A Bit Of Detail!

Following close on the heels of my last post I thought I’d try and add in a couple of close-up pictures of my Ming Chinese rocket launcher troops. The shine from the gloss varnish makes the details less clear but most of them are visible.

As I mentioned in my last post the rocket launcher above (and the crew) were based on a colour plate in the Osprey Chinese Medieval Armies book. The launcher is scratchbuilt from card with the exception of the white metal single wheel (not visible – it’s a wheelbarrow) and the folded up leather apron on the front to protect the crew from arrows while re-loading (it’s rolled up tissue paper tied with thread).

The black detail and stylised animals are all hand painted and as close as I could get to the designs in the colour plate in the book. The figures below are my separate rocketeer unit, with the rocket bundles also based on a plate in the same book.

With the exception of the figure second from the left, the rocket bundles and shields are scratchbuilt and the designs based on illustrations in the book. The figure second from the left is a Kennington Miniatures Ming Rocketeer – this figure became available after I’d painted the others but I added one to the unit anyway. Whereas his multiple rockets are just shown as scribed detail on the front end of the launcher, in my scratchbuilt launchers I filled them with lengths of stretched plastic sprue to represent the rockets!

These figures aren’t bad considering how long ago they were painted, although I’d start the flesh tone with a much darker shade colour these days. But those ancient bits of lichen on the bases are no doubt going to get replaced at some point!