Matt's painting diary

[Matt J]

Just picked up the brushes again after having practically painted nothing for the last 6 months (other than a competition entry). I thought I'd start a diary to log my stuttering progress, get some motivation and hopefully post some nice pics 

Current projects -

Imperial romans - first 10mm I'd done and mostly finished http://www.pendrakenforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,3865.0.html just got to add some slingers

Dacians - Put on hold. Id heard the range is having a revamp in the not too distant future so I'm going to wait until these come out and hopefully they'll be compatible with the models I already have (the standard infantry aren't too bad but the flaxmen and sarmations are a bit lacking)

Hastings - Anglo-Saxons still in the bags. Normans started, 120 spearmen mostly finished and knights started.

SYW Quebec - models arrived week before last and are cracking sculpts. I've glued a few to strips as trial pieces.

Also ordered some of GW's new paints to try out. These should arrive this week so I'll give them a go.

Hopefully I'll have some photos posted this evening

[Steve J]

Look forward to seeing the pics .

[nikharwood]

Look forward to seeing the pics .

Ditto 

[Matt J]

First batch of photos.

Norman spears


Partially based and almost finish. Getting bogged down with the shields. My idea of a dark age army is one of individuals so I've tried to produce a different shield design per model and after the first 50 or so its getting hard to come up with new styles.

Anyway first unit is now based and finished. Just got to do the banner. Had several goes at painting the cast one before giving up, just didn't look right whatever I did, so snipped off to be replaced with a paper one.

[Hertsblue]

Those shield designs are ace! Know what you mean about cast banners, though. Replace them every time. 

[Leon]

Nice!

[nikharwood]

Very nice indeed 

[fred.]

Good stuff, the shields look really good.

Have a look at some of the decal suppliers in 28mm for some inspiration on designs, trying to invent that many is hard work. One way to add more variety without having to invent new designs, is to reverse the colours of ones you have done already, or do the same style with different colours. Various styles of crosses seem to have been popular.

[Matt J]

Thanks for the kind comments guys

Fred - yeah i've looked at some of the decals available on line and as you say it is mostly various stylised crosses. There are other styles using dragons or lion motifs but with the shield boss and the smallness of the shields reproducing these is beyond my ability.
To be honest the whole shield thing is frying my brain  so I'm going to skip to some SYW stuff this weekend for respite.

[GordonY]

Re Shields, best advice, just go for a single block colour, at least until the whole army is done, then go back and paint the devices on them. Or in my case, move onto the next project.

[Techno]

Yet another show off !
Seriously Matt, those are wonderful !
Cheers - Phil.

[Phobos]

Excellent work, I wish to see more!

[nikharwood]

Re Shields, best advice, just go for a single block colour, at least until the whole army is done, then go back and paint the devices on them. Or in my case, move onto the next project.

[Steve J]

Beautifully done Matt .

[Matt J]

unfortunately not much done this week (kids, work etc)

just managed to do a couple of trial models for Quebec project (nice to have a break from chainmail and shields).
These are the start of the 58th foot. I'm hoping to finish the unit off this weekend (ever the optimist). Details on the models is really good though makes it much easier to get good results when painting



Also if anyone knows a link to pictures of light infantry uniforms (for Quebec) would be very grateful.