This weeks post makes for a welcome change from WW1 which for a while had dominated my modelling. I hadn’t finished with my WW1 timeline but I needed a break from the genre. There is only so much khaki I can paint before getting bored with a bland colour palette.
I had forgotten all about this particular model. I did enjoy it but it is an awkward size to dsiplay and thus is condemed to live its days out in a storage box in the garage.
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The Last Of The Mohicans – 28mm Magua Figure
My third and final post for this weekend and the background to the first post on “How to Make Fir Trees”.
One of my favourite films is The Last Of The Mohicans staring Daniel Day-Lewis and Wes Studi. I love the story, the cinematography and the sound track. A winning combination all round. Truth is from a very young age I have always had a soft spot for the Indians. There is a reason for this and it is a true story. Allow me to enlighten you.
My Grandfather on my mother’s side had three older sisters and back in the time of the Great War 1914 – 1918 the family lived in Windsor. During the war the Canadians sent over an expeditionary force who were billeted in Windsor Great Park. Many of these men were lumber jacks and native indians who were brought over to chop down trees to supply some of the timber used in making trenches. Two of my Grandfathers sisters met and later married two Canadian service men and went to live in Canada when the war ended. In the case of my Great Aunt Rose she married a man by the name Pete Commanda, a native north American Indian. They spent their lives living on the indian reservation in a log cabin on the shores of Lake Temagami, Ontario. A story which has fascinated me from an early age. For interest a couple of pictures below.
So, whilst trawling the Warlord Games web site some while ago I discovered a set of six figures based on the movie. I couldn’t resist the temptation to buy them. I decided they would make two models. One, this one, would feature Magua on his own. The other five figures would feature as the basis for a separate diorama.
One of my favourite sequences in the film is at the end when all the main characters are high up on the mountains. Somehow I wanted to create a mountain scene, albeit with a degree of poetic licence. I wanted height, I wanted rock faces, I wanted fir trees and to aid the impression of altitude I wanted snow (the poetic licence bit as none featured in the film!). I wasn’t sure how I was going to achieve this and even if I could I wasn’t sure how good a single 28mm figure would appear dominated by a 30 cm high base. As a consequence the idea sat on my to do list. Then I got some inspiration on how to make fir trees. I still wasn’t sure how the overall model would look but then decided to hell with it, let’s give it ago!
The first step was to sift through my outdoor log pile for a suitable log. This was followed by some saw work to cut away sections which would house the trees and the rocks. The photo’s below show some of the stages in that sequence. I then cast some rocks using Woodland Scenics molds. While various things were drying and doing their stuff I painted the Magua figure. The Trees were made following the “How To Make Fir Trees” article that I recently published.
Everything painted and dried it was then all about assembly, more painting and then applying the snow. My overall impression is that it came out looking OK. I think I achieved the depth of scale I wanted and if nothing else then it’s a little different.
Now to deal with the other five figures!
TIM
The Imperfect Modeller 
Yes!!! I remember this one very well. Very nice mate
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Cheers sunshine. 🙂
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i dont remember this at all, stunning little diorama and lovely with a personal twist too..
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Thanks Steve. The idea behind Memory Monday was to try and push out a few posts that newer followers wouldn’t have seen so glad you like it.
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Like the Luke boy I remember this one as it is where it all started , my obsession with wire trees !!
it must have been a couple of years ago when the Tech adviser started my blog for me! How time flies!
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They same time goes quicker the older you get Pat so no wonder it’s flying by for you and I! Getting to that stage where it might be time to take a break from Memory Monday. The idea was to share older stuff to people who follow my blog but who haven’t seen some of the figures/models but it looks like I am getting close to closing that gap.
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It was good idea Dave and one I’ll think about doing when I’m done with work and settled in up country , hopefully by this time next year 🤔.
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Another great blast from the past there. Those trees – wow! They came out really well (the ones in the foreground with the snow on them – the ones in the background of the later pictures are less convincing but good work all the same 😉 ).
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Haha very good. Mother Nature could learn a lot from me!
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Nice story about the family and love the diorama. Pretty sure it’s my first viewing of it too. Last of the Mohicans always scared me a bit as a child, I haven’t seen it in years though on a bit of a tangent, I’ve recently got into Scottish pipes and drums bands and there’s one called Clanadonia who do a great rendition of the last of the mohicans tune
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I’ll check YouTube out to see if I can find it. I bought the cd soundtrack for the film and love the music. Often have it on in the background when I am painting. That and the soundtrack to Dances With Wolves.
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Loved the verticality of this piece. Shame it isn’t on display more. Do you not rotate stuff out?
Cheers,
Pete.
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Thanks Pete. I do rotate every now and then but the problem with this one is the height unfortunatley.
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This is a new one for me and like Pete mentioned, the verticality of it is seriously impressive. The snow looks very realistic as well which is not always easy to do. Perhaps most of all, it has a great mood to it. Very evocative I’d say.
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Thank you, glad you like it. The snow helps to make the scene but as yiu say it isn’t easy to do.
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I can imagine! Some early snow products would yellow and deteriorate with time too. I hope this one looks just as good now as it did when you finished it!
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It does. It is a product from Precision Ice and Snow, worth checking out if you want to do winter basing etc.
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Will do and thanks for the info. I need to find an excuse to do more winter basing as it always look great when well done 🙂
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Fantastic! It has so much character. Now… H-how tall is it…? I can imagine it was a challenge in itself to create the backround for the photo you took of it.
The mini is for once a really good Warlord cast, can’t say that about everything from them.
Very interesting family history. It’s somewhat ironic and humorous that Canadians were used as lumberjacks. Did they have kids who tell you story about them from time to time?
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The other figures in the set which you will get to see in next weeks post aren’t so clever. This one stands a little over about 12 inches/30cm, too big for my cabinet. Bad planning on my part! The story, and others, have been passed down through the generationsw. As a kid it influenced my liking for cowboys and indians and the old west and then more recently WW1.
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That’s too bad, that’s what I get from praising Warlord. Tbh. their best works are bought-out sets, though I wonder how well the new Prussian-Cavalry sets are, but they are now in resin, which is not something I want to see from Warlord.
That’s quite tall… Have you considererd glassing him and putting it somewhere central on your estate? That would be quite a sight I guess (only half-joking here).
I can imagine that, real interesting stuff. Is their canadian abode still in existence or already fallen to the ages?
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I haven’t done many Warlord figures so I am not the best to judge. Some WW2 US winter infantry I did were pretty good but I think other manufactures are superior. As for displaying the model I think if I put any more out I will get lynched by the wife! As for the canadian cabin it is still there in a place called Temagami in Ontario. One day I would love to visit it.
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Usually their bought-out stuff is quite good, like the Pro Gloria Landsknechts for example and I think the Three Armies Spaniards also will be interesting. But their own stuff tends to be badly researched and aren’t always well proportioned. For example their Prussian Jägers have WW1 backpacks… their War of Religion Infantry is rather 25mm compared to the rest of the 28mm range and so on… But Warlord is mostly decent still.
H-how many glassed miniature dioramas have you already put in your garden?!
That’s great to hear, has it become a museum then?
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Not quite a museum yet but a lot is boxed up and in the garage. Space becomes key for all of us at some point I fear.
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Love it, still one of my favourite films, it looks so much like Wes Studi. Awesome
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One of my favourite films too Steve and the musical sound track is great as well. As a model it just had to be done.
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I want one now 🙂
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