On The Work Bench in June

It is Winter here in the Antipodes and that has mixed results for toy soldier projects: Firstly it means I want to spend less time outside and consequently ore time inside - good for focusing on toys soldier projects. (Anything under 19 C is too cold for me). Secondly, and less motivating, is that it stays fairly cold in my garage where I do most of my toy soldier work. So far I have managed by having a radiator close to my feet and distracting from the cold by watching re-runs of I Dream Of Jeannie on the portable TV on my workbench. Anyway, as usual, there are a host of projects happening simultaneously.

                                        Paraguayan recruits; left is a Timpo figure with putty shako. Right is a metal home casting I picked up somewhere; it really was a bit rough so I utilised the split in the leg to represent torn trousers. I added the blanket roll from putty. The shoes were not that clearly defined so I painted them as bare feet, which was the norm for the Paraguayans. (These soldiers wore kepis as well so very easy to convert with little change from ACW troops). There is an Osprey book on the topic of the 19th century Paraguayan war..

                     At Easter I picked up some more Italeri Saracens. The horses were spray painted with Games Workshop brown and then given a darker brown wash. The saddle blankets have been further undercoated white. Spots of white were added to some horses.

                                    Jecsan Mongols/Huns also got the brown spray undercoat but the flesh colour is a different shade made from a mixture of flesh, and browns. These fellows are less well armoured than most of the Italeri Mongols. And that is my crazy workbench and it actually looks like that most of the time.

                                 Here are a couple of extra West Point cadets which will bring up the numbers in my existing unit.

                                 In the background is a metal British officer with swagger stick.

                                               Replicants ACW or Western man cooking.

          Mr Wells got lost on my front lawn (when he was acting as war correspondent in the guise of 'HG Walls') and, after his eventual rescue, he had to have his arm reattached and some repainting done on the jacket. Lurking over him is some bestial apparition leaked from his fevered imagination, apparently a catasaurus.

                    This Indian received a new axe (from MPC I think). The figure is recent plastic production but I forget the maker. It appears that the Indian has looted some poor settler woman's lipstick. He also wears a captured cavalry jacket.

   The new Saracens about to be trampled by their own horses. Of course, the Saracens become part of my Fezian army where purple is the signature colour. At bottom is my conversion of an American Indian. (Yes he had to abandon his previous religion). His sword scabbard was trimmed from a plastic tooth flosser; these are really useful!

                                             These are some Saracens I had already painted.

           I picked these up at an ACOTS convention some years ago. Obviously they had been based and 'enhanced' for wargame use. As these Timpo had already been altered I added a flesh wash to the faces and recently painted some eyes on them. I love Timpo figures except that one has to now handle them delicately due to widespread brittleness. Timpo was a significant part of my childhood collection although I had only three or four of the Revolutionary War figures. I mostly had WW2, ACW and Western with a few knights.

                        These are Jecsan Egyptians picked up at last ACOTS that now have a brown spray undercoat. They are nice figures but I wish they were not so big.