200mm Imperial Guard Bust

[Deleted member 6559]

This is a half-figure of a French Imperial Guardsman sculpted by Carl Reid for CGS Military Miniatures. I've always been a bit wary of work by this sculptor as it can sometimes be a bit hurried-looking and unfinished, but this piece looks very nicely modelled and cast. I did actually order an Old Guardsman, and indeed got the box, but the head had been swapped for that of one of the other Guard orders (they are essentially the same kit):



I'm actually pleased about this, as the shako has lots of nice detail that will be interesting(!) to paint. There are a few variant uniform options:



Quite scared of this one......

 

[Tim Marlow]

Looks very interesting......there were a plethora of guard regiments and types so it will be interesting to see where this one goes....
After this one is finished you’ll have to find one of Maitland's boys to make him run away

 

[Neil Merryweather]

hmm interesting!
How close is 200mm to 1/12 scale, I wonder?????
That is a lovely sculpt, by the way.
I'm not overly fond of action poses for busts, but it does look good.

 

[Deleted member 6559]

Tim - I haven't worked out the colouring yet - I'm looking for something that doesn't involve too much white. As for a British guardsman, I'd love to do one, but there's very little out there, and nothing in 1/16.

Neil - I personally quite like action poses, though they're not often done well. 200mm is around 1/9, so a bit easier to paint.

Having said that, the face was a swine to do:



It's always tricky painting under visors, and add to that masses of wrinkles and an active pose and it can get a bit time-consuming. Still, I was quite wary of this one, as it looked a bit dodgy before painting, but it has turned out looking reasonably human. The face won't have all the attention either, so as part of a whole it should be OK.

 

[scottie3158]

Peter,
very nice you have squeezed a lot of character into that face.

 

[Jason Crausby]

It might have been a swine but it looks well worth the effort!
Jason

 

[MattB71]

you do paint faces very well, love your technique!

 

[Neil Merryweather]

Oh yes , excellent start!

 

[JR]

That face and material in the hat are brill .

 

[Steve Jones]

Big fan of the Napoleonic's Peter. Nice work on the face. Is it finished or will you be tinkering with it some more.?

 

[Deleted member 6559]

Thanks for looking in and for the encouraging words chaps - much appreciated.

Steve - There's always room for tinkering, but though it's far from perfect, I feel I've got away with something here and won't do too much more. Many thanks for the museum pics - very useful. I think I'm going to go for a grenadier as there's quite a lot of red involved to make him more colourful.

 

[SteveH]

Morning Peter

looks good even if you are only 50/50 with the head.

Great auburn whiskers too.

Another day waiting for work, it will arrive soon enough, then it will be back to it full speed, well 1/2 speed for now! LOL

The change of head gear will certainly give you a bigger challenge to paint, but will be more interesting than just animal skin.

Its a good job your victims are scale models, or the "Ministry of Truth" might start monitoring your busts for their PC backgrounds!

Have a good day with the Shako, it should be a worthy battle to the death!

Another grey and wet day!

Regards

Steve H

 

[Deleted member 6559]

Hi Steve

The face looks better in the morning light, so it's on to the shako today - red braiding with brass fittings.

I've had a bit of a wobble in confidence recently after working on the Saxon bust. I made the mistake of looking at how others had done it, and of course their renditions were much better than mine. One thing I did realise was that most of them had ignored the wrinkles on the face, which must have left a lumpy finish, but of course that doesn't show in the photos (re box art). With this face there is a bit of lumpiness on the cheeks, exactly because I've missed some of the wrinkles - if you don't paint them in, they look like uneven paint application. Perhaps I need to stand back a little, or stop posting over-large photos.

After Tim's comment about finding him an opponent, hours of browsing finally found a British sublect:



A Mitches V bust of a sergeant of the 33rd Regiment. Promptly ordered (with a samurai).

 

[Deleted member 6559]

The head is now finished:




I've gone for a grenadier's uniform which allows for the red cordage and shako trim. All of the colours were built up over a black base; the red with black red, dark red, carmine red and flat red, with the detail defined with black brown. The brass was done with layers of bronze, old gold and pure gold.

I did a bit more to the face, mainly shading the skin under the shako peak and adding a few more warm tones.

 

[scottie3158]

Peter,
Running out of superlatives.

 

[Neil Merryweather]

Gorgeous!

 

[Tim Marlow]

Looks great, nice job on the reds in particular. Only comment I would make is to ask if the five o’clock shadow would be that dark on a guy with ginger hair?

 

[Mini Me]

The cordage and whiskers do tend to compliment each other....nice warm tones on the skin really sets it off Peter. Rick H.

 

[Deleted member 6559]

Scottie -Thank you. No need for superlatives.

Neal - I didn't know you cared!

Tim - The five o'clock shadow should probably be lighter, but I'm going to leave it now - I like to exaggerate a bit.

Rick - Thanks. There will be a lot of blue and white on the rest of the figure, so this should warm him up a bit.

 

[Neil Merryweather]

Neal - I didn't know you cared!

What? after all this time?