28mm North Star - Silver Bayonet - from the 1st French Unit

 These are my possible entries for North Star's Army Painter: John Blanche Series - Painting Contest. One can only use paints from the two sets in that series. Priming and basing allow for some other colors. 

There are two categories - the first is in a Grimdark style. These are based on historical uniforms so not sure they should be there despite sticking to the rules. The other category is for a non-Grimdark style, bright, cheery colors. I'm not sure which ones I'm going to submit to what category yet.

The rules also stipulated that the models must be from North Star so I got that much right. I actually bought two sets of the First French Unit. One explicitly for the Silver Bayonet (round bases.) These models below, however, are for the 1812 campaign and will be integrated into those models. The other four models I threw in with my Peninsula forces, a thing I've painted very little of. 

Which of these should I submit?

A

 

B

C

D

Then these are just for angles:

The Officer

Veteran Hunter

Heavy Cavalryman

The Grenadier

Here's the wet pallet for this project. the red/orange in the lower right hand corner were for a different project but the top row and left side are all John Blanche. I'm a stingy painter and generally try and milk out every last drop. YouTube painters always mix up a huge batch for ONE miniature. Uh Uh. Not my style.

Here are some of the paint recipes I used: 

• Skin: Ruddy Terra, I mixed in Ivory White to get to the highlights
• Coats, Curaissier tunic: The Darkness - mixed in Ivory white to get the highlights, followed by the wash, Grimdark Shadow.  
• Metal - I was limited to Emperor Gold for gold and Heavy Metal for silver. To lighten the gold, I added in the Heavy Metal. To lighten the Heavy Metal I tried putting in Ivory white to poor effect. After the contest - I'll do the highlights properly with a bright silver.
• Wood on firearms: Banshee Brown, Ruddy Terra
• Reds: Fiery Vermilion over Blanched Berry. I added in Moonbeam Yellow to the Vermilion for the final highlight
• Black (boots, hats): They were primed black but I highlighted that with Ironclad Gray. The bicornes got a coat of Grimdark Shadow at the end. 
• White: Ivory White followed by thinned Grimdark Shadow then I went back and highlighted the edges and tops with Ivory White. 

On to more Napoleonic civilians and camp followers! As always, thanks for looking - questions, comments and followers are welcome and encouraged! I'm doing more and more on Facebook so follow my page there too! https://www.facebook.com/One-of-My-Men-Became-Restless-100659928063858