Because I am Kevin the Retired, I can work on stuff whenever I want. Sort of. Unless I am Kevin the Grocery Shopper, or Kevin King of Laundry, or Kevin Keeper of the Aussies. The rest of the time I am Kevin the Retired . . . unless I am fixing dinner, or loading and unloading the dishwasher. Well . . . you get it.

Anyway, I am trying to use daylight to build my ships for Force Z. My last post was about finishing the destroyers. Today, I began working on the Prince of Wales. Let’s just say it’s all a learning experience and believe me I’m trying to learn.

It’s just a little too dark to work on the ships without some natural light this time of year, so I’ve been painting in the evening and watching Lost. Never watched it back in the day, so I’m catching it now. Just as my television choices are a little different I decided to drag something out of my drawers of shame that are a bit different too. I’m working on a 90mm figure of a Continental soldier in kind of adverse condition.

I don’t know the figure. It is completely assembled. The maker’s mark says Worster. Worster Miniatures was acquired by Lost Battalion Miniatures. Lost Battalion is still around, but this figure is no longer available. I think I got it from American Eagles in Lake City after Charlie died and they “rescued” considerable surplus product from his apartment. I picked up a few of these “big boys” (as Doug Hamm calls ’em) at a pretty nominal price twenty years ago.

So there’s a story here. There always is right . . . Back when I was very young, before I ever imagined playing a game with painted little men, I was attracted to toy soldiers. My Grandfather bought me a set of Scottish Britains in the early 60’s, and I acquired a few more–the plastic Britain’s Dee-tail range when I was probably 10 or so. I was a bad plastic modeler, and painted stuff with enamels. I bought my first 54mm figure, a Rogers Ranger figure by Monagram Merite when I was 12. I ordered figures from the Soldier Shop in New York and was an enthusiastic, if unskilled painter of 54mm figures for a number of years. I acquired figures throughout my 20’s and 30’s, but mostly they simply joined a stash of stuff. And there they’ve sat.

I did recently paint a Monagram Berdan’s Sharpshooter, and I was pleased with how it turned out. I promised myself I’d paint more, but I haven’t. As I began painting the planes and then the ships for Force Z, I decided that I needed to paint something a bit different, that might be fun and relaxing, something that would be different. I ferreted around in my two drawers of strange and wonderful figs and pulled out this guy, and decided he was right up my alley.

I’ve been really inspired by others who have painted the bigger figures. Victor Cina in Oregon has done some really spectacular painting. Busts and other figures. Though I don’t love busts I do really do admire his work. We spent some time talking about it at Enfilade last year over beers and what a wonderful evening. I don’t know if I can specifically say I learned something, but Victor did insist there was no right way to do things. That encouraged me, even if I didn’t exactly take the plunge immediately.

I also saw that my friend Dean Motoyama was busily painting some resin Verlinden Napoleonics in 120mm scale. Dean is simply among the best, if not the best, painter I’ve ever known. He’s known for being able to produce figures almost overnight. But it’s not just the speed, it’s the quality. I got a chance to play a game at his home recently, and I took a look at his painted Verlinden guys, and I really liked what he did. They were clean and bright, the detail was all there, but they didn’t have a bunch of shading. Even so they looked great. It inspired me to try something big and colorful and see what I could do.

I took a look at my guy, and the first thing I noticed was there was a lot of flash and a really nasty mold mark. Really unusual for a figure of this quality and this size. I did my best to clean it up with x-Acto and file, but I didn’t get it all sigh. I used to brush prime my big guys, but decided to spray prime this feller with Miniature Painter Desert Yellow, a color I increasingly prefer to Matt White.

I decided to focus on different parts of the figure and paint them to completion. I started with head and worked down. I also made the determination after painting the neck cloth that covered our shivering soldier that I simply couldn’t do the three color shading thing. The figures was simply too large and the traditional lightening and darkening was simply too stark. So I decided to just lighten by drybrushing. It worked, and though I’m always a weeny about using colors that are too light, I did get some shading that may not show up well in the photos, but I like it.

I wasn’t quite sure about what colors to use for a Continental soldier. He was kind of a tough guy to figure out. He clearly has a uniform coat, no tricorne, but a pretty nice cocked slouch hat. He has a cartridge box, pretty nice breeches, but he’s obviously chilly, and semi-shod. He’s pretty well dressed for Valley Forge, but I think most Continental soldiers weren’t well attired after the winters of 1777-80 at least and owing to the clear desire to stay warm in this guys accoutrements, I’m guessing he’s late winter or early spring. One of my favorite units of the American Revolution is the Maryland infantry. There were eight regiments of Maryland regulars raised during the war. I’ve painted a fair number of them for my 28mm American Revolution projects. I consulted Lefferts’ book on uniforms of the American Revolution and learned that in 1777, most of the Maryland units had blue coats faced red, so I was good to go. I decided the rest of our guy’s attire could be ad hoc, begged, borrowed and stolen as he could get them.

In any case, he’s done. I don’t remember too many things I’ve painted I’ve been more pleased with. I’m eyeing my next project. I have a nice Andrea 54mm Richard Sharpe figure from the Bernard Cornwell series that is crying out for paint. From the storming of Badjaoz I think.