What a good paintjob can do for the castings (all of them) is wonderful.
Her Majesty’s Guards (or Household Division Troops) are a popular choice among collectors or simply aficionados whatever the level. It has much to do with that the daily exposure in such well know military procedures as the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, The handing of the keys at the Tower of London, and similar at Windsor castle. The more “touristic attraction” the more popularity in children minds… So, let it be.
Hardly original subject… but a CLASSIC IMHO. As seen in Facebook.Even with a bit of patience you can do it with Playmobils. (Those are my own).By the end of your “collecting life” you would have gone megalomaniac (well, a bit). Those are mine.
Imagination and craftsmanship on the tabletop. Nothing to do with the real thing of course… if you fire that gun it would go backwards?… NO of course it is a self reloading mechanism that remains in place and help reload… no limits I said… that is the stuff of legendary wargames!
Somehow creative… by DER ALTE FRITZ… seen in Facebook!Another view.
That glorious moment when the job is done!… a close look at the matt will show you the hard work and love put into those Toy Soldiers… Ready to March and Fight on the Tabletop!… and remember the main thing TOY SOLDIERS never die…
Those are not mine at all but I can understand the pride of the painter!
You won’t see many Spanish Soldiers on my web page because I do not collect the subject (and I was one of them for thirteen months and no particular glamour at all… really good Infantry if you ask me). Ten years later my little brother was in the Cavalry… no comments!
Those figures are converted Britain’s by Timothy Hyndman, the cavalry in the background are by Freddie Green. As seen in Facebook.
First two pics by John Firth and the last by John Clarke. All easy to see in Facebook if you go to A GENTLEMAN’S WAR group… I dutifully bought the rules by Howard Whitehouse… they are fun to read… but not what I do with 54mm Toy Soldiers… You need all sorts you know…
Those are very fine Toy Soldiers and excellently painted, I do not use mine with those rules, and I have to say they are more “historically collected” and only for display because I have them in 6mm too… and there is where I wargame…
French LancersRather fancy lancers…The officer is out of THE PRISONER OF ZENDA… aka Douglas Fairbanks Jr.
Seen in Facebook as usual… I am a fan of PW output… more in a few days I guess… inventive, craftsmanship and jolly good results!… Some of those Toy Soldiers are a 100 years old… so a little respect!
It is my absolute limit. Nothing interests me after the second Anglo-Boer War… or 1900 to be precise… even the tragic end of the guerrilla war and the concentration camps I found deeply distressing and not a matter of amusement at all. So be it. This is MY limit.
Funny, today I have a bit of time to write… well… the pic is to the point… by then I mixed and matched manufacturers… I did find DIXON horses fantastic coupled with FOUNDRY riders (but not exclusively… TO THE REDOUBT and OLD GLORY too!).
It was the apex of my involvement in wargaming on that scale, I had a moderate surplus of bits and pieces from here and there and I could easily change “heads” at will with my PROXON minidrill and vice… had a lot of horses of discarded projects (that I would use in fancy units as the mounted Regiment of the French Foreign Legion)… and life in the hobby was FUN.
I still used painting services for the rank and file, and only did paint myself “specials” or closer to my heart subjects. You see I had NO time enough to paint because my real life as an Architect used my time… and I have a family too!… so the only way was to organize, list, buy, get the parcels, customize, send the biggest part to the painters with full instructions… and paint a little myself.
I enjoyed those years of my hobby to the full because time was so scarce. I am older now… over seventy (bot my grandfather and father were dead at my age)… no longer can I have fantasies about long term projects… I’ve done that, been there, got the T-Shirt as they say… but surely enough those new technologies help me pass the time and share my experiences with other people with similar interests.
The Michigan Brigade of Volunteers is a pet subject (as the ACW is) and Custer was better served in the Civil War than in his “Indian times”… the famous 7th had NOT the same stamina as the wolverines… understandable too of course… I own more than a hundred volumes on the Little Big Horn and after reading them… you can have a moderate sympathy with Custer as a man doing his job… but the so called “Indian Wars” were frustrating from a military point of view.
That Custer is better known for his death in a NO WIN situation that for his campaigning in the ACW is one of those ironies in History.
Wow!… time to write without interruptions for a change!… count the present one as an extra Post. Hope you enjoy too.
There are probably one of the nicest toy soldiers around, Britain’s Cavalry are almost always splendid casts. Nowadays only REPLICA manages to get the spirit of them.
