A Good couple of weeks

It has been a really good couple of weeks from my point of view.   I have been able to find good wargaming homes for Jack’s hand built ships and some of the figures and at the same time put names to faces of some fellow wargamers who I had only spoken to by email or on their Blog sites and to raise some money for Cancer Research at the same time.  I am looking forward to seeing pictures and the figures in action.  Of course like all good wargamers I passed on tasks as well as finished products painting Jacklex ships crews for the most part and I will be interested to see what, if any, different approach is made to painting these ‘Jolly Jack Tars’.  For my part I kept them as bare metal for more years than I care to think about!

I had great pleasure in meeting a fellow blogger ‘Bob The Painter’ (Douglas Miniatures.blogspot.co.uk)  last week and looking very enviously at his marvellous collection of figures and terrain.  I had always thought Bob Black and I were a bit odd as we had never settled or specialised on a particular period.   Imagine my joy at seeing all the different and beautifully painted period that Bob the Painter (too many Bob’s) has tucked away and not feeling quite so odd. 

Many thanks for a great few hours Bob in which I felt normal and cancer was a million miles away!  That is one of the joys of our hobby it can distract you from all the daily grind for a few hours and take you to far flung places of imagination.  You know we are really very lucky.

I also had the opportunity to exchange emails and eventually talk to Mark Lodge the new owner of the Jacklex range produced by our fellow gamer Jack Alexander.  Over the years Jack has produced one off figures for games he and I, or the 3 of us, have played which never made it into commercial production.  Over time Bob and I have sorted some (a very few) of Jack’s collection of hundreds of moulds lying in boxes in his garage and so I knew where to find bits that were not parts of the range that Spenser Smith used to offer or were simply deemed missing.  I believe that when Mark launches the range hopefully in September this will be the most comprehensive Jacklex 20mm range to ever have been marketed.  This is a wonderful range and I look forward to carrying more details on both this and our sister blogsite All Things Jacklex over the coming months.

Bob's 28mm Ottoman Army

Whenever we have a game using Bob’s Ottoman and Renaissance armies, the number of hits on the blog are high and there is clearly a real interest in both the figures and the period.

On wet days I like to get my armies out of their boxes and see what I have and take pictures and post them.

When we play with Bob’s figures, invariably we only use a part of his armies so I convinced him to open all the boxes and lay out all his Ottomans, probably for the first time to see what he had and I took some pictures.  The pictures don’t do real justice to the numbers of figures and the mass effect of such a large army.  Bob has added a bit here and there over time as we all do and it was stunning to see them all out in one go.

Having done this for the first time Bob has decided that we should record all his armies so look out for some more mass effect, heraldry and unusual figures!  

I make no apologies for the number of pictures.  Bob has also added a narrative about the different makes.

'I bought an Ottoman army from Essex. The bulk of the Janissaries (pics 1+2) came from this army, along with the Spahis. Rest of the Janissaries are from Irregular, who also supplied Spahis and light cavalry (pic 3). The light cavalry includes Balkan cavalry, Turks, as well as Huns and other steppe riders. '

 'The “mob” are six large bases of white coated infantry from Lancashire Games, with assorted hand weapons (pics 7+8 + 23). '

 'The six Sultan’s guard each with a different banner are castings from a Polish souvenir that Alan brought back from Poland in 1994.'

'Guns are from Old Glory, Irregular, and a mortar with crew and accessories from Eureka Miniatures. There’s also a unit of Turkish pirates from Eureka(18)'

'There are figures from Hinchcliffe, Parkfield, Redoubt, and Pechenegs from 1^st Corps, as well some old Minifigs.