Cohort IX Legion XI: Caesarian Roman Recruits

This has been a slower build than I expected even given the demands of the Christmas period and my return to work. It was particularly unexpected given I've applied a different technique to how I painted them as an experiment to see if certain stock or massed units can't be painted quicker.

I follow many Youtube broadcasters and one of them is a fellow Aussie who does so under the label Sonic Sledgehammer Studios. One of his many videos under the banner, 'How I Paint Things' is an 18 minute tutorial on how to paint a Warlord Games plastic Caesarian Roman using the Army Painter dark wash system.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNDUc2OMaRI&t=610s

Naturally, I had long been aware of the Army Painter washes and dips but this video opened my eyes to the possibility of cracking out damn fine results in near half the time I take in my wash and layering method. So I gave it a go.

This unit is comprised of Warlord Games figures (the Optio and the Signifer) together with Aventine Miniatures (Centurion, Cornicern and others) with Wargames Foundry. I went with this spread as I wanted a largely unarmoured cohort to represent a less well equipped group to represent a relatively freshly raised cohort who have been inducted and trained on the march.

To further sell the recruit depiction, few shields have my full Legion XI details: only the Centurion, Optio and the Signifer have the horse, trident, legio and cohort devices. Only a few have the Legio XI number on their scutum and the rest are plain blue or unpainted.

Only the command figures are fully equipped (armed and armoured) and the rest are variously armed (pilum, sword and even spears) with a mix of dirty undyed linen or blue tunics. Don't ask me to explain the color ranges for the tunics - I can't. It was a spur of the moment thing. Let's imagine they were levied from some rich man's estate and household and he dressed them in blue.

I'm actually quite happy with how they turned out but I'm still not convinced this will be my regular painting solution. I think it will work for massed rank units. It certainly cut down the way I paint flesh - from a base of four to five layers to just two. You do need to remember to use lighter toned paints if you are going to slather a dark tone wash over the top. I still went back and did eyes and some un-shaved facial shadow.

The primary advantage to the method was is provided a universal layer across all base coats instead of having to layer each part (tunic, skin, hair and so on). I only bothered to highlight by dry-brushing the tunics and paid some extra attention to the helmets.

The dark tone had a very pleasant impact on the brass helmets. I only used a Vallejo brass base coat. After the wash, I hit it with a wash of orange/brown Humbrol Matt 62 (Leather) and after the matt varnish coat, lightly dry brushed with thinned Vallejo brass. I'm very happy with how the helmets look. My photography doesn't do them justice as I over-saturated my lighting and had to knock the shots back with Photoshop filters.

I polished up the iron helmets with a light dry-brush of silver and I'm pretty pleased with them also. The stylized horse signum I'm less enthusiastic about and confess to running out of ideas at the time. As a fresh cohort, they will have had no honours or adornments on their plain standard.

I have only one more cohort to go and I will have completed my legion. They will also be a fresh and lightly equipped unit. I will be building a Ballista as well as a mule cart with Scorpio by way of a limbered model for my two machine battery.Once they are completed, it will be time to texture all the bases and finish the legion. But other projects are afoot so this won't be happening any time too soon.