Olicana's Peninsular Project: French artillery battery (14:1:18)

[olicana]

Looking back on my blog I've done nothing for my Peninsular project in over a year – how time flies.

Considering the lead is all there to paint – I did my usual thing and bought almost everything at once (about 60 units) – I'm not sure how I've allowed this to happen.

Losing one's mojo is easy done but, that's not what's happened, I've just moved on to other stuff to avoid doing it. This is not usual for me because I'm generally quite dogmatic when it comes to projects.

Why do I struggle with Napoleonics? I want to game it, I read about it all of the time, I'm inspired until it comes to raising a brush. Then I raise a brush easy enough to do commissions without a second thought. I don't dislike painting Napoleonic stuff for others – JUST FOR ME! WHY?

Now I'm back on the horse and I need to get motoring. I need to get enough painted to play with. I've just finished a new unit and started on some French.

Here are the 50th Foot – as you can see they even come out OK when I can be bothered.



More pics here:
https://olicanalad.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/back-on-horse.html

[Mindenbrush]

I think it is the detail - lacing etc - that looks daunting but is really no different than any other period.

Your Renaissance armies are very colourful which takes time. Maybe cut down on the number of figures you do at a time and have on the painting table so that they get done quicker and the looming lead mountain is not visible?

[olicana]

Numbers isn't a problem. I paint for a living so batches of 50 + are not uncommon for me.  I paint a lot of Napoleonic commissions every year and I do so without a murmur - it's painting them for myself that seems impossible to gain any traction on.

I hope to do better over the next 12 months. I hope to break the back of it by painting a unit a week. Fingers crossed - well legs anyway, my fingers might be better employed and with my legs crossed I'll not need to get up as regularly

[sukhe_bator]

I have the same issues with a lot of historical periods. I find the desire to get it right makes the process more daunting. Hence I gravitate towards more esoteric periods where there is more guesswork involved, or go fantistorical - like my Game of Thrones, or LotR.
I find I have to be invested in the unit(s) to want to get them done. I start off with the basic colours first en masse, jackets, trousers, muskets, shakos and water bottles and then start concentrating on the more detailed parts in smaller numbers. That way I get a colour party completed, or a unit of Light infantry, etc. (the smallest portion of the unit/regiment I can get away with). Then I gradually add up the finished units and it encourages me to go on and complete the whole unit...
This only works if you have all the figures you require marshalled/assembled for painting, so not as helpful a method if you have large armies to do.
Don't get me started on cavalry  

[mellis1644]

I dont paint for a living or even come close to your skill levels... <sigh>

But for me I find painting is a feeling 'thing' and done for relaxation and interest. I have to be in the mood to do a project 'well' to my standards not yours <another sigh when I look at your work> and enjoy it. If you don't enjoy it you won't want to come back to it. As you are painting for a living I suspect that the same may be the case for yourself. You can motivate yourself to paint commissions as that's paid work, but just to do it for the joy of doing it will be very hard if you are not in the mood for it.

Having a target or a project goal which you need the figs for may help, or reading around the subject/watching tv shows of the period (Sharpe etc.). Something to make it interesting and spark the imagination is my suggestion.

[Yankeepedlar01]

If you are painting for others, including Napoleonics, and regularly have batches of 50 on the table perhaps your own are just a Project too far? Too much of the same might just prove the straw to the camels back?

[TheBlackCrane]

I have the same issues with a lot of historical periods. I find the desire to get it right makes the process more daunting. Hence I gravitate towards more esoteric periods where there is more guesswork involved

This.

Don't get me started on cavalry

Definitely this! (And I like cavalry armies...)


I've tried getting into Napoleonics myself. Likewise I want to game it, I read about it all the time, but when it comes to constructing armies and doing the painting...

I think I've got it down to 2 things. Firstly is rules. I can't find any I click with. GdeB I tried once but for the life of me I just could not get my head round having different numbers of figures on bases and different numbers of bases to battalions depending on the period of the Napoleonic Wars. The idea that I had to have say 8 figures on an early Russian base but then only 6 on a later one, for whatever reason it just stumped me - so that killed off my foray.

The other is the sheer number of variations, even your standard British redcoat - different lacing for different units, but then I can't re-use a unit for a battle if it wasn't there because it's got the wrong facings (well I can, but my brain says I can't!), and flank companies, centre companies etc etc. It just gets too complicated. I'm sure it isn't, but it seems like it.

So. I have a plan.
The fringe wars. (Ok, not so much fringe in some cases, but less mainstream at least). Trying to get into Napoleonics by doing bits around, for example early Russians versus Ottomans, and then add some early French and I can do French in Egypt or Suvorov, that sort of thing. At the other end of the period, the Belgian Revolution. In the middle, Swedes, Danes etc. Still Napoleonics but possible esoteric enough to maintain interest, and small enough that one doesn't get bogged down.

That's the plan at least!

[delbruck]

Perhaps you view Napoleonics as work. Maybe try some variation, like French Revolution or War of 1812.

[Phil Robinson]

If you are painting for others, including Napoleonics, and regularly have batches of 50 on the table perhaps your own are just a Project too far? Too much of the same might just prove the straw to the camels back?

I find that doing uniforms for the day job my First Carlist War stuff as definateley took a back seat whilst my dark age and 3rd century stuff has jumped to the front of the queue

[Captain Blood]

Because they’re boring, repetitive and also fiddly. Fatal combination.
How on earth people turn out these huge, beautifully painted Napoleonic armies is completely beyond me. I just can’t cope with them. You are not alone!

[NurgleHH]

Because they’re boring, repetitive and also fiddly. Fatal combination.
How on earth people turn out these huge, beautifully painted Napoleonic armies is completely beyond me. I just can’t cope with them. You are not alone!

+1, only marching poses to paint is like eating beans for month. But as a skirmish like Sharp it works and some napoleonics are avaible as action poses.

[olicana]

Perhaps you view Napoleonics as work. Maybe try some variation, like French Revolution or War of 1812.

It's an idea, but I'm financially past that stage.

Unfortunately, when I order a first order I tend to go 'all in'. I've done this before and it's worked every time until this project.

This is what came in the first 28 Kg (61 lbs) box.




I've ordered a few more since...........

[Phil Robinson]

Oh my, just had a rabbit in the headlights moment.

You are a braver man than me by far.

[Ethelred the Almost Ready]

I think Captain Blood is right, it is the repetetiveness that is the problem.  When painting Naps was brand new I knocked out a good few battalions, then things became a struggle and now I can't bear thinking about painting any more.
I don't know what you have, but perhaps try alternating between nationalities and between infantry, cavalry and artillery to keep some variety.

Black Crane, I also have not really found Nap rules I like and suspect I am unlikely to get my armies out again for a very long time.  However, the last rules I tried were General d'Armee.  These are good.  I probably would play them if I hadn't come across them when I was already thoroughly disillusioned with wargaming and Napoleonics in particular. 

[FierceKitty]

I think your better self is telling you that you should be doing SYW.