Legions Imperialis Bases

 

Legion stomping grounds.

Just a short, bas(e)ic post on the first attempt at bases for Legions Imperialis. Which is far more difficult to get right than I imagine.

I took some time to consider how I might make the bases look for those units which have them. I very specifically did not want anything fancy as I'd need to do a few, and nothing too colourful as I wanted the attention on what's standing on the bases rather than the bases themselves. No large differences in value or tone, which pretty much ends up as neutral grey. I also didn't want bland single colour grey, which is a little too boring - but also overpowering in its own way. Something to break up the flat surface is still needed.

To start with I used an airbrush across the whole set of bases I currently have (17 in total). I wanted to use Mechanicus Standard Grey, but that's not made as an airbrush paint and so opted for Dawnstone mixed with a little black instead (about a 4:1 ratio). Then I used straight Dawnstone to highlight between the cracks and recesses (which actually might have been the wrong way around). This won't go quite as bright as the layer paint - the previous layers will darken it down, and thinning airbrush paints helps give them more translucency than you might otherwise anticipate.

Afterwards it was a big mistake: Basilicanum Grey and Contrast Medium (1:2 ratio) and washed all over. It pooled wrong, didn't define things as well as I'd hoped, and just looked far too messy. I needed to drybrush back over everything with Dawnstone to clean up a lot of it, and attempt to edge highlight certain parts (edges of areas, cracks, etc). It's very important to edge highlight around the cracks, or else it ends up looking more like marbling than cracks in the pavement/road/whatever. The sharp highlight gives a much greater 3D impression - the flip side of this of course is that it's another experience to remember for marbling itself (darkened veins, with an extra dark line within, but no edge highlights). Some Nuln Oil to pick out the deeper recesses, and glazing of Agrax Earthshade in random points fills in most of the base.

The metals are a simple Iron Warriors and Skrag Brown (heavily thinned with water, more than a glaze but less than a wash) as some rust. Doesn't really work too well, but I wanted to the slight red / orange hue to break up the grey and it would help accentuate the turquoise of the Sons of Horus.

Not shown here, but I'm painting the rims with Mechanicus Standard Grey to try blend the base into the table some more. It just makes the base look even more flat. Not entirely sure I like it, but I'm sticking with it for now.

Next time I do a batch of bases I'll simply skip the Basilicanum Grey step and move directly on with Nuln Oil. It's easier to glaze that to darken random areas than it is to clean up the mess I'd made.

Of course if there are bases, there are models to put on top as well. More on that very soon!

-- silly painter.