Saturday, 8 April 2017

How I base my Zulus.

Since I have had a number of compliments on my basing technique I thought I'd do a walkthrough. This has been a progression of earlier techniques which just happened to come to maturity in time for this project. I would have liked to use this method for my half done Peninsular and upcoming WW1 projects. In the photos I've focused the camera on the base texture rather than the figures.

I first mix up some filler with some black and brown poster paint so that if any base gets damaged I won't get white patches showing through. Once this is laid on the base I then push some small stones into the soft surface. After the filler is dry I then PVA some sand patches on.


The next day I pool some oil based stain onto the filler, rocks and sand.




The next day I wet brush some Brown Derby paint onto everything. This is a local made paint by Resene which I have used for years on my bases. At this stage its looks too heavy but once it has dried it looks fine.



The next paint I use is called Irish Coffee. I try and be a bit more conservative in applying this but mistakes can be covered up with flock or tufts.



The next step is to dry brush some Palm Sugar.




Once everything is dry I apply some Army Painter Highland Tufts and some Flock which came in a Jungle basing set from Gale Force Nine. At this stage I struck a problem, I have some Tufts left over to do some casualty bases but not enough for any more Regiments or the British. I was a little unhappy to find that Army Painter has changed the supplier of these Tufts as seen in the photo below. I think that I have tracked down some matching Tufts but will have to order some to make sure.



The finished Riflemen which have had two coats of highlights on the skin before varnishing and one after, but its really hard to see any of it. I really love the look of the Shields, which are from the Iqwa Regiment. They look very Hollywood and I intend to use this as a standard shield for any supporting units.






4 comments:

  1. Nice stuff.

    The tufts at the top look like Siflor tufts, the bottom look like Tajima.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Paul, I've found some miniNatur locally which seem to match.

      Delete

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