Paint Grasshopper!

Paint Grasshopper…

Nope not him...

As a youngster, my dad often called me “grasshopper-minded”, as I would jump from one thing to the next that caught my interest and attention.

I now find that this commonly occurs while I am painting.

No matter what I sit down to paint, once I get started on it, I immediately start thinking about painting something completely different, which makes sticking on subject rather tricky.

I think its partly down to wargaming having so many periods and scales that can be played, and I want an army for ‘all of them’…

I also think, whilst painting is a leisure past-time, in reality its also a bit of a chore, its quite hard lengthy work (far easier to play with the figures than paint them after all!) to do a good job and satisfy yourself you’ve done as best as you could. So whenever I get to a tricky or fiddly bit in painting something, I immediately start thinking of something else that I perceive would be ‘easier’ to paint.

A ‘wee while’ ago I started painting up some Perry ACW figures, thinking they would be easy to do (compared to Napoleonics) – just shades of grey and brown for the ‘feds. Then I got inspired and distracted by all the pirate malarkey, which has been a fun interlude, and there’s more stuff there I like to add.

So having completed the current batch of ‘piratey’ stuff, I thought I’d better clear the painting table and complete the ACW figs which have been staring at me for months. Well I have pressed on admirably and blocked in all the base colours, and then came to painting in the fiddly straps and belts, and immediately I started thinking about painting Flames of War tanks…! (Just ordered some Plastic Soldier SdKfz 251’s and Panzer IV's, and some Battlefront Typhoons) They always seem easy. Heck, they're just 2 colours; the tank itself and the tracks. And the tank can be spray base coated…

Reality is they are just as time consuming and fiddly, when you have paint the commander and crews, the camo pattern, the stowage and then get the decals on right…

And I still have Black Powder armies for ACW, Napoleonics, and WSS (cavalry from WF on their way from Maelstrom) to finish & start! Oh and there’s still the WF Zulus to finish (first 5 test figures done – just got base them and varnish) and their Colonial Brit adversaries. Then the 6 Cowboys for 'Rules with No Name', and a whole pile of Prussians for my VSF project…

…and I’m not even going to mention the bunker that is the Lord of the Rings pile, that may well get some attention again if the Hail Sauron group kicks off, and I need to start building big ‘Hail-Caesar-style’ armies for LOTR (I’ve ordered the armies book for Hail Caesar too from Maelstrom – may give some ideas for the conversion work for Hail Sauron).

So a painting, period and scale grasshopper? Yep that’s me!