For this tutorial, I wanted to use the display base for my Patriot Guard Veteran squad as the example. This way, you can use the techniques to create your own display bases, terrain, or shrink the ideas down to fit a single mini's base. I'll start off with materials. There is a huge variety of materials that can be used, so I'm including a couple pics of materials.
Materials
Some stuff to get or keep: clear plastic packaging makes great broken glass, or even parchment if you paint it. The plasticard can be obtained for free at Lowe's/Home Depot after they do a reset...I left it turned over so you'd see what kind of signage to look for. Ask a department manager, and see if they'll hook you up. The plastic baggies are sample bags from a local quarry...ask the shift/plant manager for samples of their different sizes...free, free, free. The spray texture is quite expensive, but if you are lucky enough to find a dented can, or one that's missing the cap, they'll usually sell them for a few bucks. The last thing I'll mention isn't pictured here, but get yourself a $5 tub of pre-mixed Unsanded grout. It's used for tile repair, it's gritty, and paints great...I use that as a gap filler, and it's already textured.
In the snuff cans (left to right, top to bottom): General sand/gravel...various sizes, and I use this as my catch-can for all other materials as I apply them. The top right can has light weight crushed stones that they use to clean up gas/oil spills at gas stations...and that's exactly where I got it. It also has some very angular stones I pulled out of one of the plastic baggies you see in the 1st pic. The bottom left can has roofing aggregate...that's the small, angular aggregate that colors roof shingles, and collects in your gutters...also where I got that. The bottom right can has general crucshed stone in it, from the edge of a parking lot. The top, clear tub has old sprue that I ran through a $2 garage sale meat grinder...so far I've spent two bucks... The bottom, clear tub has slate chips from an Ebay auction I've won...I didn't even know they were in the auction with all the paints I bought! The loose slate below is left-overs from laying slate throughout my house...but you could buy a broken slate tile from a flooring store for pennies, then go home and smash it to pieces!
Building the base
In this case, I used a decorative wood base, and glued on the plastic board in the general shape of the base. From there, I planned out where to place each squad member, as a guide to building the rest of the base.
From there, it's a matter of building the rough topography using the plastic board...not to be confused with plasticard:
*That last pic is a little shakey, but you get the idea.
On the right side of the base, I added some plasticard to build a tile road later. To cut out the area for the model's base, I made a pilot hole then started shaving around until it was big enough to fit the mini in.
After the rough topography is laid, it's time to start dressing the base. For 25, 40, & 60mm bases, you can skip the earlier steps, and jump right into this part.
As you can see in this picture, I have created piles of rubble using the sprue debris that I have run through a meat grinder, random sized stones/slate chips, and a few vehicle bitz. The dark gray pieces are the slate flakes from a busted up piece of slate flooring tile. You can also now see, because the last pic was so bad, that I have scored the plasicard on the right side to resemble paving stones. Feel free to add chunks of GW ruined buildings, an IG helmet, a piece of plastic I-beam (one of my personal favorites), barbed wire, floral wire, cut up toothpicks or Q-tip shafts as pipes, etc. The idea is to pile on a bunch of crap to the point it looks like an urban wasteland, but it's not too distracting from the model...a concept with which I still battle. At any time, you can start adding the unsanded grout mix, but I'd save the filling out and smoothing for last. The grout mix is the white icing looking stuff, and as stated before, it's gritty, water based, and you can even tint it with some cheap Folk Art paints before applying, if you think it will get rubbed on a bunch.
A close up:
After you get all this on, it's a good idea to let it cure out for 24-48 hours. On a smaller, individual model base, you can get away with 6-12 hours.
Now that I've added all the goodies, it's time for my favorite part...
Painting
I start with a thin spray of Rustoleum Automotive Primer. I would not reccomend black, but it can be done...I just think it's more work, for less than impressive results.
My first coat of paint is a custom mixture of a dark gray, using Folk Art Black, and Med. Gray mixed about 50/50, then dilluted with quite a bit of water. Other colors can be used, so the overall color theme of your urban base is up to you! The "street" was washed with thinned Komando Khaki.
Next, I picked out some of the details with washes: I washed the street area with Graveyard Earth, the metal debris with Vermin Brown, there's a cargo door for a tank that I washed Catachan Green, the slate flakes with Black, and the slate chips with that light Foundation color...D-something stone, but Bleached Bone or Fortress Grey would work as well. This picture is also a little shakey...sorry:
From here, it is a simple matter of drybrushing your gravel, which I did with Codex Grey, Fortress Grey, Space Wolves Grey, Bleached Bone, and Shadow Grey. Obviously, you want to go dark to light, and the other colors were added to random areas, but not too pronounced. The ruble areas were washed again with various grays, browns, and orange-browns, but after the first wash, these others need to be much thinner. The pics below are beginning the drybrush process. In the second pic below, you can see what the completed drybrushing looks like to the left, and incomplete to the right.
When all that's done, your basing rubble, and gravel should look like this:
For the pavestone pathway, I layered on Kommando Khaki over the Graveyard Earth. I then applied thinner Bleached Bone toward the edges. On the back sides, I traced the edges with Bleached bone.
After that's done, I glazed on some of the other colors I used, such as Liche Purple, Codex Grey, Catachan Green, etc. You can barely see the colors, but they serve well to tie in colors, smooth the blending, and simulate natural tones that vary from stone to stone.
For the wall to the right, it was washed with the gray/black, then drybrushed up with Codex and Fortress. Afterwards, I glazed Reaper Ghoul Grey into it a few times, to give it a greenish tint.
When finished, the drybrushing, the glazes, and all the other good stuff comes together to create this:
Now, it's important to take an overview, and look for problem areas. For instance, this base looks pretty good, but look at it when I put the squad on it:
Author LunchBox is known around these parts for his excellent painting ability, and his willingness to help others improve. He has already produced a tutorial on glazing. Now he has another one to add to his tally.
The squad disappears a bit. Part of the problem is the crappy lighting, and over-exposure issue. Still, the base blends in with the squad, which in reality would be more true...but it's not appropriate for miniatures. This being the case, I have gone back, and glazed on some black on some of the gravel areas, to distinguish the models from the base.
I hope this helps some of ya'll create your own urban bases, displays, or even terrain.
|
