Wednesday 13 November 2019

Yusuf ibn Tashfin's Black Guard Beginning to Take Shape


I'm pleased to announce that I have finished painting and the first 12 (Gulp! A long way to go as of yet!!) miniatures of Yusuf ibn Tashfin's Black Guard have been rolled out. I went for quite a plain black colour scheme highlighted by a deep blue as I wanted the Black Guard to look quite menacing on the tabletop. 

I've went for a mix of Artizan Designs, Footsore (actually Musketeer) and Saxon Miniatures (now sold by Warlord Games). In the main these will be the manufacturers of choice but with the (obvious!) addition of Gripping beast, Doyens of the Dark Ages, superb "El Cid" range. The miniatures have been blue tacked into position on the bases as I want the composition to be flexible should I change my mind about positioning as more figures are added.

I've gone more for a sort of Sudanese look with darker skin tones than I plan to paint the 'Berber' and Andalusian units in the army. I'm not sure I'm 100% happy with the paint scheme on the Black Guard but considering I have not done any painting for roughly five years I should probably not be so harsh on myself. Ohmmmmm..... just breathe! 


Having recently done some research on the hippo shields carried by many 'Berber' tribes what I discovered was quite interesting. The existing examples of hippopotamus hide shields in various collections and museums around the globe show signs that the shield significantly blackened as the object aged. I've gone for a much lighter 'brown' and have layered the paint in such a way as to suggest the ridges that occurred during construction that one tends to find on the surviving examples. My lighter shields are not realistic in tone. The brown is matched to be reasonably complimentary to the blue in order to create some degree of colour balance. You can't take the fine art college education out of the man- apparently!

Ethiopian Hippo Hide Shield
(slightly 'blackened' with age)


Beja Shield from the 19th Century


Here are a couple of quick snaps of the unit as it takes shape from the right and the left which should give some idea of the dynamic that I am hoping to create; that of a unit in combat and not the static unit of spearmen one sometimes finds in armies of the period. I want all my units to have some sort of vignette as a minor focal point but also to show that this is a fighting force. This has always been a theme in all of my armies including my old WAB armies! Not so easy to to with a one mini- one base type of army as one found in most WAB armies.

For the spears I've gone with a cane type affair as exemplified in the El Cid WAB Supplement written by James Morris. They are referred to as bamboo in the El Cid book but as someone on LAF pointed out in my first post covering this game, it is unlikely to have been bamboo as the materiel would have had to travel several thousands of miles if that were so! If you are interested in the Spanish Reconquista and you have not got a copy of this great book then I suggest that you try your utmost to get a copy! It's filled with a wealth of information, ideas and general military history. Really. It's a gem of a book. As Warhammer historical are no longer with us you will have to look online to buy a copy. I'm sure there will be plenty of them floating about if you look in the right places. The Wanted section of the Bazaar in the Lead Adventure Forum would be a great place to start.



As you will no doubt have noticed the miniatures need another coat of matte varnish as a few bits were missed after giving them the coat of gloss. This is inevitable when varnishing with a Matte Spray over a first layer of gloss as when you apply the varnish the matte looks as glossy as the gloss! Fun, fun, fun! The gloss I'm currently using is Humbrol Enamel Varnish Spray. This is not typical as I  would normally have given the miniatures a brush on coat of Humbrol Gloss thinned with a little white spirit. I find that this gives a much tougher coat then the gloss spray and it also allows for better control of any 'pooling'. Unfortunately, I cannot find my tin of brush on Humbrol Gloss at present but I'm certain that it is safe and sound in the many boxes that I put my painting gear in! One of the fun parts of packing everything away and unpacking..... not!



This was intended to be a quick post. Not only to show that the armies were beginning to take shape but somehow to give me some impetus into getting stuck into getting the units modelled and painted.


12 comments:

  1. Thanks Neil. There's only another 300 odd to go lol :>)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Very nice. I love those Artizan Designs figures; I have quite a few myself.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Codsticker, they are lovely sculpts and do paint up very easily. The Saxon Miniatures Black Guard were the real gem when it came to painting them up. There's always been something about the Patten brothers sculpts that almost allows the miniatures to paint themselves :>)

      Delete
  3. They look really great, thanks for sharing.
    Given me some ideas for a Saracen force to face of against my Franks in Outremer

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Paul. Glad they are of some interest.

      Delete
  4. These are looking GREAT. At some point I need to do a Saga army so I can paint up some of these guys.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Allan,

      I've got more than a Saga force to paint up.... in fact there are over 200 mini's that need to see a brush before May 1020!! :>)

      Delete
  5. Great stuff mate, too many projects on the go at the moment like you too!

    Cheers
    Matt
    French Wargame Holidays

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Matt, There's only one main project at hand at the moment which seems to be making slower progress than I had anticipated! I need to be a little more conservative with my spare time.

      Delete
  6. Nice work taking shape, I might borrow this colour scheme 👍 are you using any particular reference for colours etc ?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Borrow away Matt. Be my guest.

      I believe the black guard were named thus because of their ethnicity. It's almost become a convention to portray them garbed in Black (Ahem.... the El Cid movie!). I'm not aware of any actual evidence of the guard being covered in black. I went for it because some Tuareg tribes still wear a very dark blue and, i have to be honest, because it looks good! I'm still very reading heavily everything I can gobble up in English for the early 12th Century in Spain but not much of it really goes into the depth that much of the Spanish literature attains. I had this idea that Google Translate might be my fiend with this problem but all I have managed to get is garbled and certainly not what you would call good English lol

      Delete

Please Feel Free to Leave a Comment