GMM Showcase – 1500 Minis ACW Project
Another monster GMM project finished and ready to roll out. This ACW (American Civil War) monster has over 1500 minis, is almost all metal, and is done in time for summer. Whew!
Hello, BoLS readers!
Brandon here from GMM. I am back again after a long hiatus, this time with an ACW commission. Clocking in at over 1500 figures, it is the biggest project I have ever done, and that is saying something!
Let’s talk about what this is and how it came to be.
In my 20 or so years of almost purely commission painting, I have done a lot of big projects. I enjoy working on armies (or “large batch” for some projects that don’t really fit that word) because it is what I enjoy. A single figure is a pleasure to paint, all well and fun. Many, many of them are something else and much more than the sum of the parts.
It is really hard to describe, but for some people wired like me, the thrill of a truly grand effort and its final conclusion is always the best feeling throughout, especially the conclusion. This is not just 1500 individual models painted with individual care; it is also more a single great effort of concentrated will and pleasure of craft that I am grateful to have the opportunity to be what I do. And I would say not just do, but is “me.”
Getting the ACW Minis Together
This ACW project is a combination of Perry Miniatures and Sash and Saber figures. Almost everything is metal, with a few exceptions. To start broadly, the two ranges work very well together. With some good paint over top, what subtle differences there are disappear. Which makes for a good end result, because I am always a fan of variety in sculpt in posing, just not style.
The one plastic entry is some of the artillery parts. 28 cannons and 18 limbers – 12 of the cannons were plastic. Both metal and plastic are Perry, but there is a slight difference in the size of the carriage between the two. My solution was to do a couple of extra 12pdr Napoleons and put them on the plastics and the ordinance and parrots on the metals. Just being too obsessive, but I sleep good. The limber teams are metal Perry, the boxes plastic. Really liked the plastic limber boxes.
As with any other project, the photos show me playing with and posing what the client needs for the game. The photography setup is always an interesting aspect of these. This is for Regimental Fire & Fury rules, so he needed some disorder markers (casualty figures), brave colonels (individual leader figures), and some others. I always appreciate these little things for what they add to the final photos, even though they are actually purely utilitarian.
The flags are, for the most part, GMB Designs printouts of historically accurate flags I have taken and, through a varnish process, essentially turned into a workable plastic. Then work that material and clip, cut, bend it, and use that as a base for what is otherwise all paint in what you see in the end. Really love all the flags, and the client chose a great command stand composition with the two banners, musician, and leader each.
Painting the ACW Project
One thing I really enjoyed about this ACW project is the contrasting challenges of color between the Confederates and the Union. For the Union, I worked very hard to mix the perfect blue that feels accurate but also looks very appealing. Spend a while on historical uniforms and the reality of field wear; far from color-fast dyes, a variety of them end up with true academic level accuracy in the weeds to what looks good and looks Union and is exciting to look at. Everything about the Union came from this line of thinking and was a very special and hard-fought color mixture.
The Confederates, on the other hand, are an interesting challenge of color and process rather than any one color mixture. Every single line figure was jumbled and mixed in a process of application to give just the right feel, and never ever cutting corners in color placement. No two sculpts are totally identical in finish.
Well folks, that is a big GMM ACW project wrapped. Thank you very much for viewing. I hope you enjoyed the images the project, and maybe my writing. If you would like to read even more or see the rest of the gallery images, I’d invite you to check those out on my links below. See you next time!
