Mr X Montly duels on Benno's

It time to put my statistics of painted figures a bit higher as they are now. As the title says I've been doing some duels at the Benno's Figures Forum. The challenge was to do one duel every month against another member of the forum. The challenger didn't knew who they were duelling and me neither.

The rules were kept very simple:

- One standing or riding figure out of the box

- Neutral background (white, black, blue,...)

- No base

- Two pictures, front and back

- Period or figure chosen by the challenger

To fix and arrange all these duels I needed some help from my good friend Remco, who is the moderator of the duel section on Benno's. He took care of all contacts between me and the challengers. And it must be said, he did a fantastic job. There wasn't a moment that someone realised that I was Mr X.

This will be a rather long post, but I'm to lazy to split them all up. If you want to see what my challenger made, just klick on the link I'll be adding with each month duel. So let's start!

January duel

- Challenger asked for a medieval figure, free choice.

- Scale is 1/72

- I took a figure from Caesar H086 Dismounted Crusader set.

- Link

- Result: Lost

Hardest part of this figure was to paint the white of the uniform. As I always use a white basecoat, I covered it with some grey wash from vallejo. Them I painted the upper parts white again. I'm also not pleased with the sword. Next time I will try to straighten it in hot boiling water.

February duel

- Challenger asked for a Roman Imperial figure. Same figure.

- Scale 1/72

- Figure is from the Esci 224 Roman Legion set.

- Link

- Result: Won

This was a very nice figure to paint. Lots of flesh parts, gold, silver and red. Easy to paint, only a few difficulties with the helmet, because hard to reach in some angles.

March Duel

- Challenger asked for a Barbarian figure. Same figure.

- Scale 1/72

- Figure is from the Esci 225 Barbarian Warriors set.

- Link

- Result: Lost

It was strange, that after that Roman I had to paint an opponent of him. My first thought was easy, but when I saw the figure of my challenger, I knew it was lost. He added some blue tattoos on him, so he looked much better as mine.

April duel

- The challenger asked for a Napoleonic Wars theme. We agreed on the Scottisch infantry figure.

- Scale 1/72

- Figure is from the Italeri 6136 Scots Infantry set

- Link

- Result: Lost

Never been a great fan of painting tartan, but now I didn't have a choice. I did all I could to find the right paint for this figure, but I couldn't find it. So the tartan is freehand painted, don't be to hard on me for this one.

The paint I was trying to find:

And this is what I made of it:

May duel

- Challenger asked for a Celt figure on foot. We agreed on the same figure.

- Scale 1/72

- Figure is from the Italeri 6029 Celtic Cavalry set

- Link

- Result: Won

Again a figure of the Imperial Roman period. This time I took myself a bit more time and added some small things to let him look better. Like the stripes on his trousers.

June duel

- Challenger asked for a Napoleonic Mounted Officer. Free choice.

- Scale 1/72

- I took a figure from the Hat 8279 Napoleonic Mounted Officers set.

- Link

- Result: Lost

This is the only mounted figure I had to paint in the challenge. Loved it. Okay, it was a white uniform again, but I think it turned out very well. I didn't have luck with it, my opponent was far to strong. For your information, this is a Spanish officer.

July duel

- Challenger asked for a WW2 British Soldier. Free choice

- Scale 1/72

- I took a figure from the Caesar H055 British Infantry set

- Link

- Result: Won

This one I had to paint very fast. It had to be done before I went on holliday. So I was pleased that it was a WW2 figure, and free choice, so I could take one with not to many details and cammo. Just for fun, I called him Tommy!

August duel

- Challenger asked for a WW2 single figure with cammo uniform. Free choice.

- Scale 1/72

- I took a figure from the Esci 244 German Paratroopers Green Devils

- Link

- Result: Lost

Painting cammo is not my strongest thing, so I wasn't surprised by the result. But I was pleased to paint something different. Always a good practice.

September duel

- Challenger asked for the same figure of Russian Heavy Artillery

- Scale 1/72

- Figure is from the Zvezda 8045 Russian Guard Heavy Artillery set

- Link
- Result: Won

Zvezda has some of the best sculpted figures, so I was pleased that we had a duel with one of them.

October duel

- Challenger asked for a WW2 British Para. Free choice.
- Scale 1/72
- I took a figure of the Revell 2509 WW2 British Paratroopers set
- Link
- Result: Lost

Cammo again. Not my cup of tea, so the result was expected.

November duel

- Challenger asked for the same US GI
- Scale 1/72
- Figure is from the Caesar H054 WW2 US Army (Set 1)
- Link
- Result: Lost

I was a bit surprised I lost this one. I was very pleased with how I painted this one. I tested a bit of a new technique for me. First painted the figure, added a wash and then some heavy drybrushing. Thought it should be good enough for the win. Nope.

December duel

- For this duel the challenger bought the figures on CRISIS, and gave one to me. The challenger in this case was Remco. He wanted to give me this figure for all the efforts I have done in the duelling section for the past months. Thank you Remco!
- Scale 28mm
- Figure is from Otherworld Miniatures, called Serving Wench 1
- Link
- Result: Won

I have not painted many 28mm figures, so it is always something new for me to paint one. And as this isn't a fighting figure, I even loved it more to paint. Well dinner is served!

So these were the duels we had. As a final result, I lost 7 and won 5. I would like to thank to all challengers to make it possible. Without them I wouldn't have painted so much different period and figures! Thanks guys!

Next year again? Who knows?

Also welcome to some new followers:
- Peter (and that is what I call a strong name!) from (be seated!) "Well, this isn't a reasonable use of my time and resources, but I'm going to do it anyway"
- Hightower from Hightower's Mini's

Welcome to my blog!!!!!

Happy New Year!

I wish you all a good and healthy 2014, and may all your wishes come true.

It's been a while since I posted something here on my blog, but I had a very busy time during the winter hollidays. That's what you get when you are a former cook, so I was the one who cooked the Christmas dinner. In fact I did it two days one a rowe. I will not bother you with the details but it took me some days for organising it.

Second thing is I was working on my hobby room. Now it's almost finished, and just a few things have to be done, before I take some pictures and show it to you all. If all goes well I will have the last piece of furniture that I'm missing tomorrow. More about this later on this month.

I also spended one day at the hospital, because I needed some small surgery on my left ear. That was two days before the new year. Bad planning I know, but it had to be done. The risk for ear infections was to big. Now that is solved.

But I think I was a good boy in 2013, because Santa didn't forget me. He brought me some nice things and made my mountain of plastic grow again.

The first thing is a box from good old Airfix. They are reissuing the old sets from when I was young. These Australian Infantry from WW2. I used to have these, but I've lost them. Now I have them back. They are in a harder plastic as the first ones, but they still look fantastic, and it will be a joy to paint them.

Next is a small box of the Art of Tactic sets from Zvezda. Really nice figures to make a small vignette. And always good when I want to do something in between.

Then there was a box of Italeri with the French Foreign Legion in it. Actually these figures are original from Esci, but Italeri brought them back on the market.

The next things I purchased myself but had to land under the Christmas tree. It was an agreement I had to make with my wife, or she didn't give me the permission to purchase them at e-bay.

It was an old lot of figures and buildings from Atlantic I was after and the price was very low when I jumped in bidding. I won the bid of course, otherwise I wouldn't be writing this.

The package contains figures of the following sets: Buffalo Bill, Davy Crockett, Kit Carson and Gold Rush. From these sets there was one sprue each. But the best things I show you with some pictures.

Abilene City:

Sioux Camp. I still miss one figure of this set. The other figures I purchased at CRISIS last year.

Outlaws and Sheriffs. A very rare set. And it was the main reason, together with the town houses, I started bidding. And they are in excellent shape. These figures were several times in the package. I didn't count them but there are a lot of them. One figure I don't show here. If you want to see the whole set, have a look here.

Some bigger pictures of the figures. Ladies first.

Calamity Jane.

Calamity Jane in sunday dress.

The Sheriff.

Wild Bill.

And some outlaws.

Ouch! That hurts!

Ouch again! This even hurts more!

To complete the whole thing I also received some brushes (sorry Fran!) and paints. So you see that Santa (and my wife!) were very good for me.

Next post will be some panted figures again (or one! :-D)

Have a good one and thanks for looking!

Welcome to my blog!!!!!

CRISIS 2013 Purchases

Well as promised here is my little list of purchases I've made at CRISIS this year. I always start with a plan when I go to a convention. I make a small list of the things I'm really after. But as always that are dreams. And as always you leave the place with more things that were on the list.

Let's start with the things that were on that list:

First I went to the stand of Ulrike and Jörg Schilling from Schilling Figuren. They had some new things, and I wanted them in myy collection.

First there was this nice "Ox Wagon".

Then they have a nice range of Indians.

Bear attack!

Buffalo hunt set 1!

Buffalo hunt set 2!

All these figures are sculpted by Toma. Toma's Minis World is his blog and I can recommend a visit to his blog. He has made some awesome diorama's!

Next thing on my list was this (not teasing you Fran!):

Brushes 10/0 and hopefully a good goldpaint this time!
The brushes are for painting those 6 mm figures from Ian!

And then the walk around starts, and the next things were yelling to me: "Buy me!" So here is the result:

Hasegawa Mercedes Benz G4.

Bought it for 5 euro at the bring and sell stands.

Zvezda Siege Machines Set 1! Again 5 euro!

Zvezda Siege Machines Set 2! Same price!

I just love this set! Great figures!

And then I bought some little plastic bags with figures from a second hand shop:

This all for 3,5 euro! Now look what was in it!
I give a little more attention to the bag with the brown figures!

All little pieces from Atlantic, nice to make some scenery!

25 Esci Muslim Warriors!

Some Modern Paratroopers from Atlantic! I have these already!
But they werent the main reason I bought this bag.

1. From the Gold rush set from Atlantic
2. From the Kit Carson set from Atlantic
3. From the Buffalo Bill set from Atlantic

This was the main reason I bought the bag!
The three top rows and the last row of figures
are from the Sioux Camp set of Atlantic.
Never reissued and very rare!

Sitting Bull and a squaw cleaning a buffalo skin!

Top row: A squaw making dinner and a warrior cutting some wood.
Bottom row: A squaw  from the Apache Camp from Atlantic.

Warriors returning from hunt.
Warrior with horse.

With these last figures from Atlantic I was very pleased. Pity they missed some poses as you can see here.

That was it folks!

I also want to welcome a new follower:

- Jur from Rear Guard Action

Welcome to my blog!!!!!