DIY base inserts for my Showgilrs!

[Q'iq'el]

I'm not a very good in crafts and I barely have time to paint my minis anyway, so when it comes to conversions it usually means attaching a pre-made weapon or bending the arm in a different angle. At best, some very basic kit-bashing. In other words, this post is not about some elaborate way to get truly great looking bases, it's about an absolutely rudimentary insert-production for my Showgirl crew and hopefully there are some informations in here that may prove valuable to others struggling to personalize their bases at my skill level.

When I bought my Showgirls back in August (still no time to paint them, but hopefully I can stop using proxies before Christmas ), I immediately realized I want them to stand on the bases fitting the models. I like my bases to at least superficially fit the story of what the mini is doing right at the moment - quite ordinarily my Nicodem crew is digging around a graveyard and my Lilith crew is making it through some wilderness. For the Showgirls I wanted something that would fit a location I'd imagine them fighting in their dresses and fluffy clothes. The popular choice of stage boards didn't cut it for me, because I figured the performance is the least likely time for a fight, at least according to the fluff (Showgirls keep their second identity secret and the show is their cover, so they wouldn't blow it easily).

I imagine they could go invited to some private party and then unleash it on the hosts and the guests, leaving nobody alive for one reason or another. I thought long about a balroom look and I even found very good looking bases at http://www.pk-pro.de/index.php?page=product&info=84 but they carry only 30mm bases.

Besides, as I was looking for the perfect balroom floor, I realized I want something yet different. A floor of one of these decaying unused mansions and places Malifaux is supposedly filled with. Something Colette and her girls may be pillaging through for arcane trinkets and books or simply using for a clandestine storage. Since you can't get anything like that online, I devised the simplest possible way to made my own base inserts. Here it is.

The Materials

Aside from the regular Wyrd bases, I used some masking tape (to block off the slots), some regular green stuff, a .5mm plastic card and the real deal of this story - the GSI Creos Mr. Clay.

Perhaps it is only my impression, but it seems clays are not as popular among miniature modelers as all sorts of epoxies. But there are multiple kinds of clays and some allow for very easy modeling and great effects. Mr. Clay is a product particularly easy to work it (the reason I've chosen it). It is type of clay often referred to as "paper clay". When modeling it is oily and very very soft. It sticks to plastic, but it doesn't stick to fingers or metal tools at all. This makes it easy to work with.

The worse part is that it dries slow. You need as much as 10~12 hours, more if the element you made is thick. In case of inserts, it pretty much is enough to leave them overnight to fully dry.

After the clay dries it comes away from plastic with no effort at all, is very light and feels much like it was a thick cardboard (hence the paper clay). Any imperfections can be fixed with sand paper.

The "stamps"

First I prepared 2 different stamps that would be used to stamp the floor mosaic patter on the clay. I was deliberately uneven and somewhat shabby when putting the tiles and patterns together as I wanted the feel of disrepair about my floors.

I cut off the tiles (big squares, small squares and octagons) from a .5mm plastic card. I glued them to a square piece of the same plastic card and let it dry. Two different "mosaics" for two different base patterns.

The second step of this stage involved spreading the green stuff wide on two clear plastic cards and let it dry a bit for 15 minutes or so. I went for two large circles, slightly more than 50mm in diameter, about 2~3 mm thick.

After the green stuff dried a bit I put some moisturizing hand cream on the plastic mosaics (as a simple release agent) and used them to press in the pattern in the green stuff. The impression has somewhat uneven separation lines between the tiles and some of the tiles came out uneven, but that is exactly the result I aimed for - damaged tiles here and there and the crumbling cement filling in between.

Here's the picture of both greenstuff "stamps" and the trial run base.

Preparing the bases

Preparing the bases is the easiest step. Some masking tape to fill in the slots:

The second step is to fill in the bases with the clay. I'd kneed balls of clay and then fill in the cavities. After smoothing out the surface and rounding out the edges I'd get the basic shapes of my inserts, sticking roughly 1~1.5mm above the edges of the bases, just like this:

(in the left upper corner you can see the original plasticard tiles and the greenstuff stamps taken off them).

After that I left the bases to dry for about 2 hours. I live in very humid climate (Japan) and I suppose in a dry place you'd have to make it shorter. If you wait too long the clay will be too hard to impress, but if you go too quickly, the clay will still be stick and will ruin the greenstuff "stamps".

Stamping

Probably the easiest part of the process. After drying up a bit the clay can still be impressed but it isn't sticky anymore. That means pressing in the bases with my "stamps" was really easy [edit: And it doesn't require any kind of release agent - on the contrary, the clay dilutes in water or oil and can be ruined by anything wet or oily]. It does require some strength and some of the clay spills to the edges, but all that is easy to correct later. The end product looks like that:

The bases were subsequently left to dry overnight.

Final Touch

In the morning the dried inserts would easily come out of the bases. That made it even easier to cut off the clay that bulged out when I pressed in the mosaic patterns. I used some very fine sand paper to clean up the edges and smooth out the surface of the tiles.

The cleaned up inserts were glued back into the bases with superglue and adorned with some rubble, remains of black magic rituals (stacks of skulls) and leaves fallen through the holes in the roof. One base has a plant coming from the crack in the floor. (bits mostly from an old Warhammer FB basing kit).

Done

The final steps - priming, base coating with gray paint and painting the tiles and bits on them. I've been out of touch for a bit too long and I messed up the top coat of varnish a bit (too thick), so the bases do not look their best, but the final effect is presentable enough. There are 4 other bases in the mix, for the new additions to my Nicodem and Lilith crews, but they are good as a comparison to my usual basing standards (rather low ).

Primed:

Base-coated:

Painted:

And the best part is, if I ever add to the crew, I just need to stamp a couple more inserts for the new bases.

Now to paint the girls and finally stop using the proxies!

Edited December 9, 2010 by Q'iq'el

[Yazza]

omg, masking tape to fill the slots, why havnt i thought of that!!!

so elegent and simple

[Nathan Caroland]

Nice and simple - and great looking bases that keep a cohesive look for the whole group. Well done.

[cyberakuma]

purdy if i hadn't alreadt commited to the idea of clockwork cogs etc. under glass for my showgirls i might have nicked this idea so simplistic but impressive

[Sholto]

Great work, and a clever idea. Thanks for the tutorial.

[Rorik36]

Thanks for sharing. They look great.

[Nemissary]

Great tutorial They look great

[joelmmorgan]

This is a great post. Very simple idea and the results are awesome. Thanks

[The Green Git]

Very nice example of greenstuff molds. The result is impressive!

This looks like it would work great with Sculpy. I've not heard of Mr. Clay but will give it a look.

Great writeup. Thanks for sharing.

[Peterdita]

cool and clever!

[DangerousBeans]

Am I the only one who can't see the pics?

[Sholto]

I can see them fine.

[fortythree]

Genius! They look fantastic.

[Deuce]

Very cool. I doubt I'll copy your bases but, not being much of a base modeler, I'm leaning heavily toward borrowing your technique.

Have you considered gluing the green stuff stamps to something hard and flat, like maybe a wooden block? It seems it would help keep the stamp flat and provide better control.

[Q'iq'el]

Very cool. I doubt I'll copy your bases but, not being much of a base modeler, I'm leaning heavily toward borrowing your technique.

Have you considered gluing the green stuff stamps to something hard and flat, like maybe a wooden block? It seems it would help keep the stamp flat and provide better control.

A wooden block might have been a better choice than the paper weight I used, but the flatness isn't the only issue. Greenstuff is hard to make good mold with as it sticks to everything even with a good release agent and it is so soft it bends when you remove the original shape you are trying to imprint on it.

There are dedicated clays for making molds and I'm sure if I had used one of those it would have been much easier to make a good "stamp". I only started to learn about all the intricacies of the mold-making as I progressed with the project though, so it is a lesson for the next project like this.

On the other hand, as I said, I wanted some imperfections with these floors and these uneven greenstuff molds have proven to give exactly the effect I was going for this time, so no harm done.

@DangerousBeans - the pictures are hosted on the very forum, in my album section. If you cannot see them, it must be some weird browser issue, as they are on the same servers as the forum, aren't they?

And thanks for the good words, everybody!

Edited December 10, 2010 by Q'iq'el

[Guest mxh521]

I was inspired by a McMourning vs. Freikorps game last night, and decided to whip these up from WWII V.D. posters.

[cyberakuma]

milliput yellow-grey is pretty good for mold making i swear by the stuff it's one of the most versatile epoxies i've used with milliput "soup" (normal milliput ratio mix saturated in water til a thick soup-like consistency) is also really great for filling gaps/ misalignments in castings without obscuring detail

can't say i've really tried the others in the range to see their pros/cons as the yellow grey does wonders for me

[waferthinninja]

Those are really cool, nice work

[loganproudbeard]

this is amazing!!!!!! really cool