Saturday 9 May 2015

Airfix Waterloo British Infantry

As part of the Airfix 2015 Waterloo 1815 GB (Group Build) over at the  Airfix Tribute Forum
Rules;
"Any and all Airfix Napoleonic, no matter what scale, 1/76, 54mm or 1/12. They can be displayed as vignette, diorama or singly. In diorama; a depiction of Quatre Bras is permitted too. Conversions are welcome too, as long as the result is still at least 51% Airfix plastic."

My part of the GB with all the stages, from removing the paint to the final stand can be found HERE

Without going over the top and creating buildings or an exact historic Scene from the battle, I  decided to make a line of british infantry in Action and Keep  to using 100% Airfix  and using parts from within the set itself for conversions.

Instead of a set up of strict lines, firing, loading etc I´ve gone for a more fluid look, no strictly defined firing , reloading  lines.  They were going to be based as part of a small dio but I eventually based them as a unit for  wargaming. It was a Change painting napoleonic bods, so maybe I´ll add one or two stands when I get the urge to paint something different from my usual themes...
The set is pretty generous with the number of poses but I don´t really like painting the same pose over and over to get enough bods to create a decent enough grouping and, as it´s said, Variety is the spice of life,  so some knife work was called for.

Conversions.




After painting and basing I came up with another 4 conversions but adding them would have overloaded the base, making it too crowded for my liking. 

The Flags. They  Come from the Nap Flag site, a site set up by Alan Pendlebury who very generously has made loads of napoleonic flags he´s created available for free download. Please observe his conditions of use.

The flags (as does thier uniforms as far as possible) represent those carried by the centre Company from the 1st Battalion 1st Foot Guards Regiment, but as Alan notes on his site;
"I have been unable to discover which of the 24 possible Regimental colours was carried by the 1st Battalion 1st Guards at Waterloo. I have opted for that of the 2nd company which had the red and white Tudor rose as a central device."

If anyone is looking for a decent resource site for uniform plates for the 1815 campaign;
Les uniformes pendant la Campagne des Cent Jours - Belgique 1815
In French but it has (as far as I can see) every Regiment represented with line, Grenadier etc companies

31 comments:

  1. Paint job, flags and photos...all is fantastic!

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    1. Thanks Phil. They may not be as historically correct as some newer sets (nor my painting) but they were among my first sets of model soldiers, Waterloo was one of the first battles I researched and gamed and I´ve got a bit of a soft spot for them.

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  2. Good colors and work, the flags is handsome
    This series and British Hussars are my first soldiers
    first deliberately a bought serie is often the most cherished...

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  3. I would never have believed these were Airfix if you hadn't said - what a superb job!

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  4. You've done a great job on them, they look great!

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  5. Brilliant work, I am starting to explore Napoleonics again, so this is great inspiration!

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  6. What a triumph Sir, a joy to behold!

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  7. Magnificent! And brilliant ideas for the body swaps. I used to love doing that kind of thing when Airfix were my main source of figures.

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  8. I've never seen such results with Airfix ... until now. Lovely.

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  9. Lovely bit of old-school unit building, and beautifully painted!

    H

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  10. Beautiful work with these!!

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  11. These bring back happy memories! But mine didn't look as good.

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  12. Thanks everyone. The comments have inspired me..I´ll make up another stand with the Highlanders...naturally with conversions :-D

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  13. Classic! Nice adaptions

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  14. I like the conversion of the loading one, great job!

    cheers
    uwe

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  15. really nice work and like everyone else it brings back such childhood memories

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  16. Great looking unit and excellent knife work Paul!

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  17. Very nice result and quite imaginative. I tried to make the officer figure but couldn't get it to work. Well done.

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  18. Those are classic figures - superbly painted. Some of my first minis were Airfix - I had the Waterloo French Infantry and Highlanders.

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  19. Excellent work on these figures Paul! Really like how you're showing us teh conversions you made!

    Greetings
    Peter

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  20. Wonderful soldiers, well painted instead of their scale.

    Brilliant work!

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  21. Brilliant conversions Paul. Nice of you to post the 'how to' photos too!

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  22. Beautiful painting - I always was a fan of the Airfix English but these are really lovely- congratulations!

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  23. British infantry looks great. Fantastic wok :)

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  24. Excellent tutorial - much appreciated. I have a question re: the flagpole. My roll of 0,5 mm florist wire seems to be very much prone to bends and kinks so did you use a particular wire? Thanks in advance!

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  25. Thanks. I use 0.4 Florist wire and the type that Comes in straight rods. You can get it in Hobby/arts and crafts Shops. here it comes in bundles of 40 (or was it 80...I can´t remember) rods, each rod 20 cm´s Long. As far as I know it´s soft steel. I used to use the same type /thickness of wire that came on a roll but as you say it does bend a bit easier than the rods..maybe once it´s been bent on the roll it is easier to bend again?

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  26. Many thanks for your reply. Will look for the straight stuff.

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