WORK IN PROGRESS: HUNGARIAN HUSSARS, 1848-49

3rd, Ferdinand Hussars in progress--much to complete and then touch up.

Well, contrary to expectation, after the big batch of Hungarian infantry I completed recently, I turned right around and pitched-in to do the cavalry. Specifically, three units of hussars--the vast majority of the Hungarian cavalry were hussars.   Two of them will be in field uniform and one (the 3rd, Ferdinand, above) will be in full rig.   I'm using Battle Honors 25mm figure Austrians from their 1859/66/70 line: the Austrian Hussars in Campaign Dress  will serve as the 4th (Alexander), and the 18th (Attila) Hussars in field garb (as usual, clix pix for BIG PIX)...

Alexander and Attila Hussars in Campaign Dress

...and the Austrian Hussars in Full Dress will serve as the Ferdinand Hussars. 

Ferdinand Hussars

I wound up spending most of last week grinding out the horses...

I loves my cavalry, but lordy how I hates painting horses!

I was quite taken by the idea of the white shako of the Ferdinand Hussars, as well as the overall color combination of the uniform. So I decided to do this unit in the full rig. 

From the Gyozo Somogyi  book The Honved Army 1848-49 

After getting the horses out of the way, I did the preliminary work on all the uniforms.  I then decided to then plow ahead with the Ferdindands before going back to the others.  I figure that after the much more complex figures and details of these that I'd be well practiced for the less complicated hussars in field dress.

 The headgear in particular is extremely involved (tassles, loops, more loops, cords...). Getting the yellow to stand out from the white has also presented a challenge (hence the black lining--I also used light gray as a base for the shako as opposed to straight white in order to bring just a tad more contrast--I then did some light brushes of flat white to add a bit of texture and to brighten it up). I'm now at an impasse on next steps. Having finally gotten all the yellow lace done (in rough form), I'm debating just how far I should go in representing the lace as black and yellow.   I'm probably going to go whole hog on one test figure to see what it looks like.  My instinct tells me that complete accuracy isn't probably going to render the best result in this case. I think the shako cords will be okay, as will the stripes and ornaments on the pants. I'm concerned that adding black to the lace on the pelisse and dolman will wind up giving the impression of uncorrected gaps in the paintjob.  I'm sure that were I to leave this bit of lace yellow, nobody but me would know.  However, I'll give it a shot just to see how it goes. It could also turn out well.  Either way, there is a good amount of detail work still to be done.

The painting desk, mid-project: entropy in action. 

Unfinished figures always look...unfinished. But right now, the white shako gives the distinct impression of being unfinished, at least to my eye (even though it is the most complete part of the paint job). I'm guessing that it will give a different impression (fingers crossed) once the black details are added to the cords and the figures are completely painted.  I"m guessing that the Ferdinands will take the rest of this week (and into the weekend) to complete (all 4 of 'em!).  Right now, I think I'd exchange the effort involved with these 12 hussars for those 36 infantry I just did!