Thursday, May 24, 2012

the Austrian Commission

about 5 years ago a friend of mine decided he wanted an Austrian army, and he wanted me to paint it.

He got the bulk of the army(all Old Glory done over the course of 4 months(10 infantry battalions, 2 cuirassier units,  2 artillery batteries).  not bad considering over the same period I painted my Russian infantry corps, half my cavalry corps, a division of Confederation of the Rhine and misc British and french brigades here and there for others. 

after that the pace slowed a little ,with him giving me maybe 1 unit to paint every few months.  i painted an additional 1 grenadier battalion, 3 skirmish battalions(1 jager 2 grenzer) and a jager line battalion. not long after i finished, napoleonics died off   he still had more units to bet painted (1 grenzer line battalion, 2 chevauleger units 2 more grenadier units, and 1 more foot battery and a wurst gun battery) but with the waning interest in napoleonics,  we decided to hold off. 


well now that I'm getting back into it and I'm getting a new group of guys into Napoleonic with Black Powder, he is having me finish off what he has in his Austrian army, and he's doing a similar sized Perry french army(which I'm painting over the summer). this will also help me French my rebuilding of my former old Glory Russian infantry corps, only with perry/warlord plastic Russians.  I never sold the cavalry corps, or my guard and militia, so it's just line infantry, jagers and grenadiers I need to rebuild.


anyway, so over the last 3 days I've painted 2 foot batteries and 1 Chevauleger regiment for the Austrians.  My friend opted to use Old Glory guns, with sash and saber artillerymen(i believe there was a S&S sale at the time).  i also talked him into avoiding old glory cavalry(which I'm not a fan of) and he bought Sash & Saber Chevauleger.


Sash & Saber Chevauleger of the Hohenzollern regiment

Austrian artillery, Wurst battery on the left, Foot battery on the right.
As i mentioned I'm not a big fan of Old Glory Cavalry. the never fit on the horses right, and  they seem tiny compared to the infantry.  I wasn't a huge fan of the Russian or British infantry either. however, i was pleasantly surprised by the Austrian infantry.  the sculpting seemed to be of better quality across the board, and the infamous awkward or downright anatomically impossible poses were almost entirely non-existant. the only real complaint I had with them was that some of the officers were rather undetailed.

It looks like this maybe the summer of napoleonics! stay tuned for more Austrians!


4 comments:

  1. Man these look awesome, love the red jackets, perfect work.
    Youre mate is a lucky man!

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  2. Great painting!
    I have know idea how you (and others) get so many troops finished in a short time to such a high standard?
    Cheers
    Paul

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  3. Paulalba:

    Practice practice practice. I've been painting for 19 years(I'm 31), and I've always been an assembly line painter. i paint 8 infantry at a time usual. I always say painting miniatures is like being a magician. you find easy ways of doing things that look like they took a long time to do. those cavalry took me 5 hours start to finish.

    I've figured out most of my shortcuts by experimentation, but I've always been a little more prone to try new and different techniques the other people i know. having someone who can paint fast sit down you and demonstrate some shortcuts seems to help a lot of people. i showed a friend once and hi doubled his paint speed over night(and probably increased his quality by 50% at the same time).

    Unfortunately I don't have the temperament or patience to sit here and do a step by step of how i paint, or i certainly would have already.

    I'm by no means a showcase-quality painter, but i think I'm probably above average.

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  4. Awesome looking troops. Great work.

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