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Nocturnium 409th, back on campagin!


mustardParty

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Fellow Guardsmen!

It's been a long time since my last report to Terran High Command! I hope the Emperor can forgive me. But the 409th is ready to emerge from winter quarters and hit the campaign trail once again. Real life demands not withstanding, I plan to get back to the business of putting more boots on the ground and shells in the air. I tried to find my old PLOG thread only to discover that it had been so long since my last update that it had been archived! Disgraceful! I'm fixing to keep this thread from suffering the same fate.

I have to admit, it's no coincidence that the arrival of 8th Edition and the new Guard dex coincide with this army coming off ice. The new regimental doctrines sound very fluffy and fun to play with. I plan to try them all out just for kicks since I run my own homebrew regiment.

Since it has been so long, like YEARS, since I last seriously posted, for those who don't know about the 409th, it's primarily an infantry based Guard regiment that is inspired by the American Civil War. I've seen random threads here and there on the old Intertrons in the past that were loosely inspired by ACW themes, and always had a mind to tackle it myself. I'm using a lot of third party kit which gets kind of expensive, but I think that this theme demands more than some simple head swaps to achieve the effect I'm going after. It's been a pretty long slog, but the 409th slumber'd for long enough and my boys have their dander up!

Anyway, I figured the best way to start the new thread is with a PARADE! Who doesn't love parades, especially military parades glorifying the Emperor! So, I'll start there with some beauty shots of the boys I have all painted up ready for battle:

Command Section:


Here's a couple shots of the ranking officers, the Senior Officer in the middle and two Junior Officers.
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And their Regimental Advisors:

Master of Ordnance, Astropath, a Fleet Officer and a Priest in there for good measure.
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And here's the CO with his command squad retinue:
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Bonus: Checkout my old count-as as Color Sergeant Kell in the back on the right - never got around to actually modelling the actual COLORS he was supposed to be entrusted with, but hes got the power fist and 'power' sword - the only chain sword in my army!


Also included for bonus fun, an Ordo Xenos Inquisitor I painted up about the same time as I was doing this regiment initially, in case he ever needed to commandeer the regiment on Inquisition business:
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I don't really remember where I found this guy, pretty sure he's some kind of Privateer Press mini.


Elites:


Well, I guess these guys are Elites now, which honestly I feel is not optimal, but oh well, gotta sell those stormtrooper sprues!

When I initially envisioned an ACW inspired army on the table I had thought I'd have entire platoons (in game terms) worth of infantry patterned in different uniform styles taken from famous civil war units. However, this is not as feasible as I foresaw from a cost and time standpoint. It became more practical to run Veteran squads in some of the more exotic unit patterns of the day, rather than try and run entire platoons this way. It just costs too much!! In-game it actually works pretty well as a way to distinguish Vet squads from your standard infantry squads, and easily explained from a fluff standpoint - as units gain seniority they appropriate unique attire befitting their veteran status.

Anyway my first Veteran squad is patterned after the famous Union Iron Brigade. They were also called the Black Hats since the appropriated Hardee hats as part of their uniform instead of the typical kepis and forage caps.
0p9jlV8.jpg

These guys are pretty much all Victoria Mini parts, but the heads are special. Steve Barber miniatures online has a massive range of historal minis for different eras and lots in the 28mm scale. And while historical 28mm is usually too small to be compatibile with heroic 28mm, they do have lot and lots of 28mm historic heads and their heads happen to scale extremely nicely with VicMini scuplts. They also work with GW as well, but mate with VicMini perfectly. I use the Steve Barber heads in this project extensively, they are a near perfect fit for this kind of conversion.

Here's more of the squad:
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The special weapons in initially modelled for this squad was melta, back when melta vets were the hotness. But I guess the hotness is plasma now, so I suppose I'm going to have to go back and bang out a few plasma Vets for the squad. The 'melta' arms are all VicMini and really look the part for the aesthetic.


Next Vet squad: these guys are patterned after the 11th New York Fire Zouaves. I really wanted to do some Zouaves units, but pretty much chickened out, since I don't really trust my greenstuff-fu, and no one out there is making baggy Zouave-style pantaloons in the 28mm heroic scale. So these guy are my compromise since they were a Zouave unit when they mustered in at the beginning of the war, and had a different uniform, a silk uniform that fell apart during their initial campaign! This is closer to the unit's second uniform, were they ditched their jackets and adopted dark trousers to replaces the baggy zouave pants that had disintegrated.
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Back in the old dex, (I'm talking 5th Ed. when I was heavy into planning this unit out,) There was no regiment restriction, and Harker was an interesting addition for a veteran squad. Zouaves drilled in light infantry open-order tactics - running these guys as light infantry infiltrating harassers was what I intended. This squad has sniper rifles - cheap and cheerful harassment weapons, inspired by the 'sniper' rifled muskets of the era. This squad is lead by my 'count-as' Harker. Is he even IN the next Dex or just the 8th Ed. index??
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Well, he's a cool conversion anyway, don't know if he'll find the table for a while.


And speaking of snipers, these guys can run as their own counts-as rattlings (although I do need a few more) or as part of a command squad for the BS3+. They are inspired by Berdan's 1st and 2nd US Sharpshooters. They were special regiments that recruited soliders who were proficient with the rifled arms of the day and could actually aim (most couldn't). They were used often as skirmishers at the divisional level instead of fighting in traditional two-rank battle lines.
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These guy are my own count-as Commissars. Every civil war regiment usually had a Sergeant Major, who was the senior NCO of the unit. Anecdotally these guys were known to be tough as nails and unflappable. In my fluff, these guys are senior NCO's who get inducted into special Officio Prefectus training programs and come out the other end as Sergeant Major Commissars. I always intended to get a couple actual Commissars painted up, but never got around. There's more I'd like to do for these guys to make them really stand out as Commissars on the tabletop.
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And here's another 5th Ed. relic: my counts-as Marbo.
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I think the Index still let's you run him?? But maybe its just Shadow Wars now? He was fun one to convert, but doesn't have a place right now in an 8th Ed. army. Pity.

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Troops:


And here's where the meat of the army is. My regular line infantry squads are my 'generic' Union infantry patterned guys. They aren't inspired by any one specific unit, just the typical volunteer infantry battle dress of the day.

So here's three squads:
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They are all modelled with a mix of GW and third-party kit. The fabric tunic torso that is my primary torso is supplied by Col Gravis over at Curious Constructs. This for me was a must-have to complete the look I was going for - the flack armored Cadian torso was just too much of a departure for the aesthetic. But the GW legs work well enough, even with the pockets, I'm simply not going to shave down every pair of legs! And this also kept the whole affair affordable since the legs were part of a big bulk eBay purchase for eons ago.

These squads are all modelled standing or knelling in a firing line, and I always envisioned them blobbed up as one big two-rank firing line pumping volley fire into a charing hored. Well I guess they can't blob up anymore, but they can still all get together and pretend:
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Also, don't forget the weapons specialists! The squads all got modelled with flamers, but I wanted a pool of specialist that could be subbed in, or squadded up as special weapons teams. Looking back and can't believe I only got these four painted up! There are at least five or six more boys with various specials sitting in the closet with but a primer coat on.
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To differentiate different infantry blobs I planned to model the squads differently - these next guys were supposed to be my 'objective getter' squads and are modelled firing on the move as if they were assaulting an enemy position:
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There's another squad of these guys that have only been primed sitting in foam. And apart from my 'objective getters' there was also going to be a 'forced march' blob of guys all modelled with rifles shouldered. They were going to be my flankers, being 'tactical genius'd' behind enemy lines - I guess they can be Tallarn'd behind enemy lines now, but I gotta finish them first! Probably have two 'forced-march' squads modeled just sitting there. But anyway, I might have new plans for a Tallarn detachment....


Ordnance:


And really, what would a Civil War inspired army be without some field pieces??? To me this was another essential component to selling the theme on the tabletop. So I have Heavy Weapon teams here, with a heavy ACW aesthetic:
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The GW autocannons actually work great on these light gun carriages, which are another Curious Construct gem. Pretty much all my HW teams are autocannons - that was where it was at back in 5th. I have probably about nine autocannon teams in various stages of painted-up'ness:

CkkNWbl.jpg

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Also, the regiment has a number of individual artillerists:
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They are painted with red trim and piping, which is how different service branches were noted in the Union army: Blue for Infantry, Red for Artillery, and Yellow for Cavalry.

I need artillerist for some of the other hardware:
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These 'lascannons' fit the look of my army fantastically and I got a handful of them from Col. Gravis' kickstarter ages and ages ago. Right now they are just free standing like those old school metal weapons teams so I need some individual boys to man them. I'd like to do proper based teams for these - one day.


I also need artillerists for my 'basilisk.'
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I have another one of these counts-as primed by never got a chance to paint it up. It's a totally third-party kit, but painted up looks OK. Honestly I've always been a little self-conscious about these ones - they aren't Forgeworld, they aren't GW, but they would be using Forgeworld rules, but those carriages are REALLY expensive fella! I'm happy to run them as stationary basilisks as long as the rule-of-cool is in effect.


I also need artilleriest for some ancient relic Rapier Laser-Destroyers:
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I've been holding onto one of these ancient metal paper weights since back when I was tender youth playing 2nd Edition in the back of my local FGS in high school. Found another on eBay and painted the pair up! Nice two gun Laser-Destroyer battery!

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Armor:


Yes, even though this is an ACW themed force, this is still the Imperial Guard, and that means TANKS.

But not many. Here are a pair of 'Chimeras'.
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I'm really pretty fond of these two old girls. These counts-as beauties are rather hard to come by now - they're from Spartan Games Dystopian Legions and I think that Spartan Games has discontinued this line, maybe even closed its doors? Not sure but these are impossible to locate now which does me a sad. I had always planned to get more of these chassis and make them the basis for any Chimera hull style vehicles that I wanted to incorporate. Oh well. Now I guess they really are relic Chimera's.


And finally the iconic Guard vehicle:
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That's right, even this infantry army wants a couple Leman Russes backing those battle lines. These are mostly your pretty standard Russ variants, with a minor barrel mod, mainly just to suit my own aesthetics.

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The command tank has a swallow-tailed gideon inspired by the cavalry guidons of the era. When the command tank is actually the Tank Commander on the table he gets the special Tank Commander colors inspired by Custer's personal battle flag.

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Command tank also has a vanquisher barrel swap. Too bad Vanquishers are still pretty sub-optimal. No str9??? Come on guys.

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Fine day for a scrap wouldn't you say?

Finally, why not some Executioners?
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These old style Executioner turrets have a nice fit with the army theme and I love the way they painted up. I don't have fancy weathering pigments or any skills with the oil based techniques, so all weathering is done with your basic paints and washes. This is something I'd love to expand into, but I'm generally much more in my comfort zone painting up grunts. That's what really drew me to the Guard in the first place and that's where I'm going to try and keep my focus.


Phew, that's a long post! Parade dismissed!

---

Wait, so I have plans for 409th coming soon including:

-paint ups of the outstanding, primer-only boys itching to get onto the table including three infantry squads, one artillery piece, more lascannons...

-a brand new Tallarn style detachment, with heavy Zouave inspirations....

-probably, like another tank, because the Leman Russ is such a handsome vehicle....


Nice time to be back in the hobby!

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Wow! That's an impressive collection you have there! They look great and the theme is on point and well executed!

 

Looking forward to seeing it grow more.

 

8th is definitely a good time to get back in. The drop of our new 'dex is just the icing on top! ;)

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Love it! Great job with the third party minis, Victoria and Gregor do some awesome sculpts. The ironclad Chimera are a nice touch.

 

Now you just need to find some Greybacks that have turned excommunicate traitoris. ;)

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Thanks guys, I'm really glad to be posting again and very grateful for your words of appreciation!

Like I said, I have some immediate plans for expansion with some low hanging fruit. There are a couple of squads that are already built, primed and ready for a paint job. Looks like two infantry squads at least:
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One of these is modled as an 'objective getter' squad, and the other is a marching squad, though it's more a route march and less of a forced march than I thought.

Here are a couple more marching guardsmen that needs to be finished:
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I also have a handful of weapons specialists that need a final paint job:
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And finally a few more artillerists:
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Beyond these easy opportunities, one thing I really wanted to see about revisiting was incorporating command sashes. These sashes were worn under the belt:
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They really add something to the look of these uniforms and in theory shouldn't be too hard to greenstuff right? So I've been trying a few on some existing minis. Man, I hate greenstuff.

It is very awkward to work with. Greenstuff seems to have a relatively long window of workability, but only a small window of tacky-ness where it will stick to something easily. Thats really been my biggest challenge - it seems really hard to get greenstuff to stick to what I want it to stick to and not stick to what I don't want it to stick to.

Here's a sash on a test model:
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I think it looks, OK. Probably better when it's painted up, it just kind of looks like a greenstuff rope around his waist kinda, just kind of a nondescript thing. I tried on my existing company commander:
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I don't know, I guess control will come with practice. Seems like an easy element to model but I was spending a lot of time trying to get these little slippery greenstuff snakes to behave.


I guess I'll get a lot of practice though, because one of the other larger, more longterm directions I want to take this project involves another serious stab at some Zouave style guardsmen. As I said before, no one seems to be making Zouave style pantaloons, so if I really want to go after the look, I gotta man up and do it myself. Not a bad thing, but I'm kind of impatient, and there's no way for this not to take a long time.

I feel like when you think of Zouaves, you think of the 5th NY:
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To me, this unit is what you think of when you think of AWC Zouaves - they are probably the most recognizable and widely known/recognized. They have those signature baggy pantaloons, short Zouave jackets and wear fez and turbans. So with that in mind I made an initial test model to gauge feasibility:
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I shaved down a pair of Cadian legs to remove the pockets and tunic, and just lumped some greenstuff on to see how it would look. The outcome is not the worst thing, but the texture was kind of lumpy. I've made a couple other attempts since then as well:
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And more:
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It's kind of obscured on this shot, but I also tried my hand at doing the short Zouave jacket. I don't know if it will ultimately be feasible - I just made a simple form and pressed it in place and tried to smooth the contact points.

Is there also something to be said for a minimal conversion:
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I mean the Cadian legs are already baggy kind of, by VicMini standards anyway, and those would be the scale of the arms I would use, and the torso would be the same scale too. Maybe just a little bit of greenstuff is all that's need.

Of course we're not talking about the boots yet. Zouaves all wore those fabulous gaiters and the Cadian legs all have boots only. Haven't begun how I'll approach that yet.

Of course VicMini makes wonderful legs without tunics that I could convert for this purpose that have gaiters modeled:
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But it would almost seem sacrilegious to mar a set of those. Plus, I already have the Cadian legs - I'd need to get more of the third-party ones....  Ultimately something on this scale may simply be above my skill level at the moment. I feel like I'm spending a lot of time getting frustrated with really really tacky greenstuff for 5 minutes then greenstuff that won't stick to anything after that.

Anyway, that's all that's fit for print right now. I'll be musing over how to tackle this for a bit.

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Thats looking good

id be tempted to cut off the belt and try and save the buckle then gs the sash. When thats dry glue the buckle back on and gs a thin belt over the top.

 

Letting the first lot dry saves trying to do it all in one go. If you keep both layers thin it wont look too bulky

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Are you using some kind of lubricant with your sculpting tools when using greenstuff? If not, it's going to be a nightmare working with it. 

 

I too like the command sashes and made one on a Vostroyan ordinance officer. 

 

Du0PWKF.jpg

 

The trick is to making it look like it's under the belt

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Some really fantastic work in this thread - very well done! :)

 

With respect to your GS command sashes - superglue sticks to both cured and uncured GS like nothing else. If you put nearly-cured GS that you've cut into the shapes you require onto the model, put a tiny dab of superglue onto the model first and the GS will stick and cure instantly at that point, letting you then arrange the drape of the sash as you wish whilst the GS is quite firm but still malleable (and therefore less prone to smoothing by accident).

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Thanks for the replies!

 

 

Thats looking good
id be tempted to cut off the belt and try and save the buckle then gs the sash. When thats dry glue the buckle back on and gs a thin belt over the top.

Letting the first lot dry saves trying to do it all in one go. If you keep both layers thin it wont look too bulky

 

UltraRich,  thanks, I probably do need to be thinking about these in stages,  trying to do it all in one go has been a frustrating effort.  I don't think I want to cut the belts off mini's I've already built and painted, but that inspired me to try something similar.  I made a press mold out of GS to capture the belt buckle.  I'm going to try covering the whole waist with the sash and then up a thin belt with a GS belt buckle over it and see how that looks.

 

 

 

Take a look at inso's thread he has really got a handle on GS.

 

Thanks walter I'll take a look!

 

 

Are you using some kind of lubricant with your sculpting tools when using greenstuff? If not, it's going to be a nightmare working with it. 

 

I too like the command sashes and made one on a Vostroyan ordinance officer. 

 

Du0PWKF.jpg

 

The trick is to making it look like it's under the belt

 

Wow, that looks really great, I'd love to get to the point where I have that kind of control!  I have been using lubricant - I use vaseline and switch off with that and water on my little push stick/flattener.  Water is more forgiving since it drys up - when I use vaseline it tends to get everywhere very fast and the work piece loses all its tackyness and workability. 

 

 

Some really fantastic work in this thread - very well done! :smile.:

 

With respect to your GS command sashes - superglue sticks to both cured and uncured GS like nothing else. If you put nearly-cured GS that you've cut into the shapes you require onto the model, put a tiny dab of superglue onto the model first and the GS will stick and cure instantly at that point, letting you then arrange the drape of the sash as you wish whilst the GS is quite firm but still malleable (and therefore less prone to smoothing by accident).

 

Hi Major_Gilbear - I hear you on superglue.  I've tried that and it works well and I suspect that is where I'll need to go.  Supergluing greenstuff is still kinda scary for me since it bonds instantly - if I mess up that's it!. I suspect I'll need to use this technique a little more though to control the draping that I'm trying to do.

Edited by mustardParty
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  • 5 years later...

Well it’s been a minute hasn’t it fellas!

 

Sorry to necro such an old post, but I’m back at it again, and this post is the perfect jumping off point.  

 

I fell away from the hobby for a few years, staying busy with all of those real-life distractions like having a third kid, etc.  But as luck would have it my nephew is coming into the age, with questions about my little army guys, lore questions, questions about the Emperor, questions about Space Marines.  His curiosity has rekindled the heat, and I have found myself back at the hobby table, shaking off the dust from my kolinsky sable brushes and green stuff shapers.

 

So now that we’ve been skirmishing with my Blood Angles and Guard for a little bit in 9th Ed, here comes 10th Ed to hype me all the way back into full gear - here I am, ready to try again where I left off last. 

 

Just as a re-cap,  I started this army all the way back in 5th Ed, with the crazy idea to bake a very American Civil War era themed force.  AWC being an area of personal fascination all my life, when I decided to start a guard army I determined to link these interests, informing the visual and organizational characteristics of my army. My guys have their own in-universe background and home world and society and all that jazz - all this in service of a basic theme: Civil Warsy space soldiers standing shoulder to shoulder as a human wall to shield humanity from the horrors of the universe.

 

OK so that brings us back to where I left off last.  I was humming away with the general theme and  things were looking pretty good.  But I had a particular flavor of ACW unit that I hadn’t been able to source, and I was running into my own limitations in terms of what I was able to achieve on my own.  I’m talking of course about the flamboyant zouave units of the ACW.  

 

These units captivated the public of the time with their dashing uniforms and their daring and athletic drill.  It’s definitely a unit i wanted to tackle, but I just ran out of steam.

 

But now I’m all steamed up!  I’ve been back at it taking my time.  The signature feature in the look for zouaves are those striking pantaloons.  Nothing out there in third-party land really approached the look of those but the concept did seem more or less doable with green stuff. Still my first time around I really found it pretty difficult to get the look I was after.  This time I took my time and I had to practice how I handled my green stuff - I iterated several times before I started getting results that seemed closers to what I was trying for.

 

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Now we’re getting somewhere. Only took like 5 years, nice.  At this point I had also worked out how to tackle the belt sash under the belt. I found that I had the best luck by using my saw blade above and below the belt to crave a little notch - that gave me just enough registration to guide my little green stuff snake. I also decided to go for the short jacket that was characteristic of Zouave uniforms as well.  Felt like these were generally pretty hit or miss but reasoned that mostly a lot of the detail is obscured by arms and such anyway.

 

Sz5WNHj.jpg

Now we’re getting a bit of force going here.  It really took a while to get to this point - I’d probably sculpt a set of legs only to scrap them and start over the next time I sat down in the name of iteration.

 

iVGbqIc.jpg

 

So this is where we can start to see how the whole thing starts coming together in a more complete way.  They have their heads added (historical Zouave fez and turban heads from Steve Barber minis) and the look is really starting to come together.  Also about this time I decided leaving the stock Cadian sculpt boots wasn’t going to cut it - I had to make things harder on myself and shave them down so I could green stuff the leg gaiters Zouaves typically wore.  There were some other things I wanted to do with this unit - Zouaves fought in loose order, dashing from cover to cover and I wanted to reflect this with some guys modeled at a dead run, or aggressive gait, which required some leg surgery on the Cadian legs.

 

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Just a shot from the back where you can see how I’m trying to model the short jacket and blend it back into the back of the mini.

 

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I think about this time the NEW Cadian Shock Troopers must have come out.  I do like how they reworked the proportions, it like they looks a little taller, a little leaner, and the heads look a tad smaller and everything just comes out looking more modern.  I’m sure that’s why I decided to explore what I can do to make this take even longer.  

 

By shaving down the leggings and adding a mil or sprue, and sawing off the torso from the belt and doing the same, I found I could and a little hight to the models and I though it looked proportionally similar to the new Cadians.  Ultimately this is not something I think I’ll be doing on a widespread basis to new additions because I think the VicMini parts and historical head also do a good job of being proportionally closer to something that I like for my little mens, but I did try it out a little more with this squad and some of them did come out looking pretty neat.

 

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You can see here the color bearer and the squad sergeant getting the treatment.  I found it fun to be able to reposition the torso without changing the seating against the leg piece - you can see the color bears has a twist of his spine modeled as he thrusts his flag forward.  Likewise with the sergeant’s saber.

 

MchLehL.jpg 

 

Let’s get a group shot of how things are going.  Note the double color bears - Union regiments had two color bearers in their regiments, one with the national colors and one carrying the state colors.  Let’s just go all the way if we’re coming this far.

 

Below you can see all the final details like their kit and waist sash ends being added.

 

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AND FINALLY, we’re finally ready for a test model.  I was able to prime them a few weeks ago, and I’ve been working my way as time allows on an initial color test model to see how it all looks coming together.  And you know I have to start with those pants:

 

gHPjOX8.jpg

 

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And I have to say, after all this time, I do feel like I got there with them.  Painted up they do a convincing job of achieving that Zouave look.

 

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Didn’t take me too much longer to get some paint on the rest of the model to see how it all looks combined up.  I hope to get him finished up this week for a full view of an actual finished mini. 

 

This was a long journey.  I don’t have any delusions that I’ve become some Golden Deamon champion sculptor since I first attempted this like 8 years ago or something, but I feel a solid sense of accomplishment in what I have been able to achieve within my own capabilities.  A far cry from the desperate messes i was making in my first draft…. I’m encouraged now to push on and now that I have semi regular skirmishes with my nephew I like to see more and more finished little mens hitting the table.

 

Maybe if my kids can go to bed at a decent time tonight I can finish this first test mini and if I do I’ll be sure to report back with the results.  I have some other units that I have also started working on along side these guys which I will also try and post on this week as well as the hobby juice flow once again.

 

Thats all for now troopers!

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On 9/11/2023 at 2:23 PM, SvenIronhand said:

I like the colorscheme; it reminds me of Zoauves in the ACW.

Thank you Sven, exactly what I'm going for here!

 

Found some time to finish off my initial model - the colors feel pretty close to the source material, he looks the part well enough:

 

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eWu2nwH.jpg

 

wzzw3RA.jpg

 

Tried to to go nuts, I'll have to paint a lot of these guys, and there's already a ton of effort that goes into the conversion but it painted up OK. I wanted to kind of go as far as possible with this project, go for broke with the conversion and see how close to the historic Zouave uniforms I could get while keeping it connected to 40k - but one thing I didn't attempt was the jambieres, the leather wraps that go over the gaiters at the calf.  I see source material where both are depicted, and it was just one detail I didn't have in me.  Maybe next time.

 

So one down, 59 to go!

 

 

 

 

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