Friday 21 June 2013

Making a Standard Base

Today's post is the result of a mini painting 'face-palm' moment when I realise I have missed an opportunity and messed something up as a result. A couple of weeks ago I got all my North Africa models out to photograph and realised pretty quickly that there was a significant variation in the bases from one unit to another. Its not the end of the world, but it does look rather odd and slightly ruins the look of the whole army when presented together like this.

Way back when I started this project I made a point of deciding in advance how I wanted my bases to look. I decided on the graininess of the sand mixture I would use and the exact colour palette I would employ to paint them. I took several pictures and noted down the particulars in my painting notebook, with the idea that this alone would help me to maintain consistency between my units. The problem is that although I am sticking to the same colour formula for painting my bases there is still a lot of variation from one platoon to another.

I pulled out several bases to compare and it was quickly clear that this variation is probably just down to how hard I dry brush the highlights. So although the base colouring is consistent if I am heavy handed with the Ivory highlights I get significantly lighter bases. Obvious really but its an inconsistency I haven't noticed until now (stupid, stupid, stupid!).

The solution of course is pretty obvious, I need to make a 'reference base' that I can keep aside and use as a Standard to compare against when I do new bases in future. I should have done this at the beginning, but its a lesson learned and a mistake I won't make again. 

14 comments:

  1. Myself and Ray agree with the stupid, stupid, stupid!

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    1. Having worked with each other all these years I guess you two would recognise it.

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    2. Can I have a "like" button please? ;)

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  2. If every base is ever so slightly different, as long as it does not look contrived, you could pull it off.

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  3. I think you can get too anal about this. I bet your basing looks fine to the rest of us. :)

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    1. I'm definitely anal...but the variation is quite startling between one unit and another. I prefer the strongly highlighted, lighter colouration so all I need to do is add a little dry brushing to those bases that are currently too dark.

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  4. We have all done it! (Myself more times than I should admit!) You start a project and the painting or basing "evolves" and the last one looks different from the first. Oh dear, what a shame, never mind!

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    1. It's fixable, just a silly thing to miss.

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  5. You sound very reasonable to me, but then again I'm not the best judge as I get very picky about the same thing....some would say anal I guess.:-)

    Christopher

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  6. tut tut Sir! You do realise that nobody going to want to play with these now......do them again!

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    1. I was going to say something sarcastic, but as your an excellent painter I'll just shut up and do as I'm told.... ;)

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  7. Sound like you've hit upon a solution. And as they say sh*t happens.

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  8. I'm having the same "trouble" with using a different colored static grass now. Not planning on redoing the rest of the earlier ones. Best, Dean

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  9. As a regular follower of my Blog - you will know that I paint all of my Flintloque themed bases with the same colour mix and formula.

    Over the years I have thought about changing this technique, but am glad that I have stuck with the same old formula.

    As far as static grass is concerned, I tend to mix static grass from 3 or 4 manufacturers in a small plastic box, this has the advantages of giving a more natural mix and still gives uniformity to my units - whether painted today or ten years ago.

    Tony

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