"54mm Turcmen Conversions" Topic

Here is a Photobucket link to WIP and Finished photos.
There are a lot of because some of them will be used to illustrate an article in Toy Soldier Collector magazine at some point.

The original figures were Armies In Plastic Cossacks and TSSD WWUU Germans and GIs in greatcoats.

FWIW the link also seems to give access to other albums of 54mm and 95mm (1/18th scale) conversions and of games with the figures…

Here is a Photobucket link to WIP and Finished photos.
There are a lot of because some of them will be used to illustrate an article in Toy Soldier Collector magazine at some point.

The original figures were Armies In Plastic Cossacks and TSSD WWUU Germans and GIs in greatcoats.

link

Very nice conversions and paint jobs.

Agreed!

Excellent work.

Incredible!

Your ingenuity and patience have clearly been rewarded!

Who would have thought so much could have been accomplished from such humble origins?

Mike, When you do conversions like that, how many figures are you doing, 5, 10, 20, more?? Your work is always great, but I can't imagine doing an army's worth.

Always nice Mike, and an inspiration to those of us starting out in the Big Boys' scale .

Just frustrating so many good figures are now OOP (Italeri – where are you, oh foolish company…)

Thanks for the kind words.

I do 5 or 6 cavalry at a time, around 8-12 infantry. I usually have 2 or 3 projects on the go at the same time so as not to get impatient and mess up what's been done instead of waiting for mp to dry etc.

Alongside the Turcmen I was doing early WWII French from AIP WWI French (much easier!, WWII Italians (various makers), some Basmachis (all mounted) and a Mongolian Gang based on the one in the film The Good, The Bad and The Weird!

On the Italeri issue -yes it is b frustrating that so many are OOP. Steve Weston (plasticsoldiers.co.uk) did speak with them and thought he had persuaded them to put some sets back into production, but that was a while back now and nothing seems to have appeared.

I'm sure you are aware that some of their figures are available under the 'Supreme' brand – Napoleonic British Light Dragoons and French early infantry, French cavalry (a clever conversion of other figures on the LD horse) and some WWII Russians. Tiger Hobbies (tiger-hobbies.co.uk) have them in the UK.

Yes Mike – following your original "tip off" I picked up a load of the Supreme figures – even the "odd" French cavalry as I thought "Why not?".

Shame on the SW side – maybe he could not convince them of the market.

Wonder if I could convince HaT to release them like they did with Airfix (of course, it would be interesting if Airfix just re-released this year for the 200th their own figures under their own banner – I just don't understand big business and its mind-set)

And Mike (and others) – have you seen in the flesh as it were the TSSD Alamo lancers, and if so do you have a view on how suitable they would be for Napoleonic French lancers?

TSSD Mexican Lancers – would make fine Napoleonic lancers/uhlans IMHO, and if I were to need some more that might well be the route I'd go.

The point is that to soldier production is a business and not a hobb, and is run to make a profit not to please the numpties like me who buy the figures…we all want something different is one problem for a maker. Another is that we just don't buy enough figures of the new set they bring out-instead we say they are nice and we would buy them but the lapels are 1mm too wide and so they are not really any good!

If a maker does them in lots of colours we complain because the should have made more sets of different figures, missing the point that more colours means more of the same set sold and more of the master and mould making costs covered more quickly, keeping food on the maker's family'd table.

When a maker does sets of different poses and a HQ set we moan that there should have been other poses, and/or only buy some of one type of set-and so the makers stops making 54mm figures because the don't sell enough to make it a profitable business.

Sounds good to me Mike – I will pick some up from Steve Weston next time I am down there. Thanks.

And I agree with your points, so try to spend a reasonable part of my defence budget on the 54s, even if I am a way off getting a game out of them. Mind you, if HaT wanted to make their new French 1/72 infantry in 54 as well, then I would be doomed…