The French & Friends

Let me showcase a few more bods in blue: mainly French infantry, and then some Bavarian Cuirassiers.

Some Austrians

With the stuff found at the bottom of The Heap and the freshly bought box of Austrians, I was able to complete two 16-figure units, and a third, 24-figure one is in the making. I'm also thinking about updating the existing bods with a white highlight, as they might seem too dull in comparison with these brighter ones. 

Readers with better eyesight may be able to spot a cardboard building in the background, which is a not very accurate representation of the Kismegyer farmhouse, based on the single historical painting and my visitation of the site.

Here be Dragons

 OK, it's an old joke, but please overcome the pain and inspect these eighteen Italeri French dragoons instead. One of them rides a Zvezda horse, and I suspect the bright violet facings should be more pink.

Buying and painting this set in such a short order was inspired by the fact that I only have had a dozen or so before, and let's be honest, they were quite numerous. Then I also have the idea to do a second refight of Raab, either using Blücher or something smaller in scope, and the French cavalry present there consisted almost exclusively of dragoons IIRC.

I've found that painting horses a darker brown (VMC Leather Brown mixed with VMA Burnt Umber for the red hue) is more pleasing to the eye, so I'll stick with that for now.

Another comment I'd like to make about this set is that I find it weird that only two figures have their muskets - and I removed those because the pose was odd, and added toothpick swords instead.
Other heavy cavalry sets, notably their earlier Carabiniers, have the firearms worn over the sling, which is quite the opposite of what common sense would dictate (eg. dragoons having the musket at hand, and heavy cavalry relying more on the sword). 

An actual Post

The fruits of my labor: two units of guerrillas, two limbers and some Russian Opolcheniye. Totally fitting together.

I'm working hard on the French and Austrians, and find it amazing what shows up from the bottom of my plastic pile (for instance, a complete unit of Voltigeurs).

A small progress report

It seems all I needed was some shiny new figures. I've bought a box of French dragoons and Austrian infantry, and most of them are already complete. I've just purchased two more boxes, HäT 1805 Russians (to be converted to Hungarian Insurrectio), and 1806 Prussians (to be converted to Austrian Grenz). Sadly I lack gaming time, so I'm not sure when I'll be able to field them all.

Taking a little break

I have sort of got tired of painting Napoleonics. Until I can make a bigger purchase of figures for the 1809 campaign, I don't really have much to do (some guerrillas and Opolcheniye remaining, both of which I've had enough recently), so I'm not sure when I'll post next.

Let us see the wish list instead:

1809 Austrians: Italeri infantry; Italeri French hussars for obvious reasons; HäT 1805 Russian infantry for a few units of Hungarian Insurrectio foot (the regular hussars and Insurrectio cavalry are more or less interchangeable).

1809 French: Italeri 6002 French infantry (I saw some around the last time), it's not really period specific, just a good lookin' set.

Peninsular Spanish: HäT French early line artillery to be converted to Spaniards

The might of Spain

As you can see I've been a busy bee and finished about a hundred Napoleonic Spaniards. Three units of regulars, two units of militia and the Voluntarios de Valencia (the rest are quite generic in appearance, they are rather the opposite). I've found some Zvezda and Italeri French officers hidden in the plastic pile, and as I've already got my hands full of French staff, they changed sides.

Purchase history, May

Besides the usual re-supply of glue, plasticard and Vallejo paints, I've only bought two boxes of HäT Napoleonic Spaniards. My dear readers will be able to see them painted soon.

I'm planning on purchasing a few books and more Napoleonic figures for the 1809 campaign at the beginning of June.

French heavies

This Italeri set looks good for its age. The second set of figures they ever produced, actually. These are - obviously - Carabiniers á Cheval, riding heavy horses and wearing dapper uniforms.