Monday 30 January 2017

Wargaming Hygge

Its been a while since I painted anything. I find it relaxing and well, not so much mind-ful as mind-less! The only thing that ruins this state of mind is having to paint, you know, like when you have to paint figures up for a display. That's kind of where I was post Kirriemuir. Then Christmas came along and that wasn't a very quiet break this year, then back to work and we know that's a chav and a chore too. So the end of January neared and I hadn't lifted a brush. 

My AWI diversion is almost complete. I picked up most of the figures from EBay. I usually managed to get stuff which fits together with other purchases and my own stuff and this time I managed to get some bargains too. However my luck ran out with the last lot. The pictures online were not great but there were a lot of unusual poses, officers and nco's. I could tell the painting wasn't too hot and the basing wasn't either, but I figured I could remedy that. And so I had to. Not the worst painting. I've seen, I didn't need to strip them, but not great. The blue was to pale and somehow had made it onto the tricorns too (?!?). Worse than that was that the bases had been covered with a fine rubber type flock material. I've seen this in the packet - made by woodland scenics. Don't use it. It breaks down into dust like particles which clog and stick to the figures. Out came the broad stiff brush I use for large areas of texture basing and I went over each figure once I peeled them off the base.  This removed the grains of flock stuck in every crevice, (perry figures, so lots of those), and some loose bits of flaking paint too. 

Prussian blue over the uniform, matt black, with a little grey, for the tricorns, shoes and cartridge boxes, mahogany brown for the muskets and some of the figures hair and a little bit of ivory or white for trousers and cross belts. Then rebased on mdf with some pva.  It didn't take too long and the mix of headgear and poses turned this into a rough looking veteran unit. I have one done and another to follow. 

Whilst painting this lot I kept looking at a unit of unpainted Russians which were lying, still bagged on the painting desk. I had decided that I didn't need these for the display game, (it turned out the Russians could have done with another two or three units on the day!), and had left them for another time. Well since my painting mood had returned I decided the finish these off and if not actually complete the Russian army at least finish it off for the time being. 

The problem was the cold. It snowed here this weekend. Big white fluffy wet flakes. These promptly melted overnight and froze solid. This has little to do with painting the figures, but everything to do with undercoating them. If you want figures to come out with a speckled base coat or a dull white varnish, do them in cold air. Even a garage can be cold enough as I have found to my cost before. 

However I convinced my other half that I needed the utility room and set up a shoe box and some paper to cover overspray and got to work. I keep my spray tins under the sink, so they don't get cold. The room itself was pretty much room temperature and after the job was done I opened the window and turned on the extractor fan and shut the door to the rest of the house to prevent any whiff of spray paint. I returned an hour or so later once the figures were dry and the paint hard and took them up for painting. 

Soon I was immersed in my own little world. Underneath my magnified anglepoise painting away with no distractions and pretty much lost to the world. Zoned out. With a couple of comfort breaks to the sofa and a flick through some source material also managed to make some notes for the Sugar Islands Campaign as well.

A very productive, relaxing and enjoyable afternoon. 

Hygge - as they say in Denmark !


2 comments:

marinergrim said...

Ah the joys of trying to juggle real life with inner peace. glad you got some painting done in the end.

StuartInsch said...

I might even do some of your GNW Russians, since I have the green and red paint out!