Basing your Miniatures the Easy Way with Vallejo Basing Gel
January 17, 2012 by elromanozo
Video Sponsors: Dark Age - Heavy Gear
Romain takes a look at Vallejo Basing Gel and how to apply it to your miniatures.
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Looks like a good product and with one of those jars you can probably do multiple armies if your looking for some specific texture. Personally I just mix some fine (modelling) sand with some PVA glue and a bit of water and that has always worked for me though it is messy and sticky and goes off pretty quickly.
Is enough for using it to make a 4×4 table or it would be too expensive to use it in that way ?
The 9 bucks price is pretty decent for me.
Probably not… But I don’t know for sure.
It’d be tedious to apply and sculpt if you’re going to cover all of the surface.
I think you’ll be better off with more conventional basing materials. Buy a tube of fine grade wall filler paste and some PVA glue from a hardware store. Mix these up in about 50/50 mix and paint it liberally on the board. Spray and drybrush. Works wonders, trust me 🙂
The Vallejo pot might be enough if there isn’t that much open space to texture, like city fighting boards.
I got the really rough one, the black stuff, I think its ‘lava’ its called, at christmas, my little group normally play games on a city board, so my armies tend to be based with sand painted grey/grey flock to simulate tarmac style stuff , the vallejo stuff is so much less hassle than gluing on sand painting etc, just spread some goop on the base, leave to dry, drybrush grey on, done.
I’m not sure about doing a whole table, you get 200ml in a tub, thats about 18 times the volume of a pot of gw paint, you can certainly do loads of bases with it, but how far it would spread on a table I couldnt say.
It would work, its just how many pots you’d need, it may be an expensive way to go.
I can’t say I’m convinced. Certainly seems a good idea for tables, but for miniatures I reckon I prefer green stuff, bits and sand.
Seems a bit too messy for my liking. Although i can see it used rather well for a themed army and/or gaming board.
I will stick to the old PVA then add sand/slate technique.
I doubt i’ll ever buy or use any but I do have to say it looks disturbingly delicious. mmm strawberry…
Looks more like Nutella…
The texture couldn’t be more different ! To the touch, it feels like exfoliating cream with extra gravels.
You know, like sand in an oily substance.
Nah more like cocktail sauce…. Or maybe old Ketchup.
I used a grit gel for my wolfen nomad base. It had larger grit in it than your first brown gel, but was just the same in use. Looking back at how well it work out, I think I would go with a finer grit like you had in the first part of the video. Better look into it if I plan on doing desert bases.
You could mix several grits together…
Or use one on part of the base, and the finer grit here and there.
Thats so simple why didn’t I think of that! (hits head)
It’s all right !
That’s the point of maling them all water soluble and miscible together…
Then you can paint over them.
That could be worth trying out.
Would be great to see it used on a base with miniature and then again when it has dried up.
@elromanozo
For goodness sake, get yourself a putty spatula….
Good stuff. Usually I use the GW basing kit, and grass of some type for a standard quick and dirty basing. But I usually do this after I have mounted the mini to the base, and It always looks like the mini is sinking a bit. The GW kit has irregular size sand and pebble, so you really don;t want to add the material before you attach the mini to the base. Never been satisfied with a technique that keeps the model from looking like its sinking into the ground a bit. This stuff might give me better options.
Are you going to demo the water effects?
I’m not sure I’ll do the water effects…
I fail to see the point in buying a putty spatula, as I have a plethora of tools at my disposal, and I still come back to toothpicks anyway…
GW basing kits are much too expensive for what they contain IMHO. Please consider going to a model store (you know, for trains and the like) and buy the same stuff in larger quantities, for an affordable price… Other companies also do that sort of thing (Ziterdes and GF9 for example).
BoW Romain
To each their own, but i love my little putty spatula / putty knife tool. Just so much easier to work the materials.
Tue, GW basing sand is expensive. It’s just what I happen to have and will use up and then look elsewhere. I’ve experimented with kitty litter, but you have to be cautions due to its absorption. Of course I could always just go down to the beach and nab some sand…
Well, if you’re lucky enough to have a beach nearby and live near a forest, most of your basing needs are taken care of…
Model stores sell affordable flocks and clump foliage of all sizes and colors, as well as some scenery elements, plasticard ans etched brass.
I’d also love to see photos of a finished, dried base – maybe unpainted, alongside a painted one, and one with a figure attached for scale?
My concern with a jar of this shape is the waste that’s left on the edges, and bits you can’t get to – like in a jar of Nutella. It would be a shame to leave any of this stuff behind!
That basing kits are cheap and great. (I got it 7 month ago)
Look at this example that I posted on my blog http://segmentum-solar.blogspot.com/2011/09/modelismo-decorar-peanas-con-piedra.html and you can base your minis very quickly
And water effects have a lot of posibilities. You can mix it with pigments, paints or inks and you can make extrange fluids (you can paint semi-transparent blood in your blades)
AWESOME. I think I have the same one as you but in really old packing (Grey Pumice I mean). I really wanted to be sure if I ever wanted to buy some more.
I have some really old vallejo pumice on a tub. I find it rather nice for quick basing – even if I still haven’t gotten the hang of making realistic bases. You can even leave the models on the wet pumice (use some supports if needed) and they’ll stick better than any glue I’ve used.
Here’s an example by the way – please ignore the crap paintwork and blurry cam:
http://share.ovi.com/media/pedro.m.caetano.SharedWarhammer/pedro.m.caetano.10099
The guy on the left was just left on the pumice base while it was drying. It just left it lying against a small box and after half a day it was firmly glued to the base by just half of his left foot and the very tip of the other one. It has taken 1.5meter falls and is still standing. It also looks a lot more natural as the mini’s “feet” exert a slight pressure on the ground.
Protip: mind your paint: I slopped on too much codex gray and some parts of that base look like muddy blobs.
I can’t see what difference there is to be had with this in comparison with some green stuff, glue and flock? Also, how does this dry? I have visions of slight rubbery-ness…
I’ve used Vallejo’s Black Lava quite a bit, and it is, without question, the messiest substance known to man. It works really well, but it gets on everything.