"Some questions!" Topic

I've been messing around with some tumbling dice 1/2400 models to get my feet wet in the genre and have some questions if anyone would be kind enough to spare some time.

Firstly to painting, is it acceptable from a historically accurate point to paint ships in a more neutral fashion and distinguish nationality via flags and what have you?

Secondly there is a bit I'm not entirely sure about from the tumblingdice 2nd rate ship, a small single front sail, how exactly does that go on?

Lastly a mostly assembled ship, any overtly obvious mistakes in its assembly?

imgur.com/a/Em9aLQF

Thanks for your time!

Regarding the painting – sure. Up until about 1805ish ochre or light brown sides, with or without (usuallly without) contrasting gunports was very common, with some blue, green or red (if any) contrasting on the upper quarterdeck/poop bulwarks was common, but hulls could also be overall brown or very dull red. Often strakes were picked out in black or another dark color, but at 1/2400 this may be difficult. The "Nelson checkerboard" – white stripes with black gunports appeared around 1800 give or take, and became the norm or at least common later in that decade.

The model you have looks fine as is, and the loose sail looks oversized for the model in any position. Here is a pic of Whitejamest's great looking ships, which show a third jib sail, but those seem to be cast on.

link

Were it me I would just leave it off.

That little guy looks great! If you're anything like me, get ready for a long hobby. My tall ships have grown from a 1/1000 collection to a variety of scales, including(but not limited to)- 28mm, 15mm, 1/300, 1/600, 1/1200, and 1/2400. They all present different benefits and challenges, and are delightful to model!

I asked the same question about painting when I started the AoS genre, and got what Virtual above said.. : )

basically ships were painted by the preference of the captain and ships could be any colors until the early 1800s when you started to see some (more like just barely) uniformity.

I use 1/1200 ships were are twice as big as the 1/2400s, but I use a lot of orchre / yellow, red, some blue, and black.

have fun!

-Stew

I wish there was a way to at least know what colors a particular ship wore at certain points in her career, but aside from the odd painting, no such luck.

I suppose it's to be expected. Record keepers throughout history have consistently shown an appalling lack of respect for their centuries-hence wargamer descendants. :)

Here Here! Quite rude indeed. : )

There are some references in things I've read but they are sparse and few and far in-between. For example, I've read "Nelson on the Nile" and there are a few sentences of how some of the ships were painted.

All in All, from what I can gather from smart folks here on TMP and elsewhere; the color of the ship was unimportant for identification. They just didn't have a national color or like it. Instead, to ID a ship as friend or foe, Captains looked at things like how it was rigged, what type of sails, what it was doing, the color of the uniforms of the officers, national flags, and of course signals. "make the private signal" and the unknown ship made the correct answer. Sam Willis "fighting at sea" has an interesting chapter on how captains identified ships.

Generally, ships were painted at the expense of the Captain, which resulted in most of the ships being cheaply appointed.