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If Jesus Christ were emongst them, they would decave him (SIC)

Discussion in 'vBench (Works in Progress)' started by Helm, Jan 17, 2016.

  1. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    “People who have suffered every hardship and atrocity, and who have every reason to fear that they will suffer them again, may submit tamely, or they may fight for survival. The English and Scots of the frontier were not tame folk.”
    George MacDonald Fraser, The Steel Bonnets: The Story of the Anglo-Scottish Border Reivers
    Been in the doldrums figure wise for the last 12 months, but couldn't resist this when Brian stuck it up for sale
    [IMG]
    Left the face well alone for obvious reasons, but have changed the beard colours somewhat, in the process of "browning" the armour so that's a bit experimental, I'm following Del's advice
    "don't go too bright on the armour. Remember they were thieves and did most of the reiving at night.
    Stealth was vital so the last thing they wanted was any light shining off polished metal. What they did was to rub mutton fat onto the metal and the oils were slowly absorbed giving the metal a walnut brown colour. Ernesto got the shade right on the box art but IMO it would look better with a brown hue. I'd use what Brian's done as the base and paint on and wipe off burnt umber oils. I'd then rub in some tiny amounts of sap green and a purpleish red like magenta here and there. Finally pick out some edges with a steel / gunmetal colour"
    It's just the initial wash so far I may do the breast and back plates black as they also used pitch both to rust proof and dull the shine. I've left the brush marks in at this stage to show this is a home made jib, not a fine armourers piece, that may change however if it just looks like a bad paint job after a another layer or two . As ever feel free to comment and criticise all input helps me no end
    Steve
    CAM00434.jpg CAM00435.jpg CAM00436.jpg CAM00437.jpg
  2. billyturnip A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    Wow Steve that is top face painting mate. Well done, looking forward to seeing further progress. (y)
    anstontyke and (deleted user) like this.
  3. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    lol mate It's Brian Snaddon's face I left it well alone, mine isn't anywhere like that standard :unsure:
    anstontyke likes this.
  4. kenshin393 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Dinnae trust the say so o' a Bell! Tis a reiving name and ye cannae deal straight wi' him! I personally suspect Del of being a reincarnation of Willie "red cloak " Bell, a notorious scoundrel.
    Nice work so far, liking the metalwork, nice and authentic. I've been looking forward to seeing what you did with this.
    anstontyke likes this.
  5. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    Lol Del's a man oot o' his time I'm sure (y) Cheers
    Steve
    anstontyke likes this.
  6. kenshin393 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Luckily, he's too busy feuding with the grahams and others to cause mischief for the rest of us. I have an urge to dig out albions reiver from my grey army now......
    anstontyke likes this.
  7. 1969 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Interesting to learn about the treatment of the armour, always assumed everything was a shiny metal colour but makes sense to dull it down if you want to remain covert.
    anstontyke likes this.
  8. brian A Fixture

    Country:
    Scotland
    I look forward to seeing him progress Steve.Looks like you're enjoying this fella,and i'm glad he's found a good home.Derek is an authority on this period,as he still continue's in the old tradition of raiding over the border and nicking sheep to this day.Will the man ever be caught?
    anstontyke, ghamilt1, DEL and 2 others like this.
  9. Tubby-Nuts2 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    I have this book! .. and my family name is mentioned, albeit a lesser English bunch of robbers.:D

    Regards,

    Mark.
    anstontyke and kenshin393 like this.
  10. kenshin393 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    What flavour of borderer are you mark? I'm a reiver buff myself, so much so that I moved here! The steel bonnets is a great read, everyone should have a copy.
    anstontyke and Tubby-Nuts2 like this.
  11. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    They did it with leather too mate, early dubbing I guess :D Cheers Brian hopefully your face won't look too bad after I finished lol
    Steve
    anstontyke and brian like this.
  12. kenshin393 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    BTW, I live near buittle tower, the home of Jeffrey Burn, the artist that works sometimes for osprey. He belongs to the border reiver society and on bank holidays during the summer months, they run reenactments at the Tower, well worth a visit.
    anstontyke likes this.
  13. Tubby-Nuts2 A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Hedley of Redesdale.

    The English side, of the 'Middle-March'. Probably got stuffed! as they were not a huge family, or a major player.:)

    Regards,

    Mark.
    anstontyke and kenshin393 like this.
  14. Viking Bob PlanetFigure Supporter

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Liking the face, nice brush work, I had the Osprey book on the Reivers, will have to dig it out again..
    Regards
    anstontyke likes this.
  15. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    Cheers Bob as I say the face isn't my work but Brian Snaddons
    Steve
    anstontyke likes this.
  16. DEL A Fixture

    Country:
    Scotland
    For me it was Scottish West March. My family was one of the two Bell families in the Ecclefechan Parish and as such one of the 29 Scottish Middlebie and Blackethall Bell families.
    Like many other scottish border names the Bells were not a sept as such but were retainers most associated with the Douglases
    My Grandfather moved from the Borders in 1910 having got married to my grannie who was also a Bell from the English Bells aroumd Carlisle.
    Very careful attention was paid to ensure that intermarriage was sufficiently distant to avoid too much genetic problems. As a consequence of the cross family / border marriages is that even today you ctan see strong facial resemblance in border towns.
    Apparently this was not uncommon and if not quite arranged was certainly 'engineered'. This lends a bit of truth to the tales of cross border names specifically avoiding each other during Scots English battles.
    There's a lot of romantic nonsense around the reivers. With the exception of a few powerful individual families such as the Douglases most of the others were scraping out an existence and much of the reiving was about feeding the family. The theft of a familys livestock, particularly in winter was was tantamount to a death sentence. It was very much a matter of survival for most families.
    Don't go too rough on the breastplate, remember he's kitted out as a family Heidman and would have a relatively high quality kit.
  17. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    I don't plan on roughing it up just going to try a "coarse" paint to look like pitch has been used to dull the steel for those night time raids (y) It may well not work out and I'll go back to the original plan Del
    Steve
    anstontyke and Tubby-Nuts2 like this.
  18. Ron Tamburrini A Fixture

    Country:
    United-Kingdom
    Derek is an authority on this period,as he still continue's in the old tradition of raiding over the border and nicking sheep
    Well its better than what they do with them in Ayrshire :eek:
  19. Helm A Fixture

    Country:
    England
    And Wales
    anstontyke and Tonton like this.
  20. billyturnip A Fixture

    Country:
    England

    Lol, the first thing that crossed my mind was you've started painting in the style of Brian Snaddon but the penny didn't drop... what a muppet. :oops:
    anstontyke likes this.

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