French Mounted Infantry Colonels (Perry Miniatures) 28mm

This is the second metal set I bought during my ebay rampage (this cannon being the first), x3 French Infantry Colonels and I've got to admit I was slightly concerned when I first opened the packet. The figures seemed to be bent and slightly skewed, the black horse in particular had really strange shaped legs and all the swords were bent. It didn't take much effort to get them looking acceptable but I was really worried about snapping the swords off.

These were really nice to paint, in particular the figure on the brown horse wearing the habit veste was really nice to paint. My only complaint is that the moulding on the right eye of the dark brown horse seemed to be non existent, it was simply a flat surface. Luckily the dark paint hides this but it almost made me throw the horse away and scrap that figure.

I used the same websites as previously stated here to pick the uniforms, however it was slightly complicated as this page by Calpe Miniatures suggests that the uniforms worn by officers varied due to the officer's allowance for uniforms and sometimes incomplete instructions to tailors.

Overall I was very happy with these figures, again I had to get separate bases but luckily I had some spares kicking around (I do love my spares box!).

I tried to adapt the uniforms slightly as 3 colonels is a bit much for the small brigade I want to build up. The officer on the light brown horse is intended to be an infantry colonel, the black horse figure will be a cavalry colonel (I had Ney in mind as I painted this one) and the final guy on the medium brown horse is intended to be an artillery officer - so I've attempted to keep his uniform similar to the gunners.

French Foot Artillery firing 6 pounder (Perry Miniatures) 28mm

So I managed to break my golden rule, which considering I've not done many sets since coming back into the hobby is a bit of a shame.. but it felt soo good!! I bought myself 3 sets at once, normally I like to take one set at a time so that I don't get distracted. This time however I bought myself a box of Napoleonic French Infantry, Mounted Infantry Colonels and a team of Foot Artillery firing a 6 pounder. I finished the artillery and colonels way before I had even unboxed the infantry and what I found was brilliant!

At first I was really worried that the metal would be really flimsy and snap if I wasn't careful, but once the cannon had stuck together they were fine (it took a few attempts to get the barrel to take and I had had trouble with chipping so I've got some varnish to try).

I found a couple of really helpful websites to help me with the uniforms, anybody interested in getting accurate and detailed descriptions for Napoleonic armies should certainly check out Napolun.com If this is one guy writing this himself then he's got a lot of time on his hands.

If you prefer a visual representation of the uniforms (although a slightly romantic depiction) then this Historex site is great!

Only downside to this minis (although understandable) is that they don't come with any form of base, I picked these up off ebay for a couple of squid so altogether for about £9 I'm over the moon with this set!

The English Army 1415-1429 (Perry Miniatures) 28mm (Finished)

So after quite a long time I've managed to finish my box of men at arms and archers. I do wish I had been a bit more adventurous with the jupons for the men at arms and the patterns for the archers gambesons but I stuck to simple designs so I wouldn't ruin them!

It was a great set to work on, although I would have liked to have had a wider variety of poses for the archers, there are only so many times nock, draw and loose can be interesting. I decided against arming any archers with melee weapons but maybe that would have given me more choice in poses.

Men at Arms

Archers

Darksphere - Wargaming supplies, Waterloo, London

I accidentally came across this shop a few months ago when I was looking to get hold of some supplies at short notice, I didn't fancy waiting for eBay or any other mail order suppliers. At first glance it's very hard to tell what this place even is, it's situated under an archway in the railway bridge about 5 minutes from Waterloo station. Inside though is an Aladdin's cave of modelling and gaming goodies!

The first time I went here the whole shop was crammed with people playing a fantasy card game (although I didn't look close enough to see which one). They were selling packs of cards by the cart load and even had dustbins set up at the end of the gaming benches so people could get rid of their packets easily!

The shops itself has a really good selection of models, card games, board games and other handy things. I bought my Tiger from this shop as well as a tonne of paintbrushes, paints and sprays. It can be hard to find what you're looking for but the staff are always really helpful! So helpful in fact that when I asked a general question about some matt varnish the assistant even started looking on Google for me to see if it's the stuff I wanted!

The selection of models is huge and they are always really well stocked, to give you an example the image below is of one of their shelves (photo taken from the Dark Sphere website).

I've not yet ordered anything from their website as I only work around the corner and so can always find time to pop in, but I think the website does let the shop down a bit. It feels clunky and slightly dated and a lot of the products don't have photographs to match - whilst this isn't a problem if you know what you want to buy it can be a pain if you're just browsing. 

Overall though I love this shop and sadly it's prejudiced my views of smaller model retailers and shops because I look at how much these guys stock and think that it's shame nobody else does but I guess anything is possible if you've got that much space!

It's well worth a visit if you're in the London area and is literally a 5 minute walk from Lambeth North or Waterloo stations.

Dark Sphere 
Arch 186 Hercules Road 
London
SE1 7LD

Tel: 020 7928 1373

French Cuirassiers (Perry Miniatures) 28mm

Newest box completed in time for tomorrows 200th anniversary of Waterloo. These are a set of French Cuirassiers by Perry Miniatures (link) I got these from ebay from nannyogg999 on ebay who has a fantastic range of models and exceptionally quick delivery times. I've ordered two sets from this seller now and both have arrived within 2 days of me placing the order.

This is a nice set to work on and the first cavalry I've done since I worked on a set of Warhammer Chaos Knights. The only issue I had was that I managed to screw up which figure was riding on which horse and which legs belonged to who. This wouldn't normally matter but as the officer would have ridden a different horse, had a different helmet and had a different set of legs it does make a difference. As it turns out I didn't actually make an individual who can be identified as an officer because of this.

Other than that these were nice to paint although I had some issues with a very thick black undercoat, I must have sprayed too close!