Wednesday 4 September 2013

French line foot artillery (7)

Here's another Napoleonic piece from much earlier in the year, which I forgot about.  This is the limited edition set released at the end of last year by Martin Kelly of the Befreiungskriege website and which was sculped by Peter Fitzgerald of Calpe Miniatures.  The process behind the design and commissioning of this set is explained on Martin's website and he has some very good tips on how to paint these figures.  The figures are quite specific: two soldiers of the artillery train; a foot artillery drummer; and a "Marie-Louise" infantryman carrying what looks like potatoes.  There's also a campfire with a "marmite" cooking pot over it, which I'm afraid I totally forgot about when taking these photos!  So Martin's site is well worth looking at for information on painting these types of soldiers.  And if you look here you can see these figures painted up as Italians by young Simon Haldezos in Kapiti, NZ.

The bluey-grey of the artillery train's uniforms is a tricky colour to pin down.  I used the Foundry palette "Confederate Grey 117", which has a tinge of blue in it and I think works ok. The blue facings and trousers on the drummer were painted with Foundry "French Blue 65".  There were quite a few straps and bits on these figures, some of which I couldn't immediately identify - those sort of things are always painted with Foundry "Canvas 8" or "Deep Brown Leather 45".  I confess the precise colours to use on the whip eluded me, so I just used various browns.    

This is a neat little set - it's not often you have the chance to paint members of the artillery train on foot. These were the first Calpe figures I've painted.  They were enjoyable to do, with clean surfaces and carefully sculpted detail.  The figures are a tad larger than Perry sculpts, but look fine together on the table.   The Calpe website states that French (and Saxon) artillery pieces and crews will be available in September or October, so I'll be sure to pick up some French artillery when they are released.  I'm tempted to look at their French line infantry too at some stage.

4 figures. Painted February 2013.




14 comments:

Christopher(aka Axebreaker) said...

Superb work on some lovely figures Giles! Great choice of colours!

Christopher

Der Alte Fritz said...

Those are very nice figures. I've always liked the Calpe range.

Chris Stoesen said...

These are great. Fantastic painting as always.

Ken said...

Very nice Giles! You can't beat the 28mm figures for the detail and they really benefit from your brushwork.

Juan Mancheño said...

A really painting work. This vignette is fantastic!

Sire Godefroy said...

Another lovely little vignette. You should apply for doing the cover diorama for WSS!

Cheers, SG
mountainsoflead.com

Ubique Matt said...

Superb painting as always. Another vote for a WSS cover.

Regards,
Matt

Bedford said...

Great stuff giles....

They look lovely.

Darrell.

Stefan (aka. Monty) said...

Hi Giles,

once again some excellent figures.

Cheers
Stefan

Anonymous said...

Lovely work on your Frenchmen Giles. A real treat for sore eyes.

And thanks for mentioning the non conforming Italians of The son & heir.

Salute
von Peter himself

AJ (Allan) Wright said...

The lace work on the musician is fabulous!

Joseph K said...

They look great, I hope mine will come out looking as good as yours, thank you for inspiring me to get to finishing mine

Anonymous said...

Hi Giles,

You don't know how rewarding it is to see some examples of my little project all painted up. That's an excellent job.

Dare I mention that I do have a few sets let for sale if anybody feels inspired by your efforts?

All the best,
Martin

Benno said...

Great stuff as always Giles.