Painting an 1812 French Line Battalion in 15mm!

vvv Index below! vvv
Hello everyone!
Today, I'll show you how I paint 15mm Napoleonic Line Infantry, by showing off my process from start to finish when painting an entire Battalion of them! This is part of a much larger commission, so if 15mm Napoleonic figures are interesting to you, let me know and I can surely make another episode on the subject before too long!
Apologies if I sound a bit tired in this one - that's because I am!
My sources for this uniform included the venerable Osprey "Men At Arms" series, specifically the volume on Napoleon's Line Infantry, "Uniforms of the Napoleonic wars in colour, 1796-1814," devised and illustrated by Jack Cassin-Scott ; military research by John Fabb ; text by Philip J. Haythornthwaite, and the website napoleonistyka.... which has some great reference for battalion organizations and the elusive colours for the various companies' plume colours.
Index:
00:00 Introduction
00:57 Preparing metal miniatures for painting
02:44 Getting their bases ready
03:20 Prime everything, then pick paints
04:00 First coat
10:48 Time for a wash!
11:24 Work on the bases while that dries
11:56 Second coat, same(ish) as the first
19:34 Matte varnish, then metallics
21:12 Basing the figures
22:35 Conclusion
If you have any experiences with miniature products you would like to share, leave them in the comments so I can see them!
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Miniatures portrayed were produced by Magister Militum

[@panzerleader49]

15mm armies, especially Napoleonic, are Waaaaaayyyyy underrated. They paint well, they game really well, and they are incredible on display. Thanks for posting!!!!

[@JacquesofallGames]

I agree in every respect! Thanks for watching, and I'm glad you enjoyed it!

[@LittleLouieLagazza]

2022: 5th viewing. More 15mm Napoleonics, please! Thank you for posting this!

[@JacquesofallGames]

Thank you so much, I'm very glad it was so helpful! I hope to be able to get back to posting again as soon as possible, but I've recently taken over as primary caregiver for my son and my painting time has gotten very slim, let alone filming and video editing - as a fun behind the scenes fact, my current painting commission is in a covered cake tin in the kitchen so I can poke away at it in five minute increments here and there, haha. I have some footage of past projects I may be able to carve up and turn into KZbin episodes over time, so we will see how that goes! I really appreciate your support, though, and rest assured I'm motivated to get back to KZbin as soon as I can carve out the time!

[@timbuktu8069]

I just acquired 400 War of 1812 figures. This video is motivating me.

[@JacquesofallGames]

That sounds awesome! I've done some painting for the Seven Years War in the Americas but never 1812, though I've thought of taking a stab at the period a few times.

[@timbuktu8069]

A Napoleonic war with American Indians, pirates and Davey Crockett-what's not to love?@@JacquesofallGames

[@regwirth3004]

Glad to see this video, there are very few about 15mm figures. Looking forward to see some more French Napoleonics (Young Guard would interesting). Figures look great.

[@JacquesofallGames]

I'm glad you liked it! There seems to be a lot of demand for 15mm historical figures, which is encouraging. I'm working on some detached skirmish bases for this commission at the moment, which I haven't been filming because of time constraints, but the next batch after that is Old Guard, which I certainly will be filming!

[@cdiiw5463]

Love 15mm Napoleonic. They turned out great. That much detail will look incredible when part of a full army.

[@JacquesofallGames]

They look excellent en masse! A tabletop full of these will definitely be a spectacle.

[@claymationmaker641]

More 15mm! I’m doing 15mm world war 2 Europe British v Germans and pacific Japanese vs us marines, getting some metal minis soon and these vids are fun to play in the background, and some good info for working with metal. I’m using crossfire rules btw

[@JacquesofallGames]

Oh cool! I've never tried crossfire, but I watched Lindybeige's videos on it ages ago and it sounded very interesting! I have finally finished off the Line Battalions for this Napoleonics commission, so I'm going to be starting work on some Old Guard Battalions next. Work is slow, since I mostly get to paint late at night when my son is asleep, but I expect to have at least one more 15mm Napoleonic video ready sometime in Spring!

[@henrymatthews3986]

Thanks so much, this is a brilliant tutorial! So organised and clear- I’ve found it really helpful 👍👏👏😃 And yes, anything else you could post about 15mm Napoleonics would be excellent! Cavalry and artillery units especially. Would love to see some footage of the whole army en mass- together they must look awesome 😎

[@JacquesofallGames]

I'm very glad to hear that you enjoyed it and found it helpful! Napoleonic uniforms in particular can be sooo daunting at any scale. Cavalry and Artillery are on the way eventually! This is all part of a very large commission I have on the go, and we are taking it one branch at a time haha! As for footage of the whole army, I look forward to seeing that as well - I'll have to get the customer to lay them all out on the table when all is said and done!

[@henrymatthews3986]

@@JacquesofallGames That’s brilliant news! Yay! 😁

[@worldhistoryminiatureshous9757]

Great and effective tutorial . This Napoleonic troop looks good ! Bravo

[@JacquesofallGames]

Thanks very much! I look forward to watching your video on the Burgundian Knights and Archers when I have some free time!

[@worldhistoryminiatureshous9757]

@@JacquesofallGames I am pleased with your reply ! Tomorrow a new one about the Zouaves . Have a nice week end , Robert

[@majmarkbrown7816]

looks cool but look big for 15mm to me. I guess I'm used to the old MiniFigs line. Nice video.

[@JacquesofallGames]

Thank you! Yes, the scale differences across different 15mm manufacturers can be pretty significant. These are Magister Militum, for what it's worth!

[@LittleLouieLagazza]

Requesting a video for how you're painting 15mm cavalry, and another for artillery. You can TEACH!👍👍 Starstruck here 🤩🤩🤩

[@JacquesofallGames]

Thank you so much! I'm on a hiatus of indeterminate length at the moment for personal reasons but am constantly looking forward to getting back to painting for KZbin. The good news, though, is that I actually do have 15mm cavalry and artillery lined up for whenever I manage to paint again!

[@BearGrisham]

What brand of varnish do you use? I’ve had an issue with chipping recently which has been annoying. Great work by the way!

[@JacquesofallGames]

It's liquitex matte varnish, purchased from my local Michael's art store! I think it's meant for traditional painting on canvas but I've found that it works very well applied to models through an airbrush. And thank you very much!

[@jjl2505]

Hi dude, these look great! What size are those bases? I'm going to be basing my 15mm napoleonics at four to a base as well and I'd like to recreate what you've got there. It's a lovely effect.

[@JacquesofallGames]

Hello, and thank you! I'm glad you like them! The bases are 2.2cm to a side - I did some mockups by attaching the models to various sizes of cardboard squares with blu-tack, and this size seemed like it was wide enough to be stable and easy to pick up during a game without making it look like the troops are social distancing, haha!

[@LittleLouieLagazza]

"BritTorrent" is an awesome name, it has to be fairly said. Greetings from Kuala Lumpur, brochacho! 👍👍👍

[@ARIES5342]

The site says they are 10mm. Just posing a question.

[@JacquesofallGames]

If you sort by 15mm scale on the magister militum website, then filter down to french Napoleonic figures, you should find the collection of models that were used in this video. For a specific example, you may search FRN6 using the smart search box at the top of the page to find the French flank company figures in March attack pose that prominently appear in this video. I hope that helps!

[@ARIES5342]

@@JacquesofallGames Thanks, the buildings and carts all say 15mm but the figs say 10mm.

[@JacquesofallGames]

Hmm interesting - I can at least say for sure that these figures looked and felt like proper 15s when I was working on them.

[@SemperFidelis903]

Definitely not using the 3-foot rule here. Different colored plumes--jeesh.

[@JacquesofallGames]

How do you mean? "Not using the 3-foot rule" as in you would prefer to just pick a plume colour for the whole battalion and handwave it? That may be your preference, but my customer liked the historical authenticity of this approach. The stands are meant to represent the different companies within a Battalion of French Line Infantry, each of which was indicated by a different plume colour. napoleonistyka.atspace.com/French_infantry.html has a great visual aid for identifying them.