Sunday 12 April 2009

SYW French and Hanoverian Cavalry







The top three pictures are of Cuirassiers du Roi, a French cavalry regiment of the SYW. It’s always been one of my favourite regiments and in the past I have used Front Rank figures. These are Foundry from the new French SYW range and I’ve gone in with the macro lens to show the comic-book faces of these guys. On the plus side they have variety (all twelve figures are different) and on the down side – well, I leave that for you to judge.

The bottom two pictures are of a Hanoverian Horse Regiment (Leib regiment) this time going back to Front Rank figures. The Front Rank Seven Years War range is now showing its age (it must be 20 years old) and, although you don’t get variety of poses, you do get solid no-nonsense castings that paint up well.

The problem with anybody planning a WAS/SYW French army in 25mm is the small number of manufacturers doing half decent cavalry. I wonder if I can persuade Alec Brown (of FR) to rework some of his French cavalry. Later on this month, I’ll post more pictures of French cavalry to show you why Foundry’s latest range has become a bit of a laughing stock.

And to end on a positive note, I have received a box of Perry’s plastic British Napoleonic Infantry (absolutely fantastic and being painted now) as well as quite a few boxes of their plastic ACW infantry and cavalry. These are superb and the rest of the year will see me trying to finish off my ACW armies.

Savory Update:
Proof reading done.
Artwork finished.
Printers hyper-ventilating.
Web-site finished.
We will be launching soon. I am expecting receipt of all the books around 28th May and expect to be able to start posting out in early June

4 comments:

  1. Nice work, Nigel, as always.

    I have always liked the Front Rank range. although as you say time is taking its toll. More than twenty years in fact- I got my first ones about 1986 IIRC.

    I too would like to see the French cavalry reworked- although I have to say that their French dragoons are some of my favourites. Front Rank have always been a lot of fun to paint up.

    Looking forward to Savory! June should be a good month.

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  2. Splendid painting - but yes, the figures are rather caricatured!

    Good news on the Savory! :-)

    Thanks.

    David
    http://nba-sywtemplates.blogspot.com/

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  3. Lovely painting, Nigel. But those Foundry faces....chewing wasps must have been a regimental sport.

    Best wishes

    Giles

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  4. Animated though the Foundry figures are, there still seems to be an unacceptable level of distortion in size of heads, hands, muskets and so on, that just puts me off. I much prefer the FR figures and bought a lot in their early days. However, it's always good to see more figures available in this period. I'm sure I'll be able to use some of them.

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