Forests and Fences

Last time I blogged I wrote about the Splintered Light miniatures I had started painting for Song of Blades and Heroes.  Between last blog and today, while I haven't been blogging, I haven't been idle either.  Aside from paving an area here at the Castle and generally seeing to the grounds, I've also managed to paint a couple more figures and make some terrain to decorate the battlefield.

All in all I'm very happy with how it's all turning out.  Here's a quick run down on what I've managed so far.

I already had a handful of model trees from years ago when I played DBA, but being rather top heavy, they tended to fall over whenever anybody within 20 meters sneezed.  As well as stability I also wanted to provide some base for the trees to sit on, but not something with the trees stuck to them - I want to be able to remove the trees for storage, and if done right I could also use the base without the trees for rough ground or similar.  I bought a pack of washers and glued them to the tree bases, as well as a couple of rectangular drinks coasters - cheap and thin MDF board, but perfectly strong enough for the purpose.  Using wall filler I created a texture on the surface of the coasters, and cut out the spaces where the trees would eventually fit.  I also added some rocks for general effect (nicked from our garden no less).

Once the wall filler had dried I painted it thinly with watered down PVA glue, and then applied sand in different clumps to provide an additional texture.

In the background you can see some stone fences I also made - these were constructed from icy-pole sticks with small rocks glued layer on layer, and then sand added to the base.

Once done I undercoated them all.  I used black for the fences, and white for the forest and tree bases (white because I wanted them to match with the bases of the miniatures I have already painted).

Once done and dried the painting could begin.  The fences were easy, several layers of gray, from a dark gray to a lighter gray were dry brushed onto the surface, in successively lighter coats.  I then added clumps of the foliage one uses for model trees in spots to create a mossy/overgrown look.

The forest and tree bases were done in a similar fashion, several coats of a dark brown, followed by two layers of lighter browns, and finally a very light dry brushing using a skin tone.  The rocks were painted black and then given the same treatment as the fences, foliage included. To these I then added grass flock, and some grass clumps from the Army Painter company.

Here are the results:

And here with the figures I have painted so far:

So far I'm very happy with how they're turning out.  Now to get the rest of the figures done!

Cheers,
Giles.