As I wished to add some kneeling Coureurs-des-bois / Canadian militiamen to my range, I took one of my stock Canadian figures (running, firing musket) and cut it at the waist.
To make the the legs, I used a resin casting of my basic kneeling-legs anatomy mannequin.
I glued the trunk to the legs, and sculpted the details with epoxy putty, making sure that the arms of the original running figure would fit neatly also on the new kneeling master.
I thus obtained a first kneeling figure in a firing pose.
I obtained a second pose by sculpting an alternative set of arms.
While you can paint Canadian irregulars with almost any combination of colors, I like to always follow more or less the same scheme, which consists in painting every figure with some red, some blue, and some green.
For example, if I paint the cap of a Canadian red, I will paint his waist sash green, and his loincloth blue. Sometimes I brake this rule, and paint a touque cap gray, or the leggings brown... Additional, smaller items, such as the strings supporting the powder horn or the gourd canteen, the leggings garters, or the flaps of the moccasins, afford further possibilities to add notes of color without much effort.
This way, even identical figures will look quite different, and, when grouped together, three or four Coureus-des-bois will make a colorful, attractive lot.
In general, however, I avoid over-decorating Indian-style belts, straps, and pouches, and prefer to paint them a plain deerskin color, believing that the highly decorated native specimens that have made it to this day were for the most part ceremonial items not worn in battle.
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