Re-basing Project: Intro

As I mentioned in my previous post I have decided to rebase my ancients armies. A rebase is quite a big task and I have thought about it a lot which after weighing every thing up I am going for it.

Firstly it was the format and size of the bases. I really like the look of larger Impetus style bases and looking at my table size 80mm seems to be the best frontage. With that size I feel I can get a more substantial look. Another reason is the depth, I have found my 2mm thick bases hard to handle particularly when picking them out of storage. Finally the corner cutting basing I have been doing has caused some bases to warp!

Secondly the aesthetics. My usual tactic of desert sand and stone mix and static grass has served me well. Originally using Games Workshop's Sand and Grass tubs to achieve a quick and effective basing. However as they do these items were discontinued and I found that Javis had a suitable alternative and a mix of static grasses managed to get a good match for GW grass. This consistency served me well however running low on the Javis sand ans stone mix I found the new batches different colour and consistency. This frustration coupled with previous issues clinched the rebase project.

With my new Geek Villain cloth on here I thought it would be great if the new bases matched the colours of the cloth's design! I had seen a video on You Tube of Simon Miller's For King & Parliament game with an impressive almost invisible basing scheme. I won't be able to make them invisible but the matching basing colour to the board became an objective.  

I was initially planning to do a quick sand and grass basing again but after being inspired by other blogs and the work of my commission painter friend I concluded painting the sand a MUST. It is the most reasonable way to get consistency and matching the colour of the sandy rocky areas of the cloth's design.

So I gathered paint and basing materials and did a few tests. For the paint quite a few Wilko tester paints were used to achieve a shade similar to Vallejo's 'Dark Sand' which is a close match to the sandy rock areas of the cloth. There is plenty of scope to achieve various earthy tones, after trying out various shades I remembered I had an ochre already in. The mixing tester sheets: 

In the end Retro Yellow and Soft Hessian mixed at 1:2 gave a good match for the base colour. I may also use Chocolate dream for a slightly darker version but either will work. Their Lemon Sorbet shade works well as is for the dry brush highlight to bring up the very fine and light dusting of sand applied.

Any stones I stick on I can paint up grey and then its just a case of the static grass. The spring was too bright and the Summer too dark, mixed roughly equally gave an almost spot on blend. Then it was just a matter of testing a few figures on the new bases with the new basing recipe:

Quite happy with these results but wasn't too keen on the thicker lighter edging so a nice slimming black was applied which finished it off nicely: 

Also a bit of added self adhesive grass tufts for vegetation variation: 

My commission painter friend recommended cutting down the tufts for more usage and if smaller tufts are needed so will try that down the line. I will have to attempt a step by step post once I have got a standardised plan going forward until then I will muddle through the various formats until I have it nailed down but overall I am happy with this style. It was straight forward doing it for this Seleucid pikemen command stand but the bases of pikemen themselves packed onto the base will be another story! Before I base them I will be "updating" their painting style and will also form a test piece for future pike units. I will write a post on the format of units in relation to their base size and density with regards to rules.