Diehards at Osborne

The two of you who read this blog will no doubt remember that in an earlier post (Research) I mentioned that the Diehard reenactment group were visiting Osborne House over here on the Isle of Wight over the Bank Holiday.

Armed with my camera, two of my children and an understanding wife I went along to meet up with Tim Rose to take a few (ok, hundreds) of photos of the group in action,

The display itself was excellent, giving an overview of period drill (including bayonet drill) and then demonstrating deploying skirmishers and volley firing. The static display which was set up around the Diehard's camp was first class as well - having now seen a Martini-Henry round close up I have more than a little sympathy with the Zulu and Mahdist warriors who took on the British army in the 19th Century.

A bonus of this trip was Tim "volunteering" a couple of his members to pose for me in pictures which I could send to my sculptor.

I must have looked more than a little mad running around these guys taking pictures from every angle, but they put up with it with great patience and I can't thank them or Tim enough for their help. I just hope that the figures do them justice!

The latest news from the sculptor is that the equipment is underway so hopefully it won't be too long before I can post pictures of some greens.

Logo

Well, I decided the logo/picture I'd done myself in my first post was fairly crap. My photoshop skills are pretty limited so I decided to get one done properly.

I looked at all the logo creation sites I could find on google, but when I went to check them out on review sites I was struck by how many of the people reviewing them had only ever done the one review. Call me a cynic if you like, but that always looks dodgy to me. The only one I could find with what looked like decent reviews wanted £75 to create a logo, not an unreasonable amount of money, but money I'd rather spend on getting more figures sculpted.

Then I found Freelancer, it's a site where you can invite tenders for all sorts of jobs from people worldwide. I typed the brief and within two days had more than 40 quotes. In the end I went with Jasper - "ph0t0sh0pguy" who came up with the logo below, which was exactly the kind of thing I was after, for only $39. Great experience and if I decide to get business cards produced, I know where I'm going.

The logo is fairly simple, but I love it!

And so it begins

A momentous day for Le Queux Miniatures! Ok, that might be over-dramatizing slightly, but I'm excited anyway...

I've given the go ahead to the sculptor for phase one of the project; producing the masters for the rifle and equipment which will then be cast and used in the production of the figures. As soon as I get photos of these I'll post them up for both readers to see!

Also, in my excitement I've registered a Domain name - lequeuxminiatures.co.uk. I went with "Go Daddy" and got it registered for two years for £7 - didn't seem too bad to me? Don't look for a website just yet as I've not got any further than the name - I'm hoping my talented brother will put together a fantastic website for me as soon as the figures are nearing completion.

As no post is complete without a picture, I've posted a photo I took when I visited Fort Victoria near Yarmouth with my family last week. I think it's a 32pdr smooth bore cannon, but there's no information displayed, so I'm not sure! Have to say they've made a fantastic job of the replica carriage which was only finished a couple of months ago.