Painting Challenge entry 2: Regiment Prinz Friedrich August

My first proper entry to the painting challenge was my first finished Saxon Regiment for my 1813 project. Or more exactly the first battalion of Regiment Prinz Friedrich August. I had painted the second battalion beforehand already and planned to finish the whole regiment before the painting challenge started, but didn't have time so left it to be painted as my first larger entry.

Originally raised in 1701 by Count Beschling and participated in the multitude of wars during 18th Century including the Wars of Polish and Austrian succession and the Seven Years War. The battalion fought against the French in 1806 with the rest of the Saxon army followed by campaigns against Austrians in 1809 and the ill-fated Russian campaign of 1812. After the Russian expedition the Regiment could muster one under strength battalion that took part in the battles to slow down Russian and Prussian advances in early 1813. Brought up to strength during the short armistice they later suffered heavy casualties and finally switched sides at Leipzig with the majority of the Saxon army.

As detailed before the paint job was kept fairly simple with block colours being applied over white before being washed with black ink and then highlighted with 1-2 different shades depending on the area. To add a bit of variety to the unit I decided to paint some trousers with different shades. I kept the jackets the same colour for everyone, but for future units I might have to try adding slight variations to the uniform colours as well as some mud.

The flags are from GMB designs as pretty much all the flags I've ever used. A bit on the large side and only a few millimeters smaller than the free flagpole area, but they definitely look amazing.

These AB miniatures really are a joy to paint and don't feel like a chore like most 15mm miniatures. Almost makes me start to think that 28mm isn't the better scale :) The downside is that there's sometimes even too much detail, which makes them quite slow to paint if you really want to do them justice. The only real issue is that there's only 4 different poses available. Calls for some conversion work and I think I'll add at least some Sappers and convert some greatcoat wearing troops from French troops in future units.

 1st Battalion

2nd Battalion