Building the British
Time for another update on Project Platoon! Here is the progress so far. in the lead by far is Christy, she’s only waiting to finish off the last of her vehicles and troops before she’s ready. In joint second we have Mark and Paul both who have squads assembled but not quite the full Platoon. Mark has tanks ready and Paul is close with a good two squads ready to go. Jasper has a good two squads done with more coming. Ah but I hear you ask, what of Guy, the Editor? What of me?
We’ve been working hard to finish off WSS 59, our ‘Guthrum and the Great Host’ themed issue. Behind the scenes the task of building my sections of British troops, the first section have been well under way since before Christmas. I now have close to a Platoon, although most are still in ‘snow camouflage’ from the white spray paint.
I’d chosen the Warlord plastic infantry with a mix of Artizan Designs. I like working with plastic for the conversion possibilities, so expect heads from all sorts turning up including a few spare Warlord British Zulu War, Victrix Napoleonic and Perry Zouave head (each complete with ‘Tommy’ helmet naturally!). I guess I like to ‘play’ with my models as I assemble them and look at the possible permutations and combinations.
So where did I start? Well after cleaning up the torsos, i started gluing the weapons into the right hands, using the guide which came with the box, ensuring rifle arms joined with rifles etc. Once they had set, I experimented with positions for the final models. When satisfied with the positioning, I glued the left arm in place and let it dry. Only then did I attach the right arm (and weapon) to the body. All going well they should meet up fine, or require a little bit of shaving on the right arm pit. Then I added the gear and backpack. Lastly I added the head. I always like to do the head last so I can ensure a good pose for it. Is he looking down the barrel of his gun or looking over to one side? I found gluing the head first just doesn’t look right or end up facing an odd direction. Now they are ready of spraying and basing, which I’ll cover in my next blog entry.
