My £10 Mystery Box (1 Viewer)

[johnnybach]

Hey trooper - I've just had a thought.

You asked me if I would post a photo just now - and without a second thought, I took one on my window-sill - bunged it on the computer and did all of the photobucket stuff and posted it.

If you had asked me whether I could do that just a couple of months ago - I would have just laughed. Also, my daughter has shown me, at my request, how to download, store and retrieve photos and other images from the internet (such as the ones you have posted me lately), without the need to copy etc. I am currently painting the Mountie Drum Major - from the picture you sent me - but directly from the screen!

This forum is doing me a power of good - and not just because of the soldier hobby. It really is developing some skills I never knew I had. I wonder would the Britfarmer pass on my thanks to Sharon & C.. for providing this facility?

Its B*** marvelous.

Thanks friends. johnnybach

 

[thebritfarmer]

Hey trooper - I've just had a thought.

You asked me if I would post a photo just now - and without a second thought, I took one on my window-sill - bunged it on the computer and did all of the photobucket stuff and posted it.

If you had asked me whether I could do that just a couple of months ago - I would have just laughed. Also, my daughter has shown me, at my request, how to download, store and retrieve photos and other images from the internet (such as the ones you have posted me lately), without the need to copy etc. I am currently painting the Mountie Drum Major - from the picture you sent me - but directly from the screen!

This forum is doing me a power of good - and not just because of the soldier hobby. It really is developing some skills I never knew I had. I wonder would the Britfarmer pass on my thanks to Sharon & C.. for providing this facility?

Its B*** marvelous.

Thanks friends. johnnybach

See it is easy when you know how !! I pass on your thanks to Shannon when I speak to her next.

 

[johnnybach]

Hey Scott,
I think I should thank you too - because I follow your instructions on how to post a pic. As you say, easy-peasy - when you know how.

Yes please do pass on my remarks to all involved with this facility. I have had nothing but kindness and help from everyone - so far. There's only one snag that I can see;

It gets in the way of painting!

But as the Commandante points out - maybe that's no bad thing!

Regards to all - johnnybach

 

[hsm]

well i have started Johillco Bikaner Camel Corps figures- these are lead and were completly stripped -pretty sure they are not recasts.
These (set of 6) are going to be done as two sets of 3.
the epic stuggle beween refurb, repaint, or custom..
Well these are mine-so I am going to put my angle on them

while I was painting these camels last I thought about the old school factories in the UK turning these out...wonder what these workshops looked like, and what the people thought of their job.....and if these would last 50-60 yrs......

I will honor their memory with a nice job!

Grant

Your score is wonderful- I too have had a recent "score" .
i will explain.
There was an ad from a widow for someone to to please take her husbands beloved toy soldier collection away. it repeated for awhile so I contacted her. a good friend of her husband had come up already and "picked through" but there was still a 1/4 ton of stuff(litereally).

Well she lives quite some distance away, (east coast) I am in Toronto.
A chum was out there and he was coming home for Xmas so I asked him for a solid. no problem.

so I got a trunk full of castings, a melting pot, a pouring kit, molds home made and commercial, and literally over 1000 castings and figures. for free.
Well I am going to paint a bunch , and recyle a buncj as I learn to cast.

soon I will post pics of some of the pecualiar items/sets tha materialized. there is a lot of stuff! some are Britains, Johill,bulldog, tradition, ted toy,
mignot...etc etc. once I learn to properly post pics I will share.

wow! I have a lifetime of collecting toy soldiers here on top off my own-
but Like I said mush of what is left are 'recasts" for painting-but - some are hollowcast.... prepped for refurb?

Grant

 

[johnnybach]

Hi Grant - nice to hear that you're having a go at some of these at last. I do agree with you, when you handle something like that - you do get the feel of the history that went before. I'm also glad that you are giving them "your best shot" in the painting department. Lots of the "experts" seem to agree that Johillco was every bit as good as Britains - and some reckon they are more animated figures. Good luck to you, and hoping to get a peek or two of them at some point in the future - when they are finished. johnnybach:salute::

 

[trooper]

while I was painting these camels last I thought about the old school factories in the UK turning these out...wonder what these workshops looked like, and what the people thought of their job.....and if these would last 50-60 yrs......

I will honor their memory with a nice job!

Grant

They were grimy, dusty, and smelt of hot rubber, hot metal, talcum powder and graphite. The work benches were littered with soldering irons, files and saws. the shelves were stacked with hundreds of boxes containing bodies, arms and weaponry. All around the central casting tables were precarious stacks of rubber moulds, piles of metal in the corner (which had to be lugged up five flights of stairs), a tatty sink full of mugs with tea making kit to the side. A notice board covered with pinned on orders, a seperate corner with paint and brushes for undercoating, reels of wire of different grades, an ancient mould press on which 15 tons had to be applied by a back breaking ratchet, the constant grinding rattle of the casting machine, baking hot in summer and freezing cold in winter. That was Norman Newton's workshop at Dyer's Buildings, High Holborn in 1961. To quote Maurice Chevalier, "Ah yes, I remember it well" Hard work, but happy days. Trooper

 

[johnnybach]

In short then trooper - Heaven! Sounds just like my workbench now.%^V

Ah! - Dontcha just lurv the smell of hot metal in the mornings?^&grin

johnnybach.:salute::

 

[hsm]

here is a teaser- perhaps a mod will move my part to painting thread...here are some pics..

 

[hsm]

going to post the pics at my painting thread- didn't mean to move in on the 10 quid mystery bucket!Grant