[Barrett Hiebert]

Hey,

Not to take the limelight away from the new awesome work that Jeff is presently doing but I promised Jeff I would show my acquirments from him on the forum. Jeff has already previewed his work but due to life I was a little behind to show the shield and sword together. I can not praise Jeff's work and communication enough. I plan to do business with him in the future. A big thanks to Roland Warzecha for the shield construction blueprint and Matthew Bunker for the friendly consultation and resource finding and giving to Jeff for the characteristics of what a late migration era shield and scabbard are. If there is anyone else I missed out I do apologize in advance.

Edit: Also thanks to Jeff's wife who did the splendid painting of the shield!

So without further ado... (I do apologize for the weak macbook webcam use; I've had a camera before but never ended up using it so I sold it )

Enjoy. If anyone would like more pictures I can try my best to take some more or borrow a friends camera.

Best regards,

Barrett Hiebert

P.S. Oh and I'm happy, don't let the face fool you.

[J.D. Crawford]

Ah, so you're the lucky owner of both pieces. Outstanding! What sort of sparring do you plan to use them for?

By the way, I understand Jeff's wife had a hand in the shield artwork. Behind every great man...

[Barrett Hiebert]

J.D. Crawford,

...there is a great woman.

Oh yes and thank you for bringing that up. The lovely wife of Jeff did the painting for the shield of which I am very thankful for. It looks lovely. Cheers to her!

And yes I am the lucky man. I plan to eventually work my way up to full speed sparring in the future with a full plate metal sparring harness made. Of course the harness won't be fully historical and congruent to the armour worn in the Merovingian Migration era but it doesn't need to be. It only has to allow me to fight safely.

Barrett

[Paul Hansen]

Looks really good Barrett!

Congratulations!

That is possibly the best kit for this period and purpose I've seen so far.