A few more of Clifford’s retinue

It’s been way too hot to paint (again) so I got on with some assembly and a couple of conversions.

As I have posted before, I’m planning on a contingent of eight light cavalry, and eight mounted archers with their dismounted equivalents.

I’ve completed the horses and horse holder group, and one mounted and one dismounted archer. Now I have assembled two more archers and the first of the light cavalry.

One is a conversion joining a plastic tabard torso to legs with partial armour. I added mail and riding boots using Green Stuff and spurs using lead to match the mounted figures, and the result is alright.

These conversions take me ages, so I’m not sure if I’ll make matched pairs for all of them. Wait to see …

The front four figures are mounted and dismounted archers, with three mounted light cavalry behind. All these are from Perry Miniatures plastic sets.

Clifford’s Flower of Craven

I stalled with this retinue because I became unhappy with the appearance of the wyverns.

Call me fussy (I’ll be fine with it), but even when I was applying the Little Big Men transfers I had a sense I wouldn’t be happy with the result.

The problem is the thickness of the carrier film: it’s somewhat thicker than a conventional water slide transfer (decal to our American cousins), and doesn’t really respond to Micro Sol.

I’ve used a few for Edward IV’s cannon crews and hand gunners, and the result wasn’t too bad. These were applied to the left hand side of livery jackets or tabards, where there weren’t too many creases.

When applied to the backs of the four archer figures I have painted, the result was very much appliqué … and I came to dislike it every time I looked at them.

More recently I had a look at The Mighty Brush’s web site (I have some of Luther’s transfers, and they are sharp, and delicate, and thin) and I discovered a new sheet of wyverns. Brilliant! Ordered in red. Problem solved.

Then, the tricky part: could I remove the LBM wyverns without making a terrible mess of the figures, since they had been varnished by now, and some were based.

A new #11 blade in my scalpel, a steady hand, a bit of retouching … and the result is not too shabby.

Now I have a bit of emotional energy for the Flower of Craven again.

The Mighty Brush wyvern transfers, with gold fleur-de-lis destined for Margaret of Anjou.

These transfers are so much better. I’ll probably use this size and one smaller size for the remainder of the retinue.