Empire Company of Honor (or Honour)

 The original unit that inspired my Projects of Shame was the Empire Company of Honor. This was one of the "famous units" presented in the Uniforms and Heraldry book that GW Published during Warhammer 6th edition.  A Warhammer take on the historical "color plates" reference books for historical wargaming (and general military history).  Sometime back in...2016(?)... I was flipping through the book and when I stopped on that page I immediately knew I needed to recreate that unit. It set me on a long odyssey to find miniatures that were reasonably close to these guys in the picture.  I ended up buying probably 8 packs of Wargames Foundry landeskneckts and other renaissance billman, just to find 16 figs that were close enough (and I bought some packs of bills and halberds).  You can see in this picture where I was trying to decide between a GW banner bearer and a Wargames Foundry banner bearer.  I went with the Foundry fig because he was holding it up in the air, like the picture.

The final completed unit

Not a great picture, but a different angle

Another angle

This picture was too dark...

This picture was...slightly better?

The order of these pictures got messed up when I uploaded them to Blogger, so try to follow along. When I looked at the banner from the artwork, I knew that banner was gonna be a problem. I have gotten much better at freehand-painting banners, but not good enough to tackle that thing.   So...Internet to the rescue! I found this banner for Stirland.  Then I found a Java web app recreation of MS Paint, where I uploaded the picture, and with some liberal use of the Fill tool turned the background from green to red.  Then I printed it out and it was "close enough."

"Triumphant" on this side of the banner

"Altdorf" on the other side of the banner

Most importantly for me, this unit, this project, is "done".  It's inspired by the artwork, and I think it's good enough.  I had to do a couple of head swaps and add a few plumes here and there. I am happy that I finally followed through and completed this unit. 

Herohammer Ludwig Swartzhelm

 When I first started the hobby way back in 1993(?) one of the models I was obsessed with was Ludwig Swartzhelm. I would stare at the picture in the Empire army book.  A few years ago I managed to acquire the model and my growing Empire army now needed a Battle Standard Bearer.  It was time to tackle this guy.

Here are the final results (in reverse order of WIP - doh.)

Hand painting this emblem was intimidating, but I've been working on free-hand skills for a while now so I gave it a go.  

The biggest challenge was actually trying to recreate the dark blue armored barding on the warhorse. The rest of the model was pretty easy to paint. 

One thing that I did NOT want to spend a lot of time on was the banner.  I've been painting free-hand banners a lot recently, and I've gotten reasonably good at it.  But I wanted this guy "finished" and on the tabletop so I cheated and printed out a copy. 

Here's the picture.  That dark blue armor on the warhorse was difficult.

The banner!

The original miniature, primed and ready to go. I should have uploaded these pictures in the opposite order.   A new trick I've started using for painting mounted figures is to blue-tac the rider to a spare horse and then just paint him on that.  I've tried using a pin and sticking it into cork but that never seems to work for me.  This works fine. 

Aly's Brown Magic Wash

 

Aly's Brown Liquid (or magic wash, as I call it).  It's almost the perfect shade for all colors.

Original link:

https://alystoysoldiers.blogspot.com/p/a.html

Also here so I don't forget:

"40% Agrax Earthshade, 40% Seraphim Sepia and 20% Lahmian Medium...
The final ingredient is a few drops of Drakenhof Nightshade..."

Dwarf Longbeards

When I got that WHFB 4th edition Dwarf Army book, I would stare at the pictures for hours and hours, wanting desperately to have every unit in the book, painted the same way. One of those units were the Longbeards (in the center).  I had all of the figures, but never painted them. I distinctly remember the night before one of our "grand battles" frantically gluing the bare metal figs onto bases just to have the unit on the table (heresy, I know). They were falling down off the base as I tried to move the unit. It was terrible. 

Anyway, the past few months I've been painstakingly working on the unit. I managed to sort through my collection, match each figure, get them in the same order as the picture, and even found the same shields. I did my best to faithfully recreate the unit in the picture, only taking artistic license in extreme circumstances. 

Example of artistic license - in the solo picture of this dude, his cloak is green, but I painted him blue to match the rest of the unit.

I was rushing to take pictures so the green background is not great. Ah well - the unit is done!

Dwarf King Kazador and Cannons

 

Another quick post with recently completed Herohammer units.  Once again this is a combination of things I've been meaning to paint (King Kazador) and things that were "half painted" and never completed.  

First up, a Dwarf "Siege Gun", from Marauder.  The cannon and crew were originally painted up by a buddy back when we first started playing Warhammer 4th edition in high school (he was a fan of the "25% allies" rules, with mostly a High Elf army...any lots of allies). He eventually gifted the cannon to me because I was primarily a dwarf player.  Any it has remained half-painted like this for about 30 years.

I wanted to keep the original theme of "red and yellow" but maybe a little less "ketchup and mustard". 

So the red became muted and the yellow became gold.  

For the crew, I repainted them with mostly red, using yellow as the spot color. 

Next - King Kazador.  I remember he was the first Dwarf special character I purchased soon after getting my hands on the newly released Dwarf Army book.  I used him in a number of games and he was pretty powerful, but for some reason I never got around to painting him.  Probably because I quickly bought and painted Thorgrim on the Throne of Power as well as Ungrim Ironfist.   Anyway, Kazador is ready for battle now. 

Not my best work on the cloak, but better than unpainted metal!

Finally, another half-painted unit.  My other Dwarf Siege Gun.  I painted this cannon myself and it was "done", but I never painted the crew.  After finishing the red cannon, it was time to complete this one as well.   

I didn't take a close up shot, but the cannon barrel was my first real foray into blending (which, back in the 90s, all I had to go on was basic instructions in white dwarf painting articles that definitely left out steps). Either way, I was pretty proud of myself with the dark blue-to-light blue transition on this barrel. I even hand-painted some of the dwarf runes listed in the army book.  

I left the barrel unchanged here (because it was good enough and it's good to look back on what you've done and how much progress you've made) .  But the wheels and the gold trim were never shaded or highlighted, so I finished that up here. 

The crew were completely unpainted. I often just borrowed the fully painted crew from my organ gun.  But now the blue cannon has a proper crew.  I even figured out that the little wooden stool was for the guy to light the cannon. I never realized that until just now. 

I forgot to paint the eyes on these guys - forgive me. 

Not sure why I included two similar pictures here...

Anyway, I'm very happy to have these done. 

Projects of Shame

 I saw this concept mentioning by somebody and I immediately thought it would be a good mental hobby push for me.

It's a bit of a different look than just the "lead mountain". 

The Projects of Shame can be defined however you like for your own needs, but for me, they are generally projects that fall into basic description of “a project, large or small, that was a major motivation but has lingered for too long of a time, and I would be totally embarrassed and or dejected if I never finished it.”

 

Here's my list:

-Warhammer Fantasy Empire “Company of Honour” unit. This was a unit described in the 6th ed Uniforms and Heraldry of the Empire supplemental book.  This was an obsession for a while and I did a lot of miniatures research, eventually buying lots (and lots) of figures from multiple manufacturers in order to build this regiment.  I still have not tackled this.  UPDATE - 2/8/2026 - this unit is COMPLETE!

-US Rocketeer Corps.  This unit is considered a “project of shame” for me because it was really the very first “non GW” set of figures I ever purchased, and at the first Historical convention I ever attended.  Update: complete!

-Warhammer Fantasy unit of Dwarf Spearmen.  I originally purchased a blister of 4 dwarf spearmen from a hobby story in Germany back in 1996 and then could never find more spearmen. I always wanted to recreate that famous unit painted up green and yellow in an old white dwarf.  I've finally acquired enough of them (with a healthy quantity donated by Le Coq Fou!) and I'm almost complete.  Just need to paint a banner, and find the musician figure, and this unit will be done.

-The Epic Blood Angels army – FINISHED!  (further work is just “adding more units” to it.).  Still need to take some pictures and post here.

-Trafalgar ships for Form on the Admiral's Wake. Same story. Bought these a long time and then it languished. 1/3000th scale.

-War of the Roses.  I’ve been thinking, planning, and slowly purchasing stuff for WotR.  The only reason I haven’t tackled it is because it’s a pretty huge project especially in 28mm. With Nevermind the Billhooks, I have finally started this project, so that's good. 

-Chaos Army.  I’ve painted the major set of models that I’ve been always wanting to paint. From my perspective, this is no longer on the list of shame.  Now I can just slowly add to it.

These were my big ones. I'm slowly making progress.  This post will be here to remind me what I should focus on without getting too distracted by other shiny things.

Empire Cannon, Mortar, and some flags

 I'm trying to put a lot of focus on painting up Warhammer units and figures that are either "half done" or I've had for a while and always wanted to put on the table, but couldn't because they weren't painted. 

These two units are right up there. I have had two Empire Great Cannons painted, but only one with crew (and the crew were poorly painted), and the Empire Mortar has been primed since 1995, but I never got around to painting it. 

I'm happy to say I've finished repainting one of the cannons, and the mortar is fully finished as well. Soon I'll finish re-painting the other cannon.  These aren't my best pictures, but good enough for now.

Some folks in the Crown of Command FB group were asking for details on how I painted the crew.  From my notes:

bases were GW Warboss Green, drybrushed with GW Flash Gitz Yellow.  This is a close enough approximation to the original Gobin Green/Sunburst Yellow that we all know and love.

The beige smocks/tabards/shirts were Vallejo Model Color (VMC) US Field Drab, then highlighted by adding VMC Green Ochre, then add VMC Buff for final highlight.

The black was VMC Black mixed with a little GW Mephiston Red (never go with straight black - need some depth).  Highlighting black can be tough, so I just added a little VMC Green Ochre to this to get some basic highlights on the extreme edges.  I usually try to use colors from the rest of the model /palette to tie it all together - black will usually be a reflection of the color of the clothing nearby. Be careful or it turns to grey.

For the red, it's GW Mephiston or VMC Flat Red, then adding VMC Vermillion for highlights, then final highlight a light touch of GW Wild Rider Red (it's almost orange). 

Flesh - Reaper Master Series Fair skin (i think 9047), then a thinned wash of Army Painter Soft Tone.

I also finally got around to hand painting some banners for two of my Empire units, the Swordsmen and the Halberdiers. 

2020 Painting Year in Review

 2020 was, let's face it, pretty terrible. On the other hand, it appears that my painting productivity skyrocketed. 

Here's a bunch of pictures of almost all the figures, terrain, or other things that I completed during the year. I say "almost" because there are at least 3 things that I can't include yet until after a few painting competitions end. 

Anyway, here goes!