Hullo,
I was leafing through Gush's Armies of Renaissance, and looking at the decidedly old school figure photos I started wondering "when did wargamers start to base their figures on textured bases, hiding the seam between figure and base?"
I started playing in 1977 with plastics, but I can't recall when my basing habits evolved to the modern style.
There must be other evolutions as well... any idea when the fashions changed?
Cheers,
Aksu
Individual taste? I did it in 1966.
The people saw the beautiful manicured grass bases from early GW armies, and saw that it was good.
The peasants rejoiced!
IMHO of course, mid-80s is when my bro and I noticed
1979 for me - we bought our first house and it needed quite a bit of work. Experimented with texturing bases with left-over Polyfilla. Still using variants of the same thing today.
It must have been in the early to mid 70's after I asked Peter Gilder about how he did his bases at one of the Model Engineering Exhibitions my then club attended. If memory serves he used a mix of filler and sand which was an absolute nightmare to get to stick to the bases.
Before that I remember talking to Bob O'Brien (he of the original WRG triumvirate) -name dropping again but only wargaming veterans will remember his name- and he used a lot of Airfix figures. His method was to mark out the figure's base on thin card, cut it out then glue that to another piece of card to level the base. Again a nightmare but for a different reason -Airfix cavalry bases were not very symmetrical.
I then starting using just filler stippled with an old toothbrush.
MickS
1987, when someone introduced me to epoxies.
I started gaming in the 50's and then we didn't base anything. In the 60's I started basing Airfix figures on cardboard painted green. Then after I got a copy (and still have) of Donald Featherstone's "Tackle Model Soldiers This Way" I saw a broader horizon of gaming beyond the ACW and WW2, but still based figures on green cardboard. I graduated college in the late 60's and started in my career which left no time for gaming. I still bought references and books, and even some figures, (which I also still have unpainted - 25 MM). I retired in 2000 and got back into the hobby, and was really gung-ho after discovering DBA and HOTT.
It was at this time that I first saw sculpted bases and loved the look, so have been doing so ever since. I primarily use Elmer's wood putty and various sizes of railroad ballast as my basic basing material. I like the totally painted look for my elements, so don''t like using the static grasses - for the reason that when everything else is painted, and the static grass isn't it doesn't seem to fit right to me. My method is slow, and really messy in the puttying stage, but it's still worth it to me.
So, all of that said, I guess I'd say 2000 is when I started sculpting bases.
Terry
Mid (?) eighties for me, when I entered a painting comp at GW, and saw how much more finished figures with textured bases looked.
Cheers - Phil
Probably early/mid 1980s for me.
What time is it?
I still don't sculpt bases. I've been flocking for about 10 years, but using static grass more recently.
Early 1990's for me. Although I did use tetrion in the 80's. Rebasing with that was an absolute nightmare.
Quote from: Terry37 on 23 September 2017, 02:19:19 AM
I like the totally painted look for my elements, so don''t like using the static grasses - for the reason that when everything else is painted, and the static grass isn't it doesn't seem to fit right to me.
Aah! The joy of the internet .. discovering one is not alone :)
Me too!
In the late 70s I began to add flock to my bases. By the late 80s I was using textured basing material, usually sand and glue, then painting, dry brushing and flock. By the mid 90s I was using textured being material and static grass, but with the smaller scales I have now moved back to flock as it lies lower than static grass and also covers better. Basing has been a real evolutionary process for me so that now, as well as flock or static grass, I use tufts, rocks flowers of different types, muddy puddles, tree trunks and so on.
Most people at the club I attended were flocking their bases at least when I started wargaming in the early to mid 80s. Certainly the first army I ever painted and based (15mm vikings) had flocked bases. I think a few people were using miliput or similar to texture bases too, but they were very much the minority. Just about everyone was flocking though.
Quote from: Nick the Lemming on 23 September 2017, 11:10:32 AM
Most people at the club I attended were flocking their bases at least when I started wargaming in the early to mid 80s. Certainly the first army I ever painted and based (15mm vikings) had flocked bases. I think a few people were using miliput or similar to texture bases too, but they were very much the minority. Just about everyone was flocking though.
And some were rolling out textured epoxy putty instead. Thus was born the age of flock and roll.
Quote from: FierceKitty on 23 September 2017, 11:21:23 AM
And some were rolling out textured epoxy putty instead. Thus was born the age of flock and roll.
That growling noise is your coat bein chewed - OUT
Not often Ian and I agree, but yes.......begone!
You all know what he's going to say now, right? =)
Mew?
Pass me a broom - there's a stray kat in here
Serious question. Does anyone use KittyLiter in their basing?
To the original question - pretty sure that I first saw it in the early seventies but most people I knew remained old school, as did I until early last year.
I started in the early 90s with some 15mm Peter Pig nam stuff.
Some of my friends were definitely using kitty litter and polyfiller back into the 80s
Used kitty litter to build some walls in 15mm
Quote from: paulr on 24 September 2017, 06:24:53 PM
Used kitty litter to build some walls in 15mm
:) I used it for the same purpose with my Airfix ACW stuff back in the days of yore.
I think some of the more corse modeling sand I get from Minibits is the same stuff. (Yes - I like to support our hosts by having tubs of kitty litter shipped across the Atlantic :) )
I used it once, but then the cat crapped all over my figures.
Never didn't use some form of basing enhancement - texture plus flock.
Heck even my Peter Laing Persian and Greek armies from c1976 or so had fully textured bases.
Always used flock (painted afterwards). Then i discovered Vallejo Dark Earth texture Paint (when ordering My First pendraken mini's).haven't looked back ever since.
Except for lord of the Rings, i used flock there, Too many To update!
Quote from: Leman on 25 September 2017, 12:49:46 PM
I used it once, but then the cat crapped all over my figures.
We apparently were acquired by the same cat at some point or the other.
I believe I've always based my wargaming figures in one form or the other. Using fillers and stuff like that has never really worked for me; I always use fine sand (the white sand used for birdcages and such). Just spread it on evenly until you have achieved the amount you want, maybe spread some small rocks in it depending on the sort of ground you want to create, form it with a dry brush if you want and then I use a cheap seringe to carefully soak it with diluted white glue. The big advantage is that you don't run the risk of smearing putty and stuff all over your figures. Afterwrds I paint and drybrush it, add grass, flock etc and that's it.
Cheers,
Rob
I use silver sand (play sand) and red sand (cement sand) mixed.
I am starting to use Mike Salweys homemade bastex method which is sand ( builders sand which has been cooked to remove fungi etc),PVA and brown paint. I like it as you can create a thin enough mix to almost flw round the smaller bases that 6 and 10mm figures tend to have
Early 90s I think, when I had an extension built and a bag of ready-mix cement was left by the builder. I use PVA glue and dip the stands in the ready-mix cement. It is wet enough to make the cement cure.
And we thought we had it tough when rebasing :o
Broke my scalpel last night whilst rebasing - and that was only Vallejo pumice paste.
Quote from: Leman on 28 September 2017, 07:58:04 AM
Broke my scalpel last night whilst rebasing - and that was only Vallejo pumice paste.
We should start assigning aboriginal American-style names to members here.
Broken Scalpel isn't a bad one to start with. We could add
Drills Own Finger,
Hates Southerners,
Won't use little houses,
Coat in the Teeth....
Mad Kitty may be ?
Man-who-fights-woman
Glued-face-to-palm
Dabbles-with-hexes
Stuck-in-tanks
Bent-arm-off
Runs-with-brushes
I gave Leon the dream quest name, Owl-who-never-sleeps some time ago
Quote from: FierceKitty on 28 September 2017, 10:32:32 AM
We should start assigning aboriginal American-style names to members here. Broken Scalpel isn't a bad one to start with.
Or, code words as per the US military. If Broken Arrow is a lost nuke, what could Broken Scalpel possibly mean . . . ?
Or Bent Spear, Chipped Paint and Wobbly Base?
Broken scalpel - him who press too hard
Bent Spear - him who uses not for intended purpose
Chipped paint - she who put make-up on in train
Wobbly base - man who play with toy soldiers who eat and drink much of tribes supplies.
I think I'd have to be "Does much, achieves little" ... sorry GENERAL Does Much, Achieve Little.
Quote from: Leman on 28 September 2017, 04:20:14 PM
Wobbly base - man who play with toy soldiers who eat and drink much of tribes supplies.
Yes, when in America last week, I was warned about him by their Chief Brewer,
Dances With Drunks ....... =)
Quote from: paulr on 28 September 2017, 07:01:06 AM
And we thought we had it tough when rebasing :o
Rebasing? Why would you want to? Get it right first time :D
Unfortunately we all occasionally buy other peoples figures which are based wrong. Or the other thing is that the bloody rules writers change the base sizes......QED
IanS
Quote from: ianrs54 on 14 October 2017, 07:51:26 AM
Or the other thing is that the bloody rules writers change the base sizes......QED
Or, more likely, we base for one game, play a bit, then move on to another ruleset. And then another. And them another. And somewhere along this chain we find that the current game works better with a different base size. And then we re-base.
And then there's a flurry of nostalgia and the original game we started with all those years ago comes back into fashion . . .
Cheers, M.
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