Pigs at Risk!!

 After the summer hiatus (no new post since July, but a lot of painting as you'll see in the future), something new at last, and a bit different from my usual warbands.

Thanks to fellow forumers at Benno's, I've recently discovered a MDF buildings manufacturer called Blotz, with an interesting 20mm range - which is rather rare since I only new one so far. Among other things, They propose a Dark Age houses series, which should be great with Viking, medieval or even Fantasy figures. 

I assembled and painted the first buildings a few weeks ago. Then I searched my figures collection and found a few peasants, farm animals and medieval soldiers, so that today, I can show you the last Philotep's production, in Mini-o-rama: 

 

Let's start with the beginning... A long time ago, in a small village somewhere in Europe, lived a poor farmer with his wife. They had two grown-up sons, almost men, a precious manpower for the farm's work. They lived all together in a tiny but nice thatched house, and were fortunate enough to owe a few pigs.

One morning, they were alerted by the unusal noise of the pigs. - What's happening ? said one boy to the other - Let's have a look, answered the other. They went out in the courtyard to discover that some brigands were just robbing the pigs! And the men looked dangerous - probably some mercenaries looking for food.

 Too bad their dog had just died, he would have warned them earlier.

(technical comment: the truth is that I have not painted any dog figure yet, I will put one on my todo list, I promise)

- Dad, dad, help! shouted the younger boy, they're trying to get into the storehouse, I won't be able to defend it alone!

Fortunately, the farmer was working in a field near the house, and he was back very soon, ready to engage the looters himself.

 

The mercenaries were fierce, but the farmer much stronger, and his sons courageous. Step by step, the looters were losing ground. Taking benefit of the thieves' distraction, the stolen pig turned back and run straight into its pig pen. At this sight, the armed men lost their motivation and started to retreat, not without insulting the farmers and the pigs.

- They might return, said the farmer's wife, more of them, hungry and dangerous. But for today, I am very proud of you all.

And so we leave the whole family in their small farm, in a happy end this time.

Will the mercenaries return ? How many of them ? Will there still be some pigs, or will they have been all eaten ? And what about the dog ?

You will find answers to all this questions and many more one day in the next episode: The pigs at risk 2!! (or not).

Oh, credits:

- farmers by Strelets, Valdemar and Zvezda

- farmer's wife by Hät

- looters by Orion, Strelets and Accurate

- pigs by Pegasus

- buildings by Blotz

Every pig used in this story has not been harmed. You may have noticed that I didn't paint them pink - not because they are dirty, but because the actual pink pigs that we see today are the result of crossings between European and Asian pigs that started during the 18th century. The medieval pigs were probably darker, grey brown or black (source: Michel Pastoureau in Libération, 2018).

Viking shieldwall

 I have been working on my Viking army these days, and painted enough warriors to assemble 8 Bd elements for DBA.

Here you are the result:

 

 You'll spot figures from several manufacturers: Strelets, Zvezda and Emhar.

 I still need 4 elements for a complete DBA army. But my first purpose is to gather a mythological army for HOTT, so the 4 last elements should be:

- 1 frost giant

- 1 giant Wolf (such as Fenrir)

- 1 element of Dwarves

- 1 element of mounted Valkyries

The first two elements are done already, and I'm working on the last two. See you next time to have a look at the whole army :)

Japanese bridge

Hello, Happy New Year (it's never too late) !

The beginning of the year is the perfect moment to:

- have a look at the previous year, and write a summary of what was achieved, and what wasn't

- make plans for the year to come

You know what ? I have no desire to develop any of these items - I would have the feeling to be at work and to be compelled to write the annual review and the planned workload. And since this blog is about a hobby, I decided to have NO plan and to paint whatever I like... as usual :D

So, the year will begin with something different: a new civilization, and improved scenery.

Today, we have a look at a small Japanese bridge.

I have been deeply interested in Japan for years, and I have been lucky enough to visit some parts of Honshu (the main island), particularly the Tokyo and Kyoto areas. And since I am also interested in History, I appreciated to visit castles, temples and traditional houses, and also the wonderful gardens in which you can sometimes see some typical curved bridges such as this one:

The wooden Japanese bridges are often painted vermilion red, like the tori, because that colour indicates a passage between the world of the Humans and the world of the Gods.

Hence the color of my bridge, a mix of red and orange.

On this bridge, we can see 4 warrior monks standing their ground against invisible enemies (Redbox figures).

I realised, after writing this post, that my inspiration obviously came from Japanese woodblock prints. I'm a big fan of ukiyo-e, particularly the Edo period, and among all, my favourite artist is Kuniyoshi.

 Here you are a couple of prints that he designed:

Kuniyoshi 1839 Biography of Yoshitsune - Gojo bridge

Kuniyoshi 1839-41Yoshitsune fighting Benkei on Gojo bridge

The triptych and the diptych have the same subject: they represent Yoshitsune, a young boy and future famous samurai et fight with Benkei, a Sohei (warrior monk) who will become his most faithful ally.
 

Let's consider now the technical side of today's pictures. It's good to have a small bridge, but you also need a river if you want to take decent pictures!  Therefore, I had to dig in a plate of polystyrene, add some sand, paint, then add some flocking, and paint again... 3 days work for just  few pictures! Now you know why I haven't posted anything since Christmas :)

I hope you like the result :)

See you soon.

Edit 10/01/2020:

To answer a question asked by Eric, The bridge comes from a kit by Sarissa Precision Ltd. They have a very interesting range of 20mm buildings, but it would be very nice if they decided to adapt their whole 28mm range to 20mm :)

And I also added some woodblock prints reproductions above.

2020 Advent Calendar: Day 14

I needed one more sunny scene, and maybe this feeling is shared by those of you who live in the northern hemisphere.

For day 14 of the Advent Calendar, we discover Normans sunbathing on the shores of Sicily.

The Normans are not only known for the invasion of England and the battle of Hastings in 1066. Some Norman mercenaries began to arrive in South Italy during the 10th century AD. At first, they served either for the Lombard nobles or the Byzantines. After a few years, they became strong enough to rule several counties and in 1061, they crossed the Strait of Messina and began to invade Sicily, that was ruled by several Muslims lords. We see here three Norman knights on the shore near Messina, standing but ready to fight.

On a technical point of view, the most funny thing to do in this scene was to create a credible Mediterranean Sea for the background. I must admit that I don't know what the area of Messina looks like - maybe my sea is closer to the Atlantic Ocean :D

Hope you like them anyway. See you tomorrow !

2020 Advent Calendar: Day 9

When winter was here, you had snow everywhere. And, hidden behind the snowy trees... Invaders!!

For Day 9, we are full of fear as we discover... Vikings !!!

Ok, I probably watch TV too much. Why would Vikings attack a village in winter ? It's far easier to raid in summer... That's true, but for an Advent Calendar, winter scenes are very nice, so... I'm the boss here, my Vikings have to attack this village right now, and that's all.

So much violence... maybe some more civilians, next time ?

2020 Advent Calendar: Day 6

Another time, another latitude, no snow for Day 6 of this Advent Calendar. Let's go to Middle-East! Today we have a look at some medieval Muslim foot soldiers.

These men are part of the Ayyubid army, in the 12th century AD. The Ayyubid dynasty was a Muslim Dynasty founded by Saladin who abolished the Fatimid caliphate in 1171. Starting in Egypt, the Ayyubid created a vast empire including Syria, a part of north Africa, Hejaz, Yemen. They also conquered most of the Crusader states, including the kingdom of Jerusalem.

We can see them in action at the entrance of a small village.

Wait, wasn't there a goat ? I think we already saw this one in the pages of this blog.

The figures have been painting from time to time in the past three years, the last ones were made in 2020. They are meant to be part of my Ayyubid army against the crusaders.

Some Ayyubid knights can be seen here.

My (complete) crusader army is there.

The regular visitors will have recognized the goat that travels through time and space, rarely seen these days (I don't remember the last time :)).

The newest element in this scene is the house, that I've painted yesterday. Simple but nice (I think). This is a resin model that I bought a long time ago. I will try to create (scrath-building) some more to have a real village.

Hope you're not fed up with this calendar. See you tomorrow for day 7 :)

2020 Advent Calendar: Day 4

In the first post of this Calendar, I explained that I recently painted figures just because I had a color scheme in mind, and not necessarily to complete existing armies. This is the case today, because we will follow the steps of two warriors lost in the forest, and they won't find their friends...

Here you are, the fourth image of the calendar.

These two Housecarls might be Saxons, or Danes, in the north of England at the beginning of the 11th century AD. They got lost in the forest, and discovered by chance an old Neolithic site, a circle of huge vertical stones named a cromlech.

These guys are carrying two-handed axes. They are probably the ancestors of some Galloglaich who will walk on the same land 500 years later - see here if you want to know more about them.

A technical thought about photographs: I took pictures in the same conditions as usual, i.e. with two lamps on each side to lighten the scene. The result was so bright that I found necessary to lower light and contrast, in order to locate my guys in northern England... I was probably influenced by the TV series Vikings, in which the sky is mostly cloudy.

Hope you like them :)

See you tomorrow.

2020 Advent Calendar: Day 1

 Hello, dear fellow readers!

After a lot of activity during Orctober, it seems that I needed a break before posting anything new on this blog. A break during the whole of November... but I wasn't inactive. After focusing on a single project, I decided to paint any figure I wanted, just for the pleasure of melting colors, as many colors as possible. And here we are, I now have enough figures, single or groups, to show you something different every day... and the timing is perfect, since we are in December, so this year, you will find an Advent Calendar in these pages.

Remember that an advent calendar is a way to help children to wait for Christmas... I hope it will work :)

Let's start with the figures for Day 1:

These guys are Swiss halberdiers from the 15th century - exactly the sort of men that fought against the army of the Duke of Burgundy. So let's say that, in this winter atmosphere, they are looking for food in the woods around the city of Nancy, in 1477.

A closer look:

It looks like they eventually caught birds for dinner today.

Hope you like them (the guys, and also the birds) :)

See you tomorrow for the next image.

Late Crusader Army complete

Good morning everyone!

Today is one of the rare moments in this hobby when I can say that an army is finished. It's been a long work once again, mainly because I didn't stay focused on the same subject very long, but here you are, my Late Crusader army for DBA and L'Art de la Guerre.

 This army list represents Crusaders from the end of the 12th century to the very beginning of the 14th. it's the list you need when you want to paint Templars, and that's what I wanted :)

Please note that I didn't follow any official army list, I built a troop with the figures I had, and most important, the figures I wished to paint.

Though not based, the figures can be seen as 13 elements. Let's have a look at each element, starting with the most vulnerable.

• Maronite and Syrian archers - 2 elements

Left to right: 2 Hät figures (El Cid Andalusian infantry), 1 Italeri (Saracens), 1 Orion (Byzantine infantry 10th-13th)

These archers have already been photographed in 2018, you can find the related post here.
They will be used as light infantry with bows. You will notice that one of the previous archers has been replace by a new one on the far right of the picture - I needed another man with a composite bow instead of an ordinary bow (in case you're worrying, no, the previous archer has not been deleted, he will be in use in another unit some day :)).

• Crossbowmen - 1 element

Left to right: Zvezda (Livonian Knights with head swap), Italeri (Crusaders) with head swap, Accurate (HYW English) and Zvezda (Livonian)

To say the truth, I need at least two elements, but I can't find my Strelets Medevial crossbowmen set in the cellar, maybe I've never bought it! This unit was first designed to be part of a Teutonic knights army, but that project was delayed, so...

• Templar Foot Sergeants - 3 elements

All Strelets (Military Order Warriors)

3 elements of heavy foot soldiers, painted as Templar sergeants. Most of them have a dark grey coat of arms, but not all, I wanted them not to be too uniformed. The rectangular shields looked strange to my eyes, I couldn't find any illustration with that sort of weapon, so I cut them to have triangular forms. 4 of them have already been displayed here.

•  Turcopoles - 1 element

Strelets figures (Turcopoles)

The Turcopoles were light cavalry equipped mainly with bows - one element needed.

•  Bedouin Light Horse - 1 element

Hät figures (Andalusian Light Cavalry)

 The other Auxiliary cavalry unit is composed of Bedouins. I chose to represent them without bows this time.

•  Templar Knights - 2 elements

Italeri figures (Templars)

 The Templar knights form the bulk of my Crusader army, so I painted 2 units of Templar Knights, and I wish to add more in the future - every medieval wargamer wants to have as many knights as possible.+Some of them were painted as early as 2017, see here, in a fight against Ghulams.

Regarding accuracy, the armor of these men, particularly the helmets, are a mix of 12th and 13th century fashion - let's say that I have an early 13th century band of knights, some of them being conservative. So I have an early Late Crusader army :)

• Hospitaler Knights - 1 element

Some more Italeri knights

When you're a bit fed up with white knights, why don't you try to paint some black? That's the magic of the military orders. Not that easy to paint, and the picture above doesn't show much. I chose black and not red, because the helmets and kite shields refer to the early period.

• Crusader knights - 1 element

Italeri figures (Crusaders)

 All knights were far from all being military order knights, and it's good to use some color when you don't want to paint them white, nor black.

Now that makes 12 elements. I also wanted a command element

• General

Left to right: Hät (El Cid Spanish command), Valdemar, Hät (El Cid Spanish command)

 To identify these guys as a General, I needed an impressive commander (probably reading prayers, which must not be very easy on a battlefield), a holy man (yes the others are holy too, and yes, a Franciscan among Templars is probably a bit strange, but it was cool to paint) and a banner - Red cross on white (croix de gueules sur champ d'argent) is probably a cliché but I think it works well.

A few more (messy) pictures:

Hope it was worth the wait :)