Words of Wisdom 3

Today's lesson comes from John G Garratt ('Model Soldiers for the Connoisseur', Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1972, p50):

'There is no logical reason, except possibly as a technical exercise of dubious merits, why eyes should be painted in detail at all.'

I'm with Garratt on this one, unless you want an army of Wilko Johnsons chopping out riffs across your wargames table then enough with the staring eyes - less is more, merely suggesting eyes is much more effective for 30mm and under i reckon.

That said, think what you could do with an army of Wilkos...

Words of Wisdom 2

Mr Preece's recent dilema put me in mind of these sage words from George Gush ('A Guide to Wargaming' by Gush and Finch):

Be warned: once one embarks on super-detail and elaborate painting techniques, some strange psychological force makes it almost impossible to return to simpler standards, so one is condemned to lengthy sessions of painting for ever!

(To be fair to JP one of the things i admire about him is his apparent ability to switch between painting styles and levels of detail as appropriate for the particular project - not something i seem able to do other than using a shiny finish for vintage figures and matt for modern ones. And then there's the fact that he has 10,000 painted figures....).

Words of Wisdom 1

This tickled me - from AIRFIX magazine guide 19 'Model Soldiers', Martin Windrow (or was it Gerry Embleton) spoke thus:

Like a gun, a modelling knife is neutral; whether it works for good or ill depends entirely on the moron holding it.