with the Perrys. 

This was what I got:

And of course..  I thought to myself. 'Those are flipping gorgeous, how hard could it be to print off enough to do a Sharp Practice force in 40mm?...  Next thing I'm sourcing pack mules and cantinieres (Wargames Atlantic Digital) putting bits together to make a Water Cart...  

Of course, I'm not going to be creating works of art, so I did a couple of practice figures with Contrasts and Vallejo... 

They still need touch ups, metallics etc.  But this is all completely doable. 

I have a load of 'Mexican' terrain for What a Cowboy, that is quite large, a large 28mm tree is a medium 40mm tree, and hey ho...  here we go.

Just in case anyone cares, 25mm washers, for when they stop making 1p & 2p coins, car primer white matt undercoat, Gilman Flesh, Leviadon Blue, Gore-Grunta for woodwork, Garghak Sewer for packs, Flesh Tearer red, and bits of Skeleton Horde (trousers) and Darkoath Flesh for gourds, Fireslayer Flesh for details etc. Black is Black Templar. 5 o'clock shadow and white shading with Apothecary White.

Right... so only 100 or so figures to do... and if anyone reading this knows Lucas from Piano Wargames, beg him to sculpt some 1809 British. There is an absolute dearth of good quality British Peninsula STL that could stand up-scaling to 40mm.

Time to get on with it..  oh yes, and this new Butterfly means of course the Ducks from Fenris Games are languishing 80% done...