I’ve decided to make an early start on my 1/2400th scale pre-dreadnought project, which I was planning to kick off next year. As a ‚proof of concept‘ exercise I’m going to assemble, base an paint a small selection of Tumbling Dice French battleships of the 1890’s to create a squadron for a ‚What If?‘ Anglo-French clash prior to the Entente Cordiale. This was a really interesting period which saw the decline of the Jeune Ecole doctrine and the development of new, if outdated battleships to keep up with the Royal Navy’s building programme. Not only that but the ships themselves were extraordinary to say the least! It will be fun to paint something without masts and sails for a change but I will have to base them first, as they don’t have the usual metal sea bases. The plan for the weekend is to glue them together, stick them on laser cut mdf bases that I’ll texture with acrylic paste, then get them undercoated in Halfords white primer.