Bases

Here are some bases of WWII Heer Germans I did, for use with "I ain't been shot, mum". They are, again, 1/72.

As 1/72 miniatures seems to be designed with diorama in mind, as opposed to, say 15mm or 28mm, which are sculpted for wargaming, a big proportion of them have poses that does not suit the traditional single basing. Drawing inspiration from many places, like the "flames of war" elaborate diorama bases, I built those:

They are basically soldiers doing what they were sculpted to do. Those who seem to be peeking over/around something, are peeking over/around a bush, those who are taking cover behind something... you get it.

The figures were painted with my old "cheap paint job" approach, that is: blocking basic colors, washing them up (using GW delvan mud), and adding a single highlight where the wash turned out too strong. They look not so bad in pictures, much to my surprise, but they look like nothing more than brown blotches on the gaming table, due to poor contrast. For WWII miniatures, I must admit that "being a brown blotch" probably  fit the historical context, but that does not makes them beautiful miniatures. I am in the process of painting some Russian adversaries for them, and we'll see if I can do better with the technique used with the Velites.

The bases were simple to do, if a little time consuming. I used wood filler to build up the ground around their original bases, and to add more texture to the ground. Before the filler was completely dried, I roughly painted the darkest brown of the soil, using an old brush. This eliminated much of the roughest texture and smoothed the ground to something more realistic. Again, before the dark paint was dry, I wet-brushed a lighter shade of brown over it. The remaining moisture permitted a better blending of the browns, unlike what I would have obtained by dry-brushing. Dry-brushing give a more "dusty" finish that suit more a desert or dry-land base (yes, I am thinking of my new Velites in need of basing).

Home blended flocking was then added, along with bushes made of woodland scenics "clumps". I always use a very mixed up flocking, containing "fine turf", "coarse turf", static grass and colored wood chips (which look a lot like fallen leaves, at that scale). I really don't like uniform ground covers in miniatures. battles rarely took place on golf turf. The wood fence was made of wooden coffee stirrers, cut to shape and painted with many coats of very watered down paint, which soaked into the wood and show the real wood fibers.

There you go! more later.