July Painting Totals

I started the month strong, whipping through over 200 minis in the first two weeks. Then summer interfered. I haven't painted anything since. Here, then, are my painting totals for July.

10mm ACW Confederates, 100 infantrymen
28mm ACW Union, 92 infantrymen
15mm Napoleonic French, 24 infantrymen.

So that's a total of 216 figures this month. Not bad, but not the productive month I had hoped for.

Minifigs Napoleonic French Infantry

Sash and Saber ACW Project Chugs Along

It has been a few months since I started my 28mm ACW project, and I've found it slow going. I might have spoiled myself last summer with my 1809 Napoleonics, because these Union infantry made me feel like I was painting the same thing. Over and over. Each infantryman has, for example, five different shades of blue.

I finished my last eight sticks of Union infantry today and decided to do some basing. I'm using 3mm Litko bases with a 30mm frontage and a 40mm depth. This way I don't use much more frontage than I have on my 15mm figures, where each base has 25mm frontage.

All 212 Union infantry, ready to base

I use Elmer's School Glue to attach my figures to their painting sticks. It provides a good enough bond that they don't fall off, but it's weak enough that I can snap them right off when I begin basing. I use Elmer's Glue All to affix the figures to their permanent bases. I used to use wood glue, but whenever I decided to rebase, I was tearing figures off at their ankles. Glue All allows me to eventually break up the bases if I so choose.

All 212 Union infantry, based

An hour later all the figures were based. I have ten stands of regimental command and 43 stands of infantry. Tomorrow I'll begin flocking the bases, a much longer process.

Old Glory 10mm ACW Infantry

Last month this blog was all Napoleonics; this month, apparently, it's all ACW.

I've been spending a lot of time painting Old Glory's 10mm line this month, and I don't really have a reason to do so. I have large armies in 15mm for Fire and Fury. I'm working on a 28mm army for Guns at Gettysburg. So why am I wasting time on 10mm figures?

It's the look of the thing. If I were starting all over again, I would definitely use these figures for my grand tactical games. The infantry below are mounted on Fire and Fury sized bases, and they just look great, like actual bodies of troops.

And they're super fast to paint. I painted 20 strips of Confederate infantry last weekend--100 soldiers--in just under 10 hours. And I wasn't just slopping on the paint. You can see those figures below. Between the strips and the small size, these are very easy figures to paint.

Union Infantry

Union Infantry

Confederate Infantry

Confederate Infantry

The only big complaint I have about the OG10mm line is the flags. I don't like painting flags. But as these pictures show, I think they can look good. Remember that these figures appear at about four times life size.

More Sash and Saber ACW Infantry

I just finished another batch of Sash and Saber Union infantry. These add sixty more painted figures. Now I just have 32 more Federal infantry to paint before I start basing!

The twelve poses in this batch.

Close-up of some poses. All figures in this batch got dark hair.

All sixty painted figures. These took me about 20 hours to paint.

Backlog of figures awaiting bases. 140 down, 32 to go.

I'm working on the last batch of figures right now. Hopefully I can spend next weekend basing these up.

The Sash and Saber figures are beautiful and a joy to paint. And I got them for $.50 apiece.