By John-Michael Murray
Depending upon the types of games you play (and of course your preferences) you'll want to base your figures either on common bases or individual ones. Basing gives much greater stability, as generally the small bases that plastic figures possess are not really suitable for wargaming purposes because your troops will inevitably fall over in the heat of battle (or when someone accidentally bangs the table !) Furthermore, basing will certainly lessen the amount of wear and tear on your painted figures due to the fact that you can pick them up by these bases and thus avoid touching the actual figure too often.
There
are a number of basing techniques and of course each wargamer will have
his or her preferences and the basing medium is a personal choice of course.
The technique described below is one that I like to use for individual
figures using circular styrene bases as follows....
These
are small round plastic counters or "chips" as they are also known and
are the ones that you use in board games. They have a diameter of approximately
1.7mm , are lightweight, and are really cheap and you can obtain a box
of 100 (depending on where you live), for about 1.00 - 2.00 US / Euro Dollars
..... or maybe even less.
Once the figures are fixed to these styrene circular bases they will not fall over no matter how hard you bang the table. Also, due to the fact that the counters are lightweight, if you happen to drop the figure on the floor it will not shed its base, as could happen with a plastic figure based using much heavier pennies / cents or metal washers.
Note : By basing the figures before painting them, you'll then be able to get good grip on the circular base of the figure, allowing you to easily paint it. Furthermore, when you put the recently painted figure down it will not fall over and spoil your paint job.
This
step in not entirely necessary although it is a procedure I follow because
it takes very little time and assures correct adhesion of the figure to
the base. First start by roughing up the figure's polythene base and also
one side of the counter (both the surface of the counter and the figure's
base are very smooth). In the picture you can see a heavy duty sharpening
stone here - five or six strokes back and forth are sufficient. Alternatively
you could use a hand file laid flat on a bench instead.
Usually
most of the figures' polythene bases won't overlap the sides of the counter,
but if they do just trim them down a little before proceeding to the next
step.
To
fix the figures to their bases use thick white glue, or alternatively tile
adhesive (which sets like concrete !) .I prefer white glue however and
I've had no problems whatsoever, and I find tile adhesive to be a bit messy.
Besides, with white glue you can rectify mistakes easily but tile adhesive
goes rock hard once it's dry. White glue will also allow you to rebase
your figures without too many problems at some future date if you wish.
Put a big heavy blob of glue onto the polythene base of the actual figure as you can see here, and then press him down on to his new circular base. You can rub off any excess glue that overspills the side of the base. Once you've finished fixing all your troops to their bases leave them to dry for at least 24 hours
24
hours later next day, you'll find the figures nicely and firmly fixed to
their bases. Using enamel paint in matt green or brown colour (or any other
suitable colour according to your wishes) paint all over the base to completely
seal in the now dry white glue (in the picture these Esci British Commandos
with new helmets have had their bases sealed with green enamel paint)
You don't really need to do this sealing, but I seal over the base because I use almost exclusively water based acrylic paints (and artists watercolours for fine detail), and if I make a mistake while painting ( which I often do !!!! ) I can wash the figure and start again. However, white glue is soluble in water so washing the figure could weaken the white glue. However, if the white glue is sealed in under a coat of water resistent enamel paint then it's completely free from harm.
Anyway,
this doesn't take a moment to do and the enamel paint dries within 15 minutes
and gives you a good undercoat for later when we cover the base with flocking
material and/or small stones.
Leave this until you have all the troops painted and varnished. Detailing of the bases should be the very last thing you do after having finally varnished your figures to protect their paint jobs.
Detailing is quite easy and just requires some slightly diluted white glue, fine stones or sand and some scatter material. Obviously the choice of scenic material is up to you and will be in accordance your preferences.
You'll
remember that in this case we painted the bases with green enamel so this
serves as a good base colour. All you need to do is apply the diluted white
glue all over the base, taking particular attention to avoiding the figure's
boots, and sprinkle liberally with the fine sand and scatter material (
I usually choose a mid-green colour ). Now shake off the excess and leave
to dry for a few hours Once dry, I go over the sand and scatter material
on the base with matt varnish to finally seal in everything and that way
the scatter material won't crumble off with handling.
The
only thing left is to start wargaming with your figures.......
If you have any comments or questions, please by all means contact me.
John-Michael
Murray
P.O.
Box 660 - 38001 Santa Cruz de Tenerife - España - Islas Canarias
e-mail
: jmurram@nexo.es
Created: 09/01/2000