Monday, December 7, 2009

The Fightin’ Irish!

Here we go – back to the Dark Ages of Europe! Most of the figures are from Gripping Beast (except for one tucked in the back of one of the Blade Stands which is from Old Glory).

(Remember: click on the pictures for a bigger version)


These are optional two stands of Blade for my Norse Irish DBA army. I’m not sure if they’re Irish that have fashioned themselves after the invaders… or Vikings “gone native”… or just Viking Mercenaries…. Whatever the case theere’s some definite scandahoovian influence there!


Some Spare Norman foot. In this case spare = not-so-useful-for-DBA as all the Norman foot for DBA are Spears or Bow or Psiloi and these guys are none of the above... I kept them aside and based them for individual skirmishers…


A Viking merchant and his wife and child…

Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:

Can I stick to the Dark Ages for a bit…? Finish off the Irish…? We shall see…!

12 comments:

  1. Excellent stuff man... The mother and child is fantastic! Good to see the dark age armies coming together! I am just about to finish the first element of plastic vikings for my 28mm DBA Viking army, so it will be nice to keep pace with your dark ages stuff!

    A note on the Norman foot there... I realized that the early crusaders have a knight/blade option! That's where their DBA usefulness comes in if you are willing to cut corners and use your Normans as crusaders ;)

    Great stuff overall though man, keep it coming! I am liking the Samurai stuff as well!

    n.

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  2. Hi Tim, I have a question for you, if you've answered this previously, my apologies.

    In your last photo, the woman and child - those black areas/outlines are really well done! I really like how everything is exaggerated and well defined. How do you achieve that? It doesn't look like a wash effect.

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  3. HI Chgowiz!

    I prime/underpaint everything black and basically paint all live areas just up to the edge leaving a fine black border around everything - It doesn't make contest winners but, as you point out, it exaggerates and really brings out details that would be lost when viewing it from a bit of a distance on the table top.

    I never use washes. ever.

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  4. Tim, thanks for the response. I may have to try that technique, seems like a lot of brush control is required. I'm not that good yet! :)

    I'm curious by your last statement... never? Why not?

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  5. Yes, precision control of brush is handy.

    Washes seem like a lot of work and would slow me down... I'm all about cranking out volume!!

    Most things I paint the black outline provides all the shading I really care for. On some "character" or other important figures I will sometime paint a darker colour and highlight with a lighter colour... but that's about it!

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  6. Any advice/tips on painting for that border, or is it just a matter of experience/experimenting?

    (and thank you for being so patient!)

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  7. Advice? Not really... You've got it figured out - experimentation and experience. It's like anything in life - the more you do something the better (and faster) you get. I've been doing this constantly for over 25 years... so I've got a pretty damn quick and steady hand!

    It's as easy as learning to paint inside the lines... they're just really small tight lines!?

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  8. Ha! And me with my electronic's technician shake... :wobble:

    Thanks for the info, though. I'll give it a go on some of my NPC minis and see how it goes.

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  9. Nice! I like the Norse/Irish stuff especially. Gripping Beast does quite a good range of Dark Ages stuff. I have a few of their minis (mostly animals and a civilian or 2).
    I agree, your painting style is distinctive and while fairly simple seems quite effective for the tabletop.

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  10. Yes, look awesome on the tabletop! And speed is important as big armies are also impressive!

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  11. That's always been my theory - no one's going to notice a detail on a single figure when you've got a couple hundred on the table!

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  12. I like the Ostmen you've done for the Irish; like you say, they're a nice mix of Irish and Scandinavian influences.

    As for those Norman knights, you could use them as dismounted knights for an Anglo-Norman army, which the Normans can easily morph into.

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