Tools of the Trade 3 - Brushes, Tufts and Paints (plus some other stuff)

Over the last few days my initial orders from Mighty Ape arrived:

- 4 x Italeri 00 sables
- 4 x Italeri 1 sables
- A bunch of Warlord FIW blister packs (Armed Settlers, Frontiersmen, British personalities, Last of the Mohicans, and the 4 Indian leader pack)
- 10 x Army Painter Tufts packs ( 2 each of Woodland, Swamp, Highland, Mountain, and Lowland Shrubs - all 2016 editions)
- Army Painter Tweezers



I have to admit I was swayed by the price and the handle shape - I'm not at the skill stage where I can justify spending oodles of $$$ on Winsor & Newton Series 7  but to be able to have separate brushes for metallics, reds and white at an affordable cost is huge for my peace of mind.

I picked up the Army Painter tufts that were on special (the 2016 ones that are not as consistent as the more recent editions) as I preferred the look of them to the newer ones. Thankfully I have enough tufts now to base all 450 miniatures and bases that this project will entail as I'll be mixing them up as much as possible - I already have several packs in storage that will get mixed in as well.

Yes, 450 figures. Originally I'd estimated around 360 figures for three forces. That went south as soon as I bought some Warlord FIW and also decided that I would be adding a few more civilian/settler types to expand the scenario types I wanted to model. Project creep is real.

I popped into a local games store just for a nosy and was very pleased to see they were now stocking the entire Vallejo Model Colour and Game Colour ranges - so I grabbed some core paints that I don't have including that most vital of Vallejo products - Surface Primer Grey. An absolute must when painting lighter coloured civilian figures as I will be doing over the next 2 months. I made sure I also grabbed a few different reds so I could experiment with the shade of the British red coats. I'll almost certainly favour the darker, deeper reds over the palette that moves towards the Napoleonic red.

And because Mighty Ape only had one set left and I wanted to try painting a formal unit anyway, I picked up a box of metal Colonial Provincial Regiment - which I'll end up having to buy a second box anyway to have multiples of 6 for Sharp Practice.

Still a couple of things awaiting arrival, notably leader bases, 25mm round bases and shock dice/frames and the storage options I'm taking a punt on just to see if they are worth a long term plan.


Pete