A Doomed Pretenders Project - (03/01, Finished Irish Cavalry Unit)

[HappyChappy439]

Marvelous painting.  My one quibble is that I don't think a lord would wear his own livery.

That's an entirely fair quibble to have, and you're absolutely right there! From what I've seen, it looks like it's more likely that a lord would either wear a non-specific colourful overcoat (I'm not sure on the terminology there!) or his coat of arms, but that's less common by the Pavia-era, leaving the livery to retainers and personal guards. So it's more just a case of artistic license here!

Although, in a pinch the knight with the red and yellow plumes could count as Richard, his pose is commander-y enough to count!

[HappyChappy439]

Hi again!

Another update, back to Ireland this time!

This time I wanted to do a bit of experimenting, with both multi-basing figures, and with some different ways of painting the léine, so I decided to use a possibly slightly anachronistic unit of handgunners as test subjects!

Historically speaking, handguns were adopted fairly quickly and enthusiastically in Ireland, with many earls wasting no time in adopting gunpowder warfare towards the start of the 16th century. Although, despite this, we don't have any record for gunpowder weapons being used by the Irish contingent at Stoke, and not much to go on for Warbeck's insurrection with the earl of Desmond (although Cork was reported as using gunpowder weapons against Warbeck's forces!). For this project, the handgunners represent more of a 'late' (insofar as the first half of the 16th century can be called late!) period force, or a dip into alternate history, where France, Burgundy or the Empire decide to back up their investment in a Yorkist pretender by providing weaponry to the Irish forces as a pretty substantial force multiplier against the more conservatively equipped English. Plus the idea of an early Irish pike-and-shotte formation is a fun project, if nothing else!

Given how much yellow I've been painting with the Irish, I wanted to give the new yellow GW Contrast paints a spin, to see how those worked! They were very easy to apply, but I would say in this particular case I did need to use a few washes to bring down the yellow a bit, where it was approaching a very bright banana yellow rather than the warm saffron I was going for!

I also wanted to try and experiment a bit with conversions of the kern figures themselves. Seeing as the unit is fairly small I wanted to avoid obvious doubles, so I've included a few kern from other sets with weapon and hand swaps to diversify the bunch

This base is entirely unmodified Perry Irish handgunners



This base on the other hand is entirely weapon-swaps and conversions from the other Perry and Antediluvian kern sets



And the other two bases are a mix of the two






And here's a couple of pictures of the full band of skirmishers together





I'm quite happy with how they've turned out! Although, I'll probably be a little more sparing with the Contrast paints in future, just where there's so much pigment that some of the kern here ended up almost too yellow!

[Digits]

Lovely colouring.   

[fred]

Looking good.

I know what you mean about the contrast yellows - the one i have - Iyrdran Sun or something is a very dark orange / yellow colour. I suppose it makes a change toning down yellows rather than having to put on loads of coats to get coverage!

[commissarmoody]

Pretty cool. Which GW yellow did you use.

[Atheling]

Lovely work on the saffron colored leine. 

[HappyChappy439]

Thanks everyone!

Pretty cool. Which GW yellow did you use.

In terms of the yellows, I did the figures in batches of three:
3 of them used Iyanden Yellow, 3 of them used Bad Moon Yellow, 3 used Imperial Fist and 3 used Ironjawz Yellow.

Each of the figures for each yellow was primed using a different one of the GW base primers (so one White Scar, one Wraithbone and one Grey Seer) to see how that turned out. Then once that had all dried I gave all the yellow a wash of Cassandora yellow, then a second wash of Seraphim Sepia, then finally a glaze of Averland Sunset and highlights of Yriel Yellow to make it a little less glossy (except on four of the figures which instead got Phalanx Yellow highlights)

Based on what I found, Iyanden Yellow was definitely the warmest of the bunch, while Bad Moon Yellow was probably too bright for what I was using it for, the other two were a good compromise once the washes had been applied. I'd say the Wraithbone base works best here as well if that helps!

[Codsticker]

I agree- great colour choices and very well executed. Your head swaps turned out perfect- they look very natural.

[Charlie_]

Great addition - the conversions work perfectly, and the multi-basing is definitely the way to go!

Where did you get the spare handguns from?

[HappyChappy439]

Great addition - the conversions work perfectly, and the multi-basing is definitely the way to go!

Where did you get the spare handguns from?

Thanks! The spare handguns were from The Assault Group, I'd originally got them for my Borgias and Burgundians and had a few spare!

https://theassaultgroup.co.uk/product/arquebus-straight-x-10/

[OB]

A fine looking unit with much attention to detail.  Down to the belts, very impressive.  They look just right.

[glenning]

Looking great as always, I really like the handgunners, especially the subtle conversions here and there.

[Dargonsploof]

These are very nice what are you working on now?

[HappyChappy439]

Thanks again everyone!

These are very nice what are you working on now?

Thanks! I've definitely been won over to the multi-basing approach, so I've been working on transferring some of my older figures to the multi-based layout, starting with the twelve Bonnachts (Bonnaughts?) from almost a year ago! https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=134615.msg1709583#msg1709583

As part of the rebasing I also wanted to bulk up the bonnachts from twelve to twenty-four figures, and also redo the painting on some of the older léine that I weren't quite happy with with a year's worth of hindsight to them (and also having picked up a wet-palette in the meantime too!).

To keep things as varied as possible, I've tried to include as many head and weapon swaps as possible, including four with swords and shields to stretch out the number of close-combat figures available!





And also as part of the units I've added some to be a command base, with a piper and a standard bearer. The flag is interchangable, so the unit can be fielded with the flags of any Irish lords (although here I've used the flag for the Fitzgeralds of Kildare)



With the bases, the aim is to field the Bonnachts as either two blocks of 12, or a combined group of 24 (as a mirror to formations of bills in Never Mind the Billhooks)





And finally a 'scenic' shot of the whole bunch charging in a line



I hope they've turned out ok! Focusing on the brighter, warmer yellows for the léine is definitely growing on me, with fewer of the drab ones in the mix!

[commissarmoody]

You did a great job with the conversions.