Black Hat Miniatures civilians..........

Currently on night shifts so absolutely exhausted..........these came in the post yesterday. I saw them at Salute but unfortunately Mike (Lewis) didn't have any with him on the day.....as usual it took me another 2 months to get around to ordering them. Always quick and hassle free ordering with Mike. Anyway, 2 sets of civilians hidden away in the Mutants & Madmen section....I almost missed them as there is no pic on that page so you have to click the 'Civilians' link. These are quite hefty minis, around the 35mm mark from head to toe but well detailed and full of character. They are available as packs of 5 or individually. I also have the 'Zombies' and the 'Skeletal Marines' - the latter are pictured in a group at the bottom along with an old Citadel Zombie Rambo... Black Hat also have a big range of fantasy World War 1 Goblins and Halflings that I keep meaning to pick up......one day they will all be mine.....check out the website if you haven't before as Mike has a lot of varied ranges from 10 mm Martian VSF to the old Bob Naismith Cobalt-1  range of Sci Fi figures. Well worth a punt as I often say.

MM100 Civilians 

MM100 Civilians

This guy needs a goatee and will receive one shortly.....

I picked 2 sets of the Skeletal Marines up off Mike at Salute a few years back and actually painted them up.....the lone Citadel figure is 4th from the right.

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Minifigs Gunfighters - approx 1978 but to be confirmed....

Fresh out of the dettol bath they have been in for 4 or more weeks....Minifigs (or Miniature Figurines) now belong to the benevolent Dave Ryan over at Caliver Books. Not sure if these will see production again (he is still looking through molds) but they are a sight for sore eyes as I never picked them up back in the day. I have fond memories of seeing the sleeping Mexican in an old Military Modelling at the time. Still a little white undercoat hanging on some but pretty pristine otherwise. I hope to update once I have found a listing as they are not in any of my old Minifigs catalogues....time to peruse old magazines methinks (edit 20th June thanks Paul!). I posted the Asgard cowboys by Bryan Ansell recently here and have also come across a 'wild' bunch (sorry) that I believe to be Bryan's earlier sculpts for Conquest Miniatures which, once cleaned up, I will post up.

GF1 Professional Two Gun Killer

GF2 Gunman

GF3 Gambler

GF4 Sheriff

GF5 Drunk

GF6 Cowboy

GF7 Mexican (Siesta)

GF8 Doctor

GF9 Halfbreed

GF10 Bartender Shotgun

GF11 Saloon Girl

GF12 Church Lady

and the catalogue page they came from;

enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Vanity Post - my musical 80s............

A friend converted some old music cassettes of songs from a band I played with in the 80s. Apex Beat....a Chorlton (Manchester) based group...we played together for a quite a time until muppets and dissension met. Some very good music came out over the years so just trying to save it for 'posterity'. Excuse the pics....one of me in my later 'Indigo Prime' days (see link down the right hand side for that vid....) and one of the band freezing outside a caravan in Edinburgh where we used to play for a week every so often....attempting a Beatles style Hamburg but that never worked out either.....

C & C always welcome....even after all this time................ 

enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Happy Father's Day!

Miss you daddy. Long gone and sorely missed. 

Xmas 1962. Me front left......cute as ever.

Tony Yates Heroes Mini plus one!

One of my favourite of the old school sculptors and illustrators, Tony Yates, produced a veritable plethora of minis over the years including all the Heroes Miniatures, one of my all time top old companies. I have been fortunate to pick up a number of pieces over time and have just finished a couple. The first is a Heroes mini, the 2nd in similar style so sits well with me. 

A3 Evil Overlord

She who is yet to be named...........

Don't forget to check out Tony's blog as he is still thundering away with illustrations, sculpting and an unbelievable output in painting. Puts me to shame! More posts involving Tony (it will include this one) here.

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Pirates again, Old Glory OGP-20 Island Governors With Assistants

Thought I'd post another of these packs as I think they are great and deserve some publicity with the amount of pirate related hobby stuff that is going on at the moment......previous OG Pirate codes here. It will really make a nice little vignette....if I ever get around to it.....

Very nicely sculpted, only the lady leaving a little to be desired in the facial details. Available from Old Glory US here or Old Glory UK here.

Nick over at Northstar Miniatures is releasing a set of pirates sculpted by Steve Saleh for use with the Osprey Publishing 'On The Seven Seas' Wargames Rules for the Age of Piracy and Adventure c. 1500-1730. He is adding a number of freebie minis to entice unsuspecting punters to fall for this devilishly nicely put together set up...............this includes................

The 'I Want It All' deal for On The Seven Seas contains: 

The rulebook, On The Seven Seas. 

Captain Hood's Crew, 

Blackbeard's Crew. 

Captain Calico Jack's Crew. 

Royal Navy Crew. 

Lichfield Tony. 

All five free miniatures designed for the Nickstarter pre-order program; Marcel the Monkey, Harry Bennett's hoard, Captain Kidd, Jack Cubbin The Cabin boy & the High Seas Drifter.

More info and pics on the Northstar site here.

Of course there are other companies producing pirates.....................

Wargames Foundry Some of my favorite sculpts in this line. Will Hannah along with a few old Perry sculpts that were done for Citadel back in the day. 

Black Scorpion Beautiful pieces, unfortunately (IMHO) they have moved to the dark side and now cast only in resin but if that's not a problem then well worth perusing.

Dixon Miniatures Trevor Dixon has been sculpting since I can remember. Some very nice resin ships here as well.

Freebooter Miniatures Rather pricey as sculpted for individual use within their house game 'Freebooter's Fate' but superb sculpts by that German talent Werner Klocke.

Reaper Miniatures Now, you could easily get lost with the vast range Reaper produce but if you se the search function it pars it down eg http://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/pirate. They have a lot of Werner Klocke sculpts at a more affordable level as well. And Matthew Bickley...and...etc etc

Hasslefree Miniatures They have a number of suitable sculpts including an incredible Tom Meier Pirate Captain.

Crusader Miniatures Have a few nice sculpts c/o the very talent Mark Simms.

Warrior Miniatures Very old school sculpts but worth a look in.

Brigade Games Have a few packs and rules.

Artizan Designs Produce 3 useful blisters sculpted by Mike Owen..

Bronze Age Miniatures Female pirates. David Sonderquist's company. Great sculptor and nice bloke.... Ian over at Fenris Games is starting to import his ranges over here so you could ask him to add some in.

Black Tree Design Don't currently have a range however they did buy Pirate greens of that Warlord Games Wotjek. All here in a previous post. Shout at them to get them released please....BTD haven't released anything new for years. Grrrrrr.....

Eureka Miniatures Some lovely pieces in here including an excellent Ship's Wheel. Some of them are available via Irregular Miniatures in the UK. You need to search the 28mm section...takes a little getting used to. Irregular are a old school sculpting at a very good price. Well worth looking around their site.

Redoubt Miniatures Some interesting sculpts in here...one of their older ranges that does need updating...

Games of War Produce resins buildings and metal accessories. Very droolworthy if there is such a word. And if not there should be. 

4Ground Have some nice pre painted MDF buildings. They are releasing some long awaited fantasy houses soon which will be a must...possibly July I think.

I am sure there will be many more but there is a very in depth Pirates showcase over on Frothers Forum here. A little out of date now but includes both historical and fantasy.

If you do pick merchandise up from any of the above please tell them where you got the link. It's nice to feel appreciated.........

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Holidays and Tiger Tanks...Northern France around 1967

Picture says it all. We were driving along a French main road somewhere in the North of France (caravan holiday as was the habit back then) when my mum shouted out to stop. Lo and behold at the side of the road in a small wooded area was a knocked out Tiger I......I have another slide somewhere and will post it if I can ever find it. That will be a side shot so there may be marking on it to help identification...or not. I picked it up to get it printed off some years back and it is somewhere in my hobby collection.....this slide I found whilst watching family pics with my munchkins and my mum over the weekend. It is me at the front of the picture so I am guessing I am about 6 there...so around 1967.

Edit; Thanks to Laurent (aka Tufoo  from the excellent Lead Adventure Forum) the tank has been identified...here was me thinking I had months of research to do.....it is known as the Vimoutiers Tiger Tank.  Disabled by it's crew when they ran out of fuel in the final days of the battle for Normandy. Bulldozed off the road down this very embankment by the 2nd Canadian Division. It had been sitting there since August 21st, 1944 just waiting for me and my family to come along. Thank you little Tiger. A good article here on the Wikipedia;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimoutiers_Tiger_tank

Contains a links to many more pics of the renovated vehicle here;

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Vimoutiers_Tiger_Tank

and some superb pictures of it being moved..............plus more of scrap merchant yards after the war.....makes me want to cry....

http://www.pablum.webspace.virginmedia.com/gaz/vt.html

As always enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk

Partizan in the Park - the event!

Great show and met up with loads of people. Finally got to meet wonder sculptor and illustrator Tony Yates at long last with his friend Alec. Lots of pics taken by my errant daughter (Sophia, 10) whilst I was chatting..... the marquee was wonderful in the end. Light, spacious and airy although I would hate to think of the conditions if it had been raining. Great weather as God looked down and said 'low and behold, humans playing with puny metal humans. I shall watch this in the sun with a beer....' Or similar. Thanks anyway God.

The driveway is always quite an impressive moment...

The giant marquee in all it's splendour...

Newark Irregulars had everything organised to a tee. Great blokes one and all.

I was chatting away to a nice bloke from the Continental Wars Society who's name I didn't get. Hopefully he will get in contact as I have some figures for him. We got separated at the entrance.

I went around the show first then started taking pics later so these 'to be released' Egyptian Adventure Pulp minis were first. We've been querying them on Lead Adventure Forum here so I took pics of all I could see. I only picked up the mummification pack (bigger pic at the bottom) as I was on a limited funding day....

Northstar Figures had lots of lovely stuff including the 15mm Martians from the recent 'All Quiet on the Martian Front' Kickstarter. 

and a British tank....

Beer truck. Every show / home should have one.....

Bouncy thingies laid on for free. Much fun had by my 10 year old Sophia.

General shot of the light and airy space...much nicer than the hall itself it has to be said...

Adrian's Walls had some nice resin on show....my daughter found time for a photo shoot....

I finally got to meet Tony Yates (middle) along with his gaming buddy Alec. I've been in correspondence with Tony for years now. Me on the right in definite need of a tighter bra....

I dropped my 2nd lot of WW1 research off at 1st Corps. Far too secret to divulge (ie I am on pain of death etc) but hope it's accepted like the last lot.....Simon told me it was the third lot they had had dropped off so Mark is going to be busy sculpting for a while to come......

6mm painting...jeez, I couldn't even focus on the table....

HLBS showing off their wares......I was so tempted to throw caution to the wind and hit the credit card but couldn't. A definite group of purchases at some point though.....

Dave and Jacqui of Northumbrian Tin Soldier showing off their wonderful Nightfolk miniatures. Nice chat and Sophia got a complimentary Teddy Hero....she was chuffed but we had to go back later and buy a companion for it. My main purchase of the show was the complete set. Oh my.

Force of Arms now concentrating on modern vehicles as the wonderful WW2 and Spanish Civil War lines have gone to Empress and Warlord respectively.

Some lovely VSF goodness from Ironclad Miniatures

The battle of Cremona 69AD run by Simon (AKA BigRedBat on LAF)...more pics on his blog here.

Superb scenery here....the walled enclosure of old Zimbabwe....

Fenris Games had the Cthulhu Wars resin in stock....I was already cleared out of pennies.....

Marvellous Ainsty Castings now spreading the blog minis to an unsuspecting show public....spread the word folks.....

Black Pyramid Gaming had their wonderful Tea Wars pieces of full display. Nice chaps to chat to.

My good friend Levied Troop (also known as John) putting on a marvellous display as usual.....my daughter finding 'Le Pissoir' very amiusing....

'Zombies sir! Thousands of them!'

Sophia's David Bailey impressions of Empress Miniatures.....

This BTR80 is a must at some point to go with my Kickstarter Empress moderns....

I think these are 1st Corps WW1 Brits......

My haul..........the Tercio Creativo resin were on offer at Northstar. Had to pick them up to bolster my pirates hordes....Some Warbases pieces, Northstar's 2 'Teatime' minis.....

Foundry Mummification set

Various Artizan Pulp minis, 

Empress minis Flashman....a must have.....

2 of the show minis...celebrating the Xmas Truce of 1914 where 2 foes met up for a game of footie.

So...overall impression of the show? Excellent. The marquee was light and airy although apparently quite hot in the middle of the day whilst Sophia and I went off to the park. Games were well presented and everyone ready and willing to discuss and chat to the meandering public. Very good trade presence (always my raison d'etre for shows) and extremely well organised. Newark Irregulars deserve a pat on the back as usual. In September it's back in the hall......I did like 'In The Park' however September in England may be a little chilly for that.....

As always; enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk