"How Can I Minimize My Cavalry Painting?" Topic

I'm trying to avoid a ton of time (and money) painting a ton of mounted cavalry for both of my 25mm armies. In most cases more CSA cav is historically accurate, however, a few Gettysburg scenarios (namely McPherson's Ridge) will require more US stands. I already have about 20 US and 10 CS dismounted stands completed, but only mounted CS stands to match. On my mounted stands I only have two models per. From this point on I'd like to paint as few horses as possible, so I'm wondering if anyone has ever played with the paint schemes of their riders to work for both US and CS (of course this method would not work for command stands) or a used a method of swapping out riders so it's only necessary to paint and base half the number of horses as riders. If so, how did you secure riders to their mounts? Also, If so on method two, what manufactures sell only riders?

hey at least you're not doing a Mongol Horde army ! or Napoleonics :)

Tru dat.

Don't try to minimize the number of horses. Just come up with quicker ways to paint them. For instance Spray paint the base color, black reigns and saddle on a black horse with a dark grey drybrush and inkwash, don't paint hooves and hide them with ground cover/grass, etc.

You could save a lot of time using the method above, though I'd go the army painter dip instead and not bother with drybrushing or highlights etc.

I paint mostly Browns, different types then a light wash of bronze or copper on the haunches and shoulder. Then a wash over the whole horse of walnut brown. The figure looks like a horse gleaming in the sun.
Black for base coat and as stated above, no need to paint the reins.

only play skirmish games.

For me, the painting and planning is a big part of the fun.

However for my Boer war collection I only painted one mounted figure for each 3 foot figures.

Since most actions will be dismounted you could do the same for ACW. That should be good until it bothers you enough to paint up the mounted figures.

Vince

leave out the horses :)

If so, how did you secure riders to their mounts?

Since you're looking to save money here:

1 Salvage some large paper clips from work.
2 Use a corresponding size drill bit and drill a hole in the horses saddle, where you want the riders to sit. Drill down about 1/2 inch.
3 Using the same bit drill a hole in the underside of the rider that matches up with the hole in the horse.
4 Cut a piece of paper clip. About 1 inch. Super glue the
length of paper clip into the rider.
5 Line up the horse and rider and cut the excess paper clip to the correct length.
6 Voila!! You rider can now sit on any horse without falling off. If you plan carefully enough, you should be able to interchange all of you horses and riders. You can reinforce this with a dab of BluTac, if you wish.

Elsewise, just paint the damn horses.

All my ACW cavalry are depicted as dismounted with horseholders. One horse on each base.

As above, spray paint brown or slap on a load of household emulsion with a big brush, then some of wash/dip and the job is done although you may want to add a few highlights (white patches etc). I light drybrush will pick out the bridlework of you can't bear the aching tedium of painting it all.

I hate painting horses.

You won't like my method then.

I do both mounted and 'empty' horses for my ACW cavalry regiments.

link

I went to 10mm for that reason among others.

Wtih 28 mm, my fast paint, is paint block color (grey, black, brown), paint hair black or brown and then ink. They are not good looking, no. But they are war-game fine.

For example here. No need to paint the reins if you do not want.

All I do is 6mm … in this cases Sci-fi CAV … it takes a long time to do it "right". And only paint 5 figs at a time …

Hire someone else to paint them?

Stop going to the Pub and paint the horses.

Legion 4: nicely done!

Personally, I like painting horses better than I like painting men, mainly because there's more variety: each horse is an individual. Here's how I do it, with 15mm horses:
link

Oh ! Thank you don !

@Legion 4- very nicely done, the detail is wonderful considering the scale.

@KTravlos- I like your 28s as well. They have very nice old school charm to them.

O.K. … now I'm just bragg'n ! Thanks Jack !

nevinsrip Sponsoring Member of TMP
08 Dec 2014 11:30 p.m. PST

nevinsrip said

"3 Using the same bit drill a hole in the underside of the rider that matches up with the hole in the horse.
4 Cut a piece of paper clip. About 1 inch. Super glue the
length of paper clip into the rider. "

I don't even want to think about how the rider might feel about this procedure!!!

I paint cavalry units mounted and also with dismounted "dragoons". I buy and paint horseholder for about ?75% of the mounted units.

I went a bit nuts with my Bengal Cav: Horseholders are still mounted (using the Guides standard, 3 of 4 riders have carbines and sabers, last man has a lance. Man with the lance is the horse-holder). Saved me a little bit of work on the number of horses because they're all individually based. Pull 3 cav with swords off the table and replace with 3 held horses and 3 Sikhs with sharp pointy things. Still means I need 7 horses for a group of 4 riders, though.

Thanks Texas Jack!

Undercoat brown, I use a tan shade, paint with horse colour I use coat d'arms, paint blanket, paint mane and tail, fetlocks. Paint bridle fittings. Wash with brown ink straight from the bottle. Your brown undercoat is now the saddle and reins Let it dry overnight. Highlight blanket add white feet to taste. Job done.

Now, and this very important, use some old varnish and watch the paint fall off the horse.

Now you are ready to start again.

Seriously though it takes about 5 minutes per horse.

Army painter has advice on speed painting horses :

link

I have a friend who does a very basic paint job on his horses because he figures the well painted rider will draw the eye instead of the horse.

If you want to swap riders on the horses you can eat cheese wrapped in wax and use a hunk of wax to stick the rider to the mount. It sounds like a joke, but I have seen it done. It works better with 25mm than 15mm because you can get a big enough blob to do the job.

Use Blu-Tack?

Also, I used to have 4 horses and 1 horseholder on my dismounted cavalry marker bases. But now I only have 2 horses a base – its only a marker after all.

Tigerjon:

Don't forget all the dismounted cavalry you half to paint, lol. Try blue and gray spray paint.