Time to paint

Having awoken before 6am yesterday and not being able to go back to sleep, I did something I've not done in ages. I went into the Bunker and did some painting. In fact I did a fair amount of painting; trying to finish off some if those figures and units that have been gathering dust whilst waiting for a few finishing touches.

You know how it is. A new book, film, podcast, rule set or enthusiast at the club means a new project. Current projects are pushed aside; older projects get put so far aside that they are offside and abandoned projects get relegated back to storage boxes. This 6mm AH-1 helicopter for Vietnam is for one of the latest projects. It is from Heroics & Ros.

Iain Dickie visited last weekend and commented that I seem to have three painting tables. Not so. One is for painting, one is for preparation and the other is for basing and finishing. You'd think that the former editor of Miniature Wargames would have cast his experienced eye over this and known immediately what the set up was. But no! All he did was spot the 'secret army' figures I'd carelessly left out half painted.

For several years thee of us at DDWG (Devizes & District Wargames Group) have been painting 10mm Qin Chinese for a Warmaster Ancients game against the Bournemouth-based Purbeck Brotherhood of Ancients (my old club from when I was first starting Wargaming). A 'secret army' as we wanted it to come a complete surprise to our would be opponents who have a huge collection of armies to choose from.

Then, about 18 months back, Iain announced at a competition that he was starting his next army - The Qin! He said that he just had to build an army that included cavalry called the Wo Hoo. The three slow working painters of Qin rolled their eyes and gave an inscrutable smile.

Our intentions of putting a spurt on lasted briefly. Iain finished his Qin and was losing battles before the paint had dried on our little men. I still have at least a dozen units to paint - about 360 infantry figures. Will has his 4 horse chariot units and generals to paint and Steve...well he took a diversion and painted a whole Korean army from the Warmaster Medieval book before finishing more than three units if Qin.

It's amazing how complicated painting can get when you simply need to make the time.