Blather, Waffle and Poppycock!

[fsn]

Thank you. I agree. I'll do some test figures.

Though I could do white. I always imaging my figures to be late Summer, so I suppose the white trousers would be OK.

[fsn]

Note to Amazon. "Final Days of Planet Earth" is a long title.

However, if you capitalise it, and put it in a tall, thin, boxy font, the "F" and the "I" merge into an "A" - and that would seem to promise things that are not, if I remember correctly, in the film.

[fsn]

Gentlemen, I'm in trouble.

From being worried a few months ago that I was running out of projects, I now find myself inundated.

I'm half way through painting the Napoleonic Russians, and have the Poles to paint (barring a lancer regiment and an artillery battery that I painted for "reasons"  .) I'm currently purchasing Napoleonic Danes.

I'm being good, and will buy all the Danes before starting buying the next project which will be either Ancient Indians or some of those new Napoleonic Spanish ... or maybe some Ottomans (Ottomen?) ... 'cos I ordered a book which will arrive on the 16th June and that's bound to influence me that way. 

This is all to the good, and I feel in control of the acquisition side. However I am, as I said, half way through painting the Russians (4 bttns, 3 Cav rgts, 2 bttys done: 4 bttns, 1 cav rgt, 1 btty to do), and I looked at the painting sticks of more bloomin' figures to paint in green coats and white trousers and I thought "stuff it, I'm painting Danes."

This means I am now painting 3 different projects. This is undisciplined and now my painting has 3 painting schedules on it. This is quite unnerving and I'm not sure I can cope with the (admittedly self inflicted) pressure.   

On a side note, I wonder if our view of a "toy soldier" (e.g. in the Nutcracker ballet) is influenced by the Danish army ... probably through Hans Christian Anderson?

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Danish guards pre 1899 maybe?

[fred.]

Frankly 3 projects on the go at once would be quite sensible for me.

It was too late for a photo last night but I got to at least 6 that where on my desk. Let alone several more that are languishing at the undercoated stage.

The shiny butterfly has too big an influence on what I paint!


Edit - went and counted 9 on the desk. I'm not actually sure what counts as a project even...

[fsn]

Ooh! 9!    I'd need a new spreadsheet for that! 

I'm usually quite disciplined. Buy all the figures then paint through the OOB, alternating unit types for variety (for example infantry with cavalry/artillery).


I'm gonna say this wild abandon is just a side effect of all the anti-biotics I'm on.

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

Always got lots on the go. Working on  2x15mm SU17/22, die cast Chopper - 64 kaistra Chinese, bout 30 20mm plastics, mostly Falscrimjager, some terrain bits, A warhammer Marine landspeeder, 20 frostgrave cultists. 1 Warlord War of 3 Kingdoms arty peice, and 2 County Class CA's. Also doing some writting.

[fsn]

[Ithoriel]

Things I consider "currently on the go" as in I have made some progress on them over the past 3 months

2mm Strength and Honour
6mm Early Mesopotamian Bronze Age
10mm WW2 Germans
15mm Homo Heidelbergensis Tribe
20mm Sci-Fi for 5 Parsecs
3mm Seguko Jidai
10mm Warmaster Undead
10mm Warmaster Albion Army
10mm Warmaster Harad Army for a LotR campaign that is now very unlikely to ever happen
1/1200  scale Roman Fleet
1/2400 scale Armada Fleets

If I'd only concentrated on one of these I'd probably have completed it ... for a certain value of completed.

Alas, a butterfly flaps it's wings and my focus changes or a new project is started!   

[fsn]

Just read the newsletter.

Need to add Arab-Israeli 1973 to the list of projects.

Gosh! That means I may have to but some Centurion derivatives!     

[fred.]

Ooh! 9!    I'd need a new spreadsheet for that! 

I'm usually quite disciplined. Buy all the figures then paint through the OOB, alternating unit types for variety (for example infantry with cavalry/artillery).


I'm gonna say this wild abandon is just a side effect of all the anti-biotics I'm on.

I do wonder if I need to be a bit more organised! But then that would seem like work. 


It is far too easy to buy stuff (compared to getting it painted). I sometimes buy full armies, but more often am now adding bits to ongoing projects. Then I end up with the last 10 or 20% of a project stalled (this is obviously ignoring the projects that haven't even started.)

One of the things I struggle with, with attempting to categorise stuff is what is the unit of measure? Especially across scales and manufacturers. 

[Raider4]

One of the things I struggle with, with attempting to categorise stuff is what is the unit of measure?

"So, what's the velocity of a sheep in a vacuum?"

[fred.]

Thanks...

A greatfruit feels it could be a useful unit if measure. 

There is a US variant based around large boulders (the size of a small boulder) and washing machines. Not sure of the conversion factors. 

[fsn]

I am somewhat fortunate in that I (mostly) stick to Pendraken 10mm.*

However you raise an interesting point. I usually think of my projects in terms of "units". So for the Russian Nappies, I have 8 infantry bttn, 4 cavalry rgts, and 3 bttys - total 15. I have painted 9 units therefore am 66% of the way through the project.

However, were I to look at an Israeli force, it would be say - 3 troops tanks, 3 platoons infantry, 1 troop recce, 1 troop artillery ... etc, etc. I may still have 15 units but I can paint 30 Israeli paratroopers a lot quicker than I can paint 40 Russian dragoons. 

We need something like the BED (Banana Equivalent Dose) which is the measure of radiation given off by a 150g banana. It's about 10⁻⁷ sievert.


* excluding 1:600 aircraft and ships, 1:3000 Ships, and 1:2400 ships - of course.

[fred.]

The most obvious unit of measure would be a figure - but given the number of 10mm figures in a project, this can be a bit laborious to count - but on the other hand approximations are probably fine.

The next one would be by base - which is much easier to count! The problem is its not that comparative - for example a base could be 16x 10mm pikes, or 1x 28mm figure which feels fairly comparable. But then I could have 3x 6mm epic figures or even just 1x 10mm figure on a base. 

Then what about figures still in bags, who I may not have assigned to a base? So I don't know quite how many will end up on the base. 

If I where to count by units, I'd need to know which rules I'm painting for - which isn't always certain!

You're probably thinking this is all very slapdash! 

It also feels like a level of procrastination