I was rummaging around in the deep depths of my grey army box and found this 54mm item at the very bottom.
I can’t remember when I bought this figure, but it was probably at a Club Bring and Buy, and well over 30 years ago.
Why I bought it also eludes me, although it could have been the stance, and had a bit of an appearance of Napoleon from the Italian campaign (that idea has long since been discarded). Anyway, it cost me £1.50, as can be seen on the plastic sleeve it came in, together with the manufacture’s name of Dorset (Metal Model) Soldiers Ltd.
Dorset are still in existence under Imperial Miniatures, but I’ve not been able to locate this figure and check what it’s supposed to represent. It’s probably long OOP.
After a bit of a clean-up, I decided to give it a go under the paint brush.
I searched high and low for something that might look a bit like him, but failed totally.
In the end I decided that given his appearance looked closest to the Italian campaign of 1796, he was probably wearing a concoction of clothing of his own acquisition (thievery not excluded). The full epaulettes also indicate a higher rank.
He’s therefore painted as a mixture of various uniforms that I came across, and probably represents someone in an artillery or grenadier unit. Your guess is as good as mine.
It was fun just letting my imagination run riot, although the finished article doesn’t look that great.
Paints are straight enamels, oils over enamel with some printers inks thrown in. The braiding and epaulettes had Humbrol matt varnish added to tone down the shine, and then touched with a dry brush of pure printers ink for a little sparkle.
Hope you like my bit of messing about, but I’ve got a thick skin if you don’t.
Cheers,
Andrew
I can’t remember when I bought this figure, but it was probably at a Club Bring and Buy, and well over 30 years ago.
Why I bought it also eludes me, although it could have been the stance, and had a bit of an appearance of Napoleon from the Italian campaign (that idea has long since been discarded). Anyway, it cost me £1.50, as can be seen on the plastic sleeve it came in, together with the manufacture’s name of Dorset (Metal Model) Soldiers Ltd.
Dorset are still in existence under Imperial Miniatures, but I’ve not been able to locate this figure and check what it’s supposed to represent. It’s probably long OOP.
After a bit of a clean-up, I decided to give it a go under the paint brush.
I searched high and low for something that might look a bit like him, but failed totally.
In the end I decided that given his appearance looked closest to the Italian campaign of 1796, he was probably wearing a concoction of clothing of his own acquisition (thievery not excluded). The full epaulettes also indicate a higher rank.
He’s therefore painted as a mixture of various uniforms that I came across, and probably represents someone in an artillery or grenadier unit. Your guess is as good as mine.
It was fun just letting my imagination run riot, although the finished article doesn’t look that great.
Paints are straight enamels, oils over enamel with some printers inks thrown in. The braiding and epaulettes had Humbrol matt varnish added to tone down the shine, and then touched with a dry brush of pure printers ink for a little sparkle.
Hope you like my bit of messing about, but I’ve got a thick skin if you don’t.
Cheers,
Andrew
