Curtey's Miniatures 28mm Dark Age Farm Unboxed

I've had my eye on the Dark Age Farm by Curtey's Miniatures for a while now, and I managed to pick one up as part of my swag from Salute. At £55 it wasn't a cheap buy, but it is an inspired piece of scenery and will look good on the tabletop. Bottom line is I'm a sucker for a nice bit of scenery.....

It includes five resin buildings:

 

 

Plus some accessories and some civilian figures:

 

 

Metal doors and two beautiful thatched beehives.

Two clay ovens and a selection of non-combatants.
 





Plus a sprue of Renedra's Wattle Fencing to tie it all together.
 



Close-up of the box art: Painted example

 

You can see some more examples of the finished item here.  I'm looking forward to putting this lot together and getting it on the table.

 

 

On a separate note the Mighty Ray Rousell of Don't Throw A One, is holding a mega-giveaway to celebrate his 500th post. Many congratulations on reaching that milestone, Ray - his is an excellent blog and well worth following. I am not registering for any of the prizes as I have plenty to build and paint thanks to Salute, but there's lots of lovely prizes so take a look!

 

 

Until next time.....

 

 

 





Back to the Dark Ages

Greetings Gentle Reader,

Ok, so this is what happened: I was in a charity shop recently and spotted this audiobook on cd:

...for the princely sum of £3. I read a lot - I've read this particular novel twice (as I have all the Uhtred books), but it occurred to me that this could prove an excellent companion to my journeys up and down the M27, A3, M25, A1(M), and indeed the dreaded A32.
And so it proved. I thoroughly enjoyed Jamie Glover's characterisation, and the battle scenes really came to life.

This eventually (in my tortoise-like brain) led to me considering my collection of Dark Ages figures, an eclectic mix of manufacturers but still vaguely impressive en masse. I decided to beef up their numbers, and replace some of those I'm not particularly happy with (some of those Gripping Beast poses are very odd....), with a view to using them for a Dark Age variant of Lion Rampant.

I ordered a bunch of bits from Crusader Miniatures via North Star, and (a first for me) tried a couple of packs of Drabant Figures from Old Glory. They were delivered within days (well done Old Glory!) and are lovely little items:

 

 

 

They look to need minimal cleaning up, so I shall get them assembled and based today and await my North Star order before painting them all in one go.

 

Anyway - Happy Easter to you all! I'm off to search for this particular Easter Bunny:

 

 

 

 

Until next time.....

 

 



 

Property Development Part 2

Continuing from Saturday's post, I have now completed the Dark Ages camp, with an additional single tent should it be required:

 

 

 

I also completed the ramshackle barn - I deliberately gave it a neglected and overgrown look:

 

 

 

 

 

Until next time......

 

 



Showcase: Part 2 of an occasional series

(In which I showcase a part of my collection that I am particularly happy with, or which may assist or inspire fellow gamers, painters and modellers).

This post is dedicated to my Viking Longship. It started out as the plastic Revell 1/50 kit (about £15 from ebay as I recall) and has been built and modified to suit the gaming table. As it stands now I can place it on any table edge and it serves as an objective, a camp or just a nice piece of scenery!

The solitary crewman (Olaf the Old) is a gripping beast figure. They make a pack of Viking crewmen, but the rest are somewhere in my lead stockpile.

I cut the ship down to waterline using a dremel, and configured the yard as if she was under repair, perhaps following a storm. The sail is just a bit of rolled kitchen roll soaked in PVA. The ship is slightly small for 28mm scale, but works well on the table.

 

The oars are stacked in lee of the gunwhales and I left the rowers benches out so I could fit plenty of based warriors inside. At that point in the build the deck looked quite bare, until the current wife suggested I add some barrels. Genius! (That's why I keep her on of course - these occasional flashes of brilliance!).

 

 

The traditional shields along the gunwhales are obviously removed as they are being toted by the crew, who are presumably pillaging a nearby monastery, or possibly setting up a new Ikea. I could never work out how such shields were supposed to be attached, and in hindsight there should be some arrangement of iron fittings (possibly) to support them, or at the very least signs of obvious wear to the ship's planking, given that they would be attached and removed regularly.

 

The rigging is purely hypothetical, but looks OK without being too fussy. The whole thing is mounted on a piece of art board, and takes up surprisingly little space in my display cabinet.

 



The overall colours came out well - subdued, but with noticeable weathering on the planking. More by accident than design I hasten to add!

 

Until next time.............