Napoleonic & ECW wargaming, with a load of old Hooptedoodle on this & that


Sunday 14 October 2012

ECW - High-Ups #1

It's half term at my son's school, so we have some plans to get away, and spend a couple of days visiting Loch Ness and Culloden. The plans are a bit vague - well, not so much vague as flexible. Even people with no real experience of Scotland will realise that such activities as these are heavily dependant on the weather. The latest idea is that, since the short-term forecast is iffy, and - more specifically - since the recent deluge is likely to have reduced the entire Highland area to a vast bog, we will go later in the week.

I thought I would take advantage of the spare time by painting a couple of general officers for the ECW. Some serious work has gone into planning for the production of my units of foot and horse, and - predictably - the easier bits, the generals and the artillery, which can be picked off in odd moments, have fallen behind.

Since this is all new to me, the first few such figures are a bit of a learning exercise. I decided to produce one test figure from each of the 3 principal brands of figure - Les Higgins, Hinton Hunt and Kennington/SHQ. Further, for this first series I am going to mount each figure on the "correct" (i.e. the same) make of horse, just to get the idea. Later, the intention is to mix and match pretty freely in this respect.


The first figure is the SHQ one - this is a fairly routine cavalry officer from the range, but he paints up well as a High Up. So here is Sir William Brereton, looking suitably belligerent. SHQ are relatively modern castings, with crisp detail, and are easy to paint, though the horses can require a lot of cleaning up first. My experience with Kennington Napoleonics taught me that their figures vary within the range in both height and stature, and that some have overscale hands, but the ECW cavalry are a superior breed all round. They are a very acceptable size match with the older 20mm ranges, though the infantry are a little chunkier. The swords are a bit sturdier than Higgins' ones, but that is not a bad thing for wargames figures.

Quite pleased with this - spare time permitting, some more should appear shortly.

8 comments:

  1. He looks well. I'm less enamoured of SHQ cavalry than I was, but that is mainly due to some iffy Napoleonics. The ECW fellas seem to be a different breed.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. There is a walking pose among the Napoleonic horses that looks somehow wrong - I haven't worked out why, but there is a camel-like, or pantomime-horse-like, quality to the animation. In fact they paint up quite nicely, but you can spot that pose a mile off. I drafted some in to make up the shortfall when NapoleoN apparently went out of business in the middle of a shipment intended for me. Thus I have a mixed unit with some NapoleoN French Chasseurs a Cheval mounted on Kennington pantomime horses - actually they look all right.

      Delete
  2. Great paintjob. This period is of special interest to me as we plan to have a 30yw diorama next year too.

    cheers
    Uwe

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Uwe - my painting style is very plain, because that is what I've always done, and because my occasional attempts to change it don't go very well!

      Regards - Tony

      Delete
  3. Fine command figure Tony.

    Hope the weather hold out for you.

    Regards,
    Lee.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Forecast not looking promising! - looks like we are currently hoping for Thursday... (and they were never seen again)

      Cheers - Tony

      Delete
  4. That's a lovely figure and paint job. Enjoy Culloden - surely one of the best visitors centres of its kind!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Ian - the mud could make Hadrian's Wall look like a bowling green!

      Delete