Back in the Saddle Again

Hello everyone!

This past weekend my parents came up to visit me, and with them came an abridged version of my painting setup and a few of my 1/72 plastic figures to paint. I will have to fit it all in around my school and work schedule, but I'm excited to get back into painting a little bit once again!

I also have the opportunity now to review the big 1/72 lot that I purchased right before I left for boot camp, since those are the majority of the figures that I had my parents bring down. (Remember to click on the pictures for bigger versions.)

Here's my basic painting setup. A small selection of basic paint colors, some green stuff, super glue, hobby knife, brushes, base flocking materials and bottle tops to hold onto the figures whilst painting. Not pictured is my old Army t-shirt that I use as my brush-cleaning rag.

1/72 Review: Random eBay Lot

12 Strelets Russian mounted jagers. While not enough for a full unit of 18, they will get me well on my way to fielding a full Russian cavalry regiment.

Initial Impressions

The lot I found was unmarked as to what was in it (the descriptions only saying "American Revolution/Napoleonic?"), but thanks to Plastic Soldier Review I was able to determine that the lot consisted basically of the contents of Italeri #6066 French Infantry, Strelets #018 Russian Mounted Jagers, and Italeri #6060 American Infantry (from the American War of Independence), plus a mystery plastic mounted figure. The mystery figure turned out to be a mounted plastic medieval knight or similar and looked to be a board game piece of some kind, so pretty much useless to my needs. Also, the number of figures in the lot didn't match up to the number of figures listed on the boxes, meaning at some point there was some miniature attrition. I was also disappointed to see that some of the figs were incomplete, but more on that in a minute. Overall I was pleased that I got a good deal, and I can use the figures for a variety of projects: The French infantry will be French infantry, the AWI figures will mainly be painted as French in bicornes (not Portuguese as I originally speculated) with some of the figures augmenting my American militia and Native American forces for New Orleans 1812, and finally the Russian mounted jagers for my Russian forces.

29 Italeri American War of Independence figures. These are the only ones from the group that are ready to be painted as is.

Scaleability

All of these figures are the average size 1/72 figures; not the towering behemoths of some Italeri figures, and not the dwarfs of some other manufacturers. Since they will be placed in their own units there won't be any kind of disparity in height amongst the figures.

Here are 11 more Continentals, but all of these guys are missing arms, hands, drums etc. These would have normally been on the sprue, but unfortunately they didn't arrive with the figures in the big bag they came in. I will have to fix these with green stuff.

Quality

For the most part, other than the qualms that the folks over at Plastic Soldier Review have regarding the accuracy of the sculpts and whatnot, I like these figures. The sculpting on all of them (including the Strelets figs) is really good, save for the occasional miss-cast saber. I am rather disappointed that the eBayer I bought these from neglected to send all of the separate arms and drums that go with the AWI figures, which leaves almost a quarter of the entire group useless without some green stuff sculpting on my end. This is a pain.

46 Italeri French infantry in shako. All these chaps need are some cleaning up and then some paint to be table-ready.

Price

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the whole reason why I bought these figures was because of their price: 104 figures (not including the weird green knight game piece) for $5.50 shipped! That's $0.05 per figure, including twelve mounted figs. That's ridiculously cheap compared to what I've paid for 1/72 minis before. The deal was too good to pass up in that regard.

American militia. The three cream-colored figures at the lower right are from the AWI set; all are missing their right hands and muskets.

Native Americans. The figures holding their rifles at their hips are from the American War of Independence set.

The above two groups include the Native American and American militia figures that I salvaged from the Lewis and Clark set I bought at Hobby Lobby a good while back. There were three Native American figures that were included with the Revolutionary War figures, and they will fit in quite nicely with the others as is. There were also three ragged-looking figures in the same set, but unfortunately none of the hands with weapons were included with the figures, which is a shame. At the same time, though, since I will be making new hands and muskets out of green stuff, I will get a bit more variety out of the three poses than if they were all the same. Perhaps it's not much of a silver lining, but I have to work with what I have.

All in all the entire purchase was well worth the minimal price, and I should have plenty to keep me busy during my off times.

Coming soon: Well, I don't have many options. It could be French (either in shako or in bicorne), Russian mounted jagers, American militia for New Orleans, or American-allied Choctaws for New Orleans. Either something painted or some conversions made on those armless figures to get them paint-ready. Either way, I'm quite excited to get back in the hobby!

Questions, comments and suggestions are always welcomed and appreciated. Thanks for looking!

-Chuck