Finished: First Ming Chinese Troops

Having Monday off work was incredibly handy as it meant I was able to sit down and start painting the first of my Ming Chinese troops. I was initially just going to paint up one mixed spear & bow unit but decided to paint up a generals stand as well. With very little on TV in the evening, I actually managed to finish painting them and give them a coat of Klear/ink.

Last night I airbrushed them with matt varnish, then touched up shiny parts with satin and gloss varnish (as appropriate). Once that had dried, I popped them off the sticks, superglued them onto bases, left them a while for the superglue to set and then added the basing texture - I glooped some of my bulk khaki grey mixed with PVA glue onto the bases, sprinkled them with medium grey ballast then added some sand to cover the rest of the bases. An hour or so later I used a plastic pipette to drop a slightly thinner mix of the khaki grey over the top to seal it. Once that was done I left them overnight for the gloop to dry fully.

This evening I drybrushed the bases and added static grass. So, here are the first of my Ming forces:

First General

First Spear & Bow Unit

No flags yet. I've ordered a sheet of "Warring states Chinese" flags from Little Big Man studio. Wrong era, but they'll do as I can't find many images of Ming flags to make my own.

Having finished these so quickly means that I'll be able to field an allied Ming contingent for my Koreans tomorrow evening at the club. OK, so I've got to sub in some Mongols for the heavy cavalry but that will be fine.

I also started work on the next set of figures last night - nine horse archers - putting the basecoat and washes onto the horses. This evening I've done their markings and a bit later on I'll paint the bridles and reins. With the game tomorrow night and being away this weekend it will probably be early next week when they are finished. After that I'll do a unit of spear & dao infantry before painting the second spear & bow unit.