<!--quoteo(post=155074:date=Jul 23 2006, 08:12 PM:name=Commodore John Paul Jones)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Commodore John Paul Jones @ Jul 23 2006, 08:12 PM) [snapback]155074[/snapback]</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->
Aye aye! You can't top a lady that gas 80 guns, eh?
I find the JMV skins somewhat accurate, though I found a few problems.
All the JMV skins are supposedly in full dress, as they are wearing stockings and coats trimmed in gold... remember that for later.
If you were a lieutenant or lower, you hat would be plain black rather than trimmed with white to match the white piping on your coat. The higher ranking officers' lapels are blue... but they're in the Royal Navy! They would be white. (Unless you are a commander or junior captain. If that is the case, JMV needed to add a senior captain with white lapels and a commander with one epaulet on the right shoulder.)
The AMERICAN navy unifroms had blue lapels.
Hey Fabris, did you notice the medal on Norrington's uniform at the "promotion"? It is the Order of Bath medal, which wasn't introduced until 1815! Also, the frilly trim on his hat shouldn't be there. Can't recall how it goes... "Hollywood invented the frilly trim" or "just civilians wore frilly hats"... but the frilly trim wasn't part of a navy uniform's hat.
Something else that almost everyone overlooks is the actual cut of the hat. Norrington's hat is an "English cut" tricorn which was very popular with civilians... but not in the military. The military was very fond of the "French cut" tricorn. (The hat that Lord Beckett wears.)
The thing about the redcoats that really bugs me is their coattails. They look too short. Could be a marines thing I didn't know about... the marines of the 1800s wore short coattails... but that was popular in all military units around the world at the time. I think they would have looked better with actual frock coats with the pinned back tails.
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Yeah the hats are a bit dodgy. All we can really gather is that clearly the film is meant to be based after 1690 when tricorns first reputedly came into fashion in miltary and civilian circles. The feathers are nonsense, but I suppose make them that bit more wonderful. Be prefering a trashed felt one meself (since Sparrow's leather one was nonsense)..well if I ever get around to ordering one. I can just about get away with wearing a cowboy type hat in the everday, by claiming to be a diehard Fields of the Nephilim fan, but not so sure about a tricorn. I did know a kid who used to wear one all the time in Bristol I think but he was a strange duck. If I do get one I be shopping here:<a href="http://www.captjackspiratehats.com/" target="_blank">Cpt Jack's hats</a>
Yes the Order of Bath is a little odd. I wonder why they bothered adding it in at all? Were they trying to suggest some sort of illustrious past for Norrington in the years passed between the Swanns' passage to the Caribbean and the 'present'? Makes you wonder what IS the history of James Norrington in the intervening years? Sparrow suggests in CBP that the Black Pearl is virtually the last real pirate threat in the Caribbean...has Norrington distinguished himself in bringing the other pirates to the gallows?
I'm not really up on the redcoat uniforms or the history of the marines but I think we encounter the same problem of what period is being represented. Certainly 17th century uniforms were very different with longer more simple redcoats (a la Kirk's lambs type for a re-enactment reference). The Kipar.org lady reckons the soldier are either 1730s or 1760s in date, but I have no information with which to check that claim. She does comment that prior to 1742 no real uniforms existed for soldiers.
I have encountered on the royal marines museum website references to two books that may be of use (If I could find them!):
Stadden, C.C., Newark, G. and Newark, C. (1997). <i>Uniforms of the Royal Marines 1664 to the present day.</i> I think Chas Stadden was a model maker (an ex-serviceman) judging from <a href="http://www.staddendirect.co.uk/figurines/royalmarinesandnaval.asp?grenadier0153" target="_blank">this</a>
Field, Col. C. (1924). <i>Britain’s Sea Soldiers (Volumes I & II 1664-1913)</i>. Liverpool: Lyceum Press
If I can find copies of these I'll attempt to consult them, this seems to be marines' museums suggestion. I'd imagine British Marines' history is much like that of the French, in the early days units were raised as required and uniforms initially would be pretty arbitrary.
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" border="0" alt="par-ty.gif" /> I also managed to copy it from the shoulders down so I could refer to it. 
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" border="0" alt="bow.gif" /> I'm still on the look out for a copy to own of <i>The Further Adventures of Captain Blood</i>. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/bookish.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":mm" border="0" alt="bookish.gif" /> 9Don't recall the exact title.
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" border="0" alt="rolleyes.gif" /> , body. I think the shape suggests the Norrington figure in POTC/DMC, but Artois' moustache is very apparent when you see the model head on, and up close, and it looks a little like he is pouting, (not necessarily a bad thing with regards to Norrington) or that he is disfigured a bit beneath the nose. 
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