Making a snow base in less than five minutes

I got a request on making a step-by-step guide on the bases I did on the Space wolves. It´s actually quite simple, here it is!

Paints:
Black (any brand will do, just make sure it´s not glossy)
Calthan brown (GW) or any similar brown.
Graveyard earth (GW)
Black grey (VMC)
Ironhull grey (P3)
Stone grey (VMC) - actually one of my favourite colors.

Basing material
Bark and cork
Sand
White glue
Superglue
Winter turf (from the army painter)
Sodium (get it at your grosery store)
some old brushes.

Step 1:
Take some small pieces of bark and/or cork and glue it to the base using superglue. This will be rocks later.
When the glue is dry take some white glue and thin it with some water. I usually go somewhere around 1:2 glue and water. Now cover the rest of the base with the glue and dip the base in some sand. Leave it to dry.

Step2:
When the base is dry take and old soft brush and whipe of the sand and dust not seated with the glue. Paint the entire base black.

Step3:
Do a heavy drybrush (or wetbrush) with Calthan brown ocher the parts that´s not rocks. don´t worry if you get some brown on the base, not all rocks are entire grey if you look´s at one.

Step 4:
Do a drybrush over the brown using Graveyard earth.

Step5:
Paint the rocks using Black grey, I paint rather carelessly at this step as some grey on the earth gives it more depth.

Step 6:
Take a 1:1 mix of black grey and Ironhull grey and drybrush the rocks. Repeat this step with pure Ironhull grey and pick out the edges.

Step 7:
Take some Stonegrey and drybrush the edges of the stone and then some of the earth as well. do it randomly at the eart to give it some more life.

Step 8:
Take small clutches of Winter turf and glue it to the base usin superglue. Thin down some white glue using water, only this time make it really thin. I use something like 1:5 glue and water at this step. I apply the glue/water mix randomly using an old brush where I want the snow to be. Now sprinkel the Sodium on the base and then shake of the rest. Leave it to dry.
Now you got some good looking snow bases ready fore the battlefield (you can apply some varnish before they go to battle, but do it lightly).

 Untill next time, happy painting!

Basing: Doing a industrial/mesh base

Today I will show you a way to do some industrial/mesh bases for your miniatures, in the past I did one on weathering yellow and now it´s time for another. For this tutorial I took a 50mm round base from GW (but It will work on any other base).
First of all you will be needing some tulle, superglue, a base (of course), a scalpel and a pair of scissors.
For painting the base I used,
Black
Dark Flesh (VMC)
Tinny tin (VGC)
Boltgun metal (GW)
Gunmetal metal (VGC)
Mithril silver (GW).
Besides that I used three kinds of pigments,
Orange rust (Forge world)
Dark earth (forge world)
Rubbel dust (MIG).
Step 1
Take a piece of tulle and cut it to the right shape, don´t worry if its not correct, we will fix that later. Now take some superglue and put it on the base, use an old pice of card or something to spread it over the base. Now put on the tulle and carefully use the card to press it against the base. Be carefull not to glue the card as well. Leave this to dry for a while, go grab some coffe!

Step 2.
Take your scalpel and trim the edges of the tulle so it fits to the base.

Step 3.
Paint the entire base with black.

Step 4.
I use Darke flesh from VGC and staple it onto the base.

Step 5.
I repeat step 4 but this time with Tanny tin.

Step 6.
Staple some Boltgun metal onto the base.

Step 7. Drybrush the base using Gunmetal metal.

Step 8. Pick out the finest highlight using Mithrill silver from GW.

Step 9.
Bring out your pigments! I started by brushing Orange rust over the base, here it´s a matter of what you think looks good.

Step 10.
I brushed Dark earth over the base, be carefull not to overdo it.

Step 11.
This is the last step and I took som Rubbel dust and carefully applied on the base. I only did some Rubbel dust on one part of the base to make it look more interesting.

Hope this tutorial was helpfull! This base took about 5-10min to do if you exlude the drying time and is beside the cost of paints and pigments almost free. The tulle can be bought for almost nothing at any store selling fabric.
Untill next time, happy painting!

Making a base using water effect

I thought I would show you how I made a base using water effect from Vallejo. This water effect should be transparent when dried. For this base I was aiming for water similar to swamp.
Step 1
I started to build my base using some bark and sand mixed with white glue.

Step 2
When compleately dry I used VMC Stone grey and went over the base with a heavy drybrush. I took VGC Dark flesh and brushed over the parts I wanted to be coverd by the water effect. Then I did some strokes using VMC Olive green. I make sure at the part where the water meets the land retains the basic color (Dark flesh) to illustrate the wet sand/dirt. Now stroke a thin layer of water effect on the part where the water is supposed to be, leave for at least 24h to dry.

Step 3
After 24h and a final drybrush with VMC Stone grey mixed with a little white (about 3:1 ratio). The water effect shrinks a bit when it dries so you might want to use two thin coats instead on one. In this picture you can se that it has shrinked a bit comparing to step 2, but it still looks ok. Now all thats left is to maybe put some more colour on the base and maybe some static grass of your choice and paint the edges of the base black.

Untill next time, happy painting

Weathering yellow

For my Bad Moon orks I start the yellow with Ilyaden Darsun over a black undercoat. I then wash with Devlan mud and repaint the area with Ilyaden darksun leaving Devlan mud where I want my shadows. Next step is to do a highlight using VMC Sand yellow. I use bright highlights for this step, it will look fine as soon as the weathering is done. So, now our yellow is ready for weathering!

Step 1

I start with VGC Dark Fleshtone and a spunge (I used one who came in a blisterpack). I wipe of almost all the paint from the spunge and then I lightly press it against the surface. By making small motions I can control the pattern better.

Step 2

I mix 1.1 VMC Oily Steel with black and repeat the first step, try to get the metalpaint in the  same area. You could do this with a staplerbrush, but I think the spunge works well.

Step 3

Next thing to do is to take some Orange Rust pigments (I use pigments from Forge world, but any brand will do I suppose) and apply it with a brush where you think the rust should be. Don´t be shy on the pigments, you can always remove some later if it get´s to much.

Step 4

For next step I use Dark earth pigments (also from Forge World) and Applied it on the areas I figure that dirt would be. Mostly at the lower half of the armor.

Step 5

I use Black soot pigments and spot it randomly on the armor using a brush.

Step 6 (can be skipped)

I did some randomly parts with Ash grey pigments (from Forge World). About half of the time I skip this step, because it will look fine without it.

Step 7

I took VMC Oily steel and applied it on the parts of the steel color that have been to dark. This is also a choice of taste, do what you think would look best.

So, now you should have a miniature with fine looking weathering and this took me all about 10 minutes at top. Good luck and hope that you liked my step- by- step guide to how I weathering yellow.

Please note! It have come to my attention when applying varnish straight over the pigments the varnish may change the apperance of the pigments. Now, I usually dont varnish my models, but if you want to do so you might get around the problem by applying a coat of varnish after step 2 and then finish with another layer of varnish after the last step.

Until next time, happy painting!