My AWI collection as it gets painted

[FifteensAway]

This thread will document my AWI painting progress (and hopefully appease Akula, too  ).  My goal is a very large collection to be painted to a rather basic game table standard - so no need to be impressed with the paint jobs.  Maybe, if it all gets painted, you might be impressed with the volume - or perhaps decide I'm not quite entirely sane; both work. 

Here is an overall shot of what I have painted, textured, and seal coated and table ready - and veterans already since they made it to a game:


Let's move on with this photo of the command stand for for the Belzunc Dragoons - unfortunately out of focus but showing that the flag is the correct type within what was available:


The whole unit, standard for all of my twenty AWI cavalry regiments, 12 mounted, 12 'matching' dismounted, a horse holder stand (may vary with a man on foot or a horse without a rider), and dead figure:


My other French cavalry unit, St. Simon's Hussars:


On the British side, I have painted the two German mounted units I have.  First up is the mounted Jaegers:


And then the Prinz Ludwig Dragoons - with Burgoyne, of course:


Those four units get my 'foreign' cavalry out of the way.  Just the other sixteen to go.

The generals so far.  Starting with Andrew Pickens.  Note that I am not trying to paint them to match historical imagery or information, game pieces remember.

And Marquis Saint-Simon, over the French cavalry:


And for the British side we have Montfort Browne:


To be in charge of the German mounted figures, Lt. Colonel Friedrich Baum:


The more astute observers among you will have noticed that all of the units, including the 'generals' have a casualty figure.  If all goes according to plan, that will continue throughout painting the collection.

Here is the howitzer assigned to the militia brigade of five regiments already painted - eight more still to paint:


And a second image to show how the basing works:


On the British side, note that in 'real life' it is a much more 'grey' blue than shown here, a 6# gun:


Before I move on to to the infantry after a break, for those wondering what rules I will use it will be Rank and File by Crusader Publishing.  On the cavalry, most - not all - were sourced from Freikorps/QRF, oftentimes from Seven Years War range and dismounted were matched as close as possible but often a compromise.  Infantry come from many sources with by far the largest from the now defunct (though perhaps still available from others) Musket Miniatures range - a perfect match to my plans since the packs came with 18 figures including command.

[Cat]

Ooh, painted minis are good minis, and these are looking off to a good start!

[Hitman]

Okay, I have to ask...FifteensAway, I have been on LAF for a while now, and I see so many posts by you on so many topics, how on Earth do you have so many projects on the go and get so much painted? I need to know your secret!!
Regards,
Hitman
😎

[FifteensAway]

Thanks, Cat, painted minis are the ultimate goal - and I encourage others to not worry so much about the quality of your paint jobs.  Sure, we all want to do the best we can but that varies vastly from true artists to us lesser mortals.  I can paint better but compromise on quality to get quantity done.  Having an excessive number of figures propels me to make that compromise - and knowing I'd feel guilty if I didn't at least make a serous effort to get as much painted as possible before I either lose the ability or kick off into the 'great unknown' one day. 

Hitman, no real secret.  One, wife and I have no kids so don't have that 'distraction' (though we would have loved it if we did, just didn't work out that way).  And now I'm retired so lots of extra time - though really haven't picked up the painting pace all that much.  I think the real secret to productivity is to 'just sit down and do it'.  Yeah, sometimes I don't have the 'mojo' but that doesn't mean forward progress cannot be made.  For instance, the last several months I've focused on getting figures prepped and primed ready to paint and with some success: Three Musketeers fully ready, Banana Wars fully ready, Robin Hood fully ready, Jousting Tournament (and more) almost fully ready, French Foreign Legion (that started with a large chunk already painted before I got to work on them) fully ready, and, of course, a large chunk of AWI figures ready to go - but with A VAST LOT more to prepare.  I also have a reserve of ACW figures in the wings.  And my Slighltly Cracked Colonials has a solid supply of figures ready to paint - and more to prepare.  And before I switch back to painting, I'm hoping to get my Stone Age figures and Vikings prepped.  And the Old West is a bit of a priority to at least get onto the table this year - though in small measure compared to the total available (lots ready, lots more to get ready.). edit: I done did forgetified a couple of collections: French and Indian War, what isn't already painted, is fully ready.  And my recently reorganized pirates - mostly not painted by me - is also fully ready for the unpainted portion.

Having figures waiting in the wings ready to paint helps.  Frankly, however, I'd probably be enjoying the hobby more in many ways if I had less.  I absolutely do not recommend others build collections as large as I have.  It's been fun but it truly has gotten excessive - having to rent a storage space for much of it really underscores that reality.

Now, back to the painted figures.

One of five - out of a total of thirteen - militia regiments:


Another:


And another:


More:


And the fifth one:


Here are a couple of shots duplicating the units above but giving a sense of the basing and how a unit looks in column:




The five militia units so far are for the southern colonies: Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland.  This group gets more of the white and other lighter colors.  The middle colonies will get more in the tan and brown range.  And the northern colonies will get more of the darker grays and blacks.  Though all will be a mix - which makes them a bit more tedious to paint than a uniform unit which goes a lot faster.

A note or two before moving on to the British.  The vast majority of infantry will be on six bases as seen here.  However, a dozen units for each side will have eight bases - and two casualty figures to be able to break down into 'battalions', especially the jaegers but others as well.  And, no joke, I have at least 200 foot units not counting a few specialized units like pioneers for the British to clear obstacles on the Burgoyne expedition and Corps of Invalids for the colonials, also some combined foot/mounted scouting units.  I also have, too many really, a bunch of unarmed civilians on foot and some mounted.  And then a bunch of one horse limbers to add in and some one horse carts.  A pretty good portion of those last listed are ready for paint but not all.  And a large portion of the 200 still need to be worked on, a bit over half I think.

Now the British:

This image shows a base, painted (don't like bare metal showing - and all bases are sheet steel so they will work on magnetic sheets) and labelled, may not show well but it works for me.  By labelling all the bases as I progress, be a lot easier to put away after a game, especially with so many figures if I do get them all painted one day:



And here is the upright Prince of Wales regiment:


The Royal Highland Emigrants:


King's American Regiment:


And, last for now, the Volunteers of Ireland:


All red coated Loyalists.  No flags yet but will be using paper flags, have some but no where near enough.

Next in line and partially painted is a Spanish brigade, yes, Spanish - for Florida, often overlooked on the gaming table, and a German brigade.  One day I will be able to do Long Island regiment for regiment - or as near as anyone is likely to come above the smaller scales.  Why?  Only answer I can provide is: Why not?

[AKULA]

This thread will document my AWI painting progress (and hopefully appease Akula, too  ).

Thanks for posting your impressive collection mate, consider me appeased 

I can paint better but compromise on quality to get quantity done.

Quantity has a quality of its own.

[FifteensAway]

I am jazzed.  Thanks to the generosity of LAF's own kingsmt from a few years ago, I received a couple of hundred images of AWI flags I can use to create flags for my units.  Yeah, sure, there a lot of duplicates in the total but still A LOT MORE flags than I had before.  I'd thought I'd lost them but then I tried searching back emails and found I'd saved them into their own file!  So, I can have a great diversity of flags with many of them quite historically accurate - and some quasi-historical speculative but close enough.  And when I can't get an 'ideal' flag for a unit I can just use an approrpriate generic flag for that nation.

This should help.  Just today put the German and Spanish brigades in progress back within arms reach of the painting table (had been moved aside for a couple of other projects).