Canaanite spearmen II

Another post on my biblical project, quite appropriate on Easter Sunday!

My second unit of Canaanite Militia spearmen. As I mentioned in an earlier post, this unit missed the deadline by a day, as I couldn't finish the basing in time. Nonetheless, I broke my personnal record by a mile on these; 24 figures painted and based in 8 days is something of a miracle in my case. I usually take 3 or 4 weeks to do a complete unit, and my previous record for 24 figures was a little over 2 weeks. I'm quite happy also as they don't look rushed to me at all; one of the thing which limits my productivity is that I'm very perfectionnist and I cannot find the will to cut corners in order to save time. So while I did rush these a little, very little cutting corners was done!

So this is my second unit of Spearmen (first one here). The first unit was made-up of marching soldiers while this one is much more animated and in attack pose.

The figures are Foundry, and the casualties are actually Foundry Egyptians casualties (as far as I know nobody makes Canaanite casualties); some of the figures in the pack (like the Egyptian casualty in my Vulture vignette) are unusable as Canaanites but some are dressed close enough to pass as. I'm a sucker for putting casualties in units, especially on units in attacking poses. 

Some close-ups...

I must say I am having a lot of fun putting this force together, more so than I first anticipated. I was afraid all that flesh would get to me, but not at all to this point.

 It's time for a progress report :

If we look back at my original plan:
2x6 chariots

2x24 spearmen (close order)

1x20 archers (open order)

3x12 skirmishers (slingers or javelinmen)

1x Canaanite prince on chariot

I've now finished the following :  

3 Chariots

2x 24 Spearmen

2x 12 skirmishers

(plus a small vignette)

Considering the project was started just before Christmas I'm quite pleased with my progress so far. Obviously next up I will have to work on more chariots. Which brings me to a small change I've made in my army organization; my first idea was to create two units of 6 chariots but now I'm aiming at 3 units of 4 chariots, with the possibility of beefing them up to 6 later on. Most rules I intend to try are flexible on chariot unit size with 4 being the minimum size, so that's not a problem. 

So yeah, next up in this project will be 3 more chariots, I started the cleaning yesterday. Although  I also have some Napoleonics on my painting table. Recently I started doing something I never did before; paint two units/group of figures "simultaneously". I find it really helps my productivity, and when I'm tired with a unit I go with the other one. I however never paint more than two at the same time; more than that and I'm going to end up with a collection of half-painted stuff! And of course as per my usual habit I finish, base, etc. those two units before moving on to something else.