Islamic Persian Camel Gunners - Part II

As promised yesterday here are some photos of the Irregular Miniatures Camel Gunners (MIP4). I painted this as a colour trial and to see if the model was as good painted as it appears unpainted:





I'm pleased to say that once painted the figure really improves and that's from an excellent plain model. The detail is really prominent making shading very easy indeed. Each part of the "saddle" is clearly delineated which really helps. The face and hand detail is also well sculpted and cast. Most importantly the camel's face is both expressive and easy to highlight although I have to say the face isn't obvious until the model has been under-coated.

With horses, and the Donnington camel gunner (see below), I usually shade the animal building on any musculature present on the model or adding it if it's not there. With this model the shaggy coat of the animal required a different approach.

Here I've built up the coat from a dark brown base, through an orange/light brown to the final colour of bronze flesh highlighted with pale flesh. The flat areas were painted as normal whilst the rest was wet brushed at first and finished with standard dry brushing.

On the remaining models I'll won't use such a dark base to both lighten the model and to save time. Although slightly time consuming, as I sought the right final colour, painting the camel was straightforward thanks to the sculpted detail of the coat.

Whilst photographing this model I took some comparison shots with the Donnington model:





Both models are excellent and are a good size match but they are sculpted in very different styles. The Donnington model is very smooth with subtle detail that requires painted highlights to create folds, muscles and general texture. The Irregular model has emphatic detail that repays bold highlights, dry brushing and shading. Of the two camels I prefer the Donnington one but only because of it's face. The Irregular model is more historically accurate and offers variety as some castings have shields.

After all this I am now the proud owner of two painted camel gunners, three part finished models and seven sitting in the "lead pile". As all good wargamers do, only once I'd bought everything did I check the army lists. The Field of Glory Safavid list has a maximum of 4 camel gunners (oops!) and the Mughal list has a maximum of 10 camel gunners (better). The real point is that they are 12 points each and I can't see me ever fielding 120 point of light artillery, 48 maybe but not 120.

So it looks like I have more that enough camel gunners. Despite this I will finish them as they are a great diversion from the bulk of the army but then I said that of the handgunners!