31/03/2008

Parthian Horse Archers finished

At last they are done, all 90 of them, trouble is they don't look so numerous when put on the table.

As you will have read in previous posts I used a number of new techniques when preparing/painting them. Firstly, rather than glue or weld (hot pin) the figures together I drove a pin from the base right through the horse and then the rider. This was quite effective as the plastic was very soft and it then gave some rigidity to the figure (quite important where they will be used singularly). This then fitted in nicely with my decicion to buy pre-cut bases rather than cut artist card. Both of these can be considered a sucess.

Finally I tried priming with Gesso. The idea was to give a good surface for the paint as the gluable Hat plastic does not provide a good base for any acrylics. In general the Gesso went on OK, but despite repeated washings some figures still showed signs of mould release agent (another problem with this plastic) So I had to retouch about 10% of the figures. The claims for Gesso are that it doesn't hide detail, but it does on plastics because the details are not engraved so deep. I have also found that the Gesso can be brittle so if parts get flexed a lot then the whole surface will break off. So Gesso and Hat plastic is a no go - I'll go back to using a white or sand humbrol enamel paint next time

The figures themselves are nice, but I would have liked a bit more variety than the 5 poses provided

Of course I now have the difficult problem of finding compatible cataphract camels

Will

8 comments:

Steve-the-Wargamer said...

....they look good en masse though - I also like the look of the bases. Forgive me if you've already mentioned, but where did you get them from? I have a look every now and again when I'm at the shows but not seen anything that would tempt me so far....

Giles said...

Very impressive!

Best wishes

Giles

Giles said...

Very impressive!

Best wishes

Giles

Fire at Will said...

Steve, I can remember where I picked up the bases. Most of the people who buy them at my club use the ones from East Riding Miniatures (ERM) which look the same as those I bought.

Will

Anonymous said...

Great pictures! I am sure you have been asked this before, but how and with what did you take them?

Fire at Will said...

Anon, my digital camera can now be considered quite basic, however I always work on the principal of good lighting, it makes a huge difference whatever the camera type and diffuse sunlight I find to be the best, but not alwys available, especially in England.

The camera is Minolta Dimage Xt, really handy and easy to carry about, but the batteries now seem to run down quickly.

Will

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the info!

Anonymous said...

Very nice work !!