Life Slann Custom Base

Well, i'm getting back into my lizards and my Slann desperately needs rebasing since his palanquin was just stuck directly to his base (because the flying rod couldn't hold him for crap, and I didn't have anything to reinforce it). With your Wizards now having to declare their lores in their army lists instead of at the start of the game, I've decided to give my Life Slann a bit of a scenic base (since it's the main lore he'll be using, if cash allows me then I might make a Death/Shadow one at some point, death being a relatively easy pyramid of skulls, with shadow also fitting with that theme).

Now, i'm not expert with putties or modelling crap, i'd barely even class myself competant at it, so this is a huge project for me to undertake, and bits of it may look... well... crap, but it's worth a try (and with milliput being only £2 for significantly more per pack than GS...).

The general plan is the Slann being held up by a tower of vines twisted around a column of milliput (originally going to be a tree stump, but that was beyond my skill) witht he vines also growing around him and his palanquin. The base itself will be lush glade grass, similarly with his temple guard (the only reason for the rebasing apart from TLoS, they wouldn't rank up before), to show how even his mere presence encourages flora to burst forth. Currently, this whole project is in the early alpha stage, and i'm not completely bought on some of the vine's positions, but i've had a crack at it:

 

That column he is resting on might look pretty neat if you made it like an old stone relic of some sort, carve some random looking elvish designs or even some LM designs into it at places, then have a few more vines branching off the main ones coming up it...that would look pretty sweet!

I love the idea so far! and good luck with it!

Trying to think of something to do for my slann as well.

 

That might be a little hard now, it's covered in milliput vines I've finished the basic lyer of vines on the column BUT I don't think it looks right... it might just be because it's unpainted and still just a uniform colour with no additions but from here... there's something that looks a little rushed about it. There's also one huge vine I had to add because my brother knocked the table and the Slann slid suddenly to the side, dislodging a few of the other vines and making it so he wouldn't sit on top of the column, so I have to support him with it... Pictures might come soon if my camera battery holds out.

 

The battery held and I got 6 quick snaps in under the dining room light:







You can clearly see the support vine in the 4th and 5th pictures; it was quite rushed as the milliput was already starting to harden, so I had to act quickly.

Overall, it's an okay job; might do a few thicker vines on top to cover the gaps and make it look less like a coating of vines and more like it's made of vines. Still unsure about a few on the Slann too, but not enough to rip them off completely.

 

actually, if you just added some flora or some little animals crawling on the ones wrapped horizontally it'll give it that "something" you are thinkin it is lacking. Granted, easier said than done. Even if it's just a couple, I'll bet it would make a difference...if you have any gob sprues by some random chance, you might be able to use some of the little spiders they come with.

Either way, I think it still looks great! Like the guy above said, really gives it the "throne of vines" look!

Much better than I could ever do

 

dude i feel ya, converting a slann can be a real pain. i have been converting mine for the past 3 weeks, just to make his arm pointing at the enemy. it's really coming along, i like the idea and the simplisity of the whole thing. keep up the great work, definatly want to see this through to the end

 

I really admire all the work and thought put into this, it's really showing up. It totally represents the Throne of Vines and brings his power over that Lore to "life (hehe) perfectly. Fantastic work so far, keep at it!

 

Cool idea, looks good so far! I think a few much thinner vines may help it if you can, and maybe adding a little bit of texture to them like drag a blunt pencil along the length of a couple while they are setting, maybe with the already hardened stuff try a knife? Probably wouldn't want to do too much though.

I look forward to seeing more!

 

You should put some leaves on the vines.

 

Thanks for the feedback guys:

@Rokanos & Chahlie: I'm afraid that's all easier said than done. I've contemplated getting the basing kit for the brass leaves it comes with, but apart from that I dunno how to do anything like that with what I have at my disposal. The critters will also be hard, as I don't have any gobbo sprues or anyone who has them, nor do I have anything I can use for them. Any suggestions are appreciated

@Strewart: The pencil thing is a bit late for the other vines, and i've tried the knife scoring... milliput really does go rock hard, I can barely scratch it, the only other option is to do it when it's soft, so it'd have to be done only on any additions. Where would you put any extra vines? I can see little ones crawling the support the vine and between the other ones, but i'd prefer to get any larger ones out of the way first.

@Everyone else: Thanks for all your support, it's much appreciated! ^_^

 

well, snakes aren't too hard to make with milliput or GS. So you could prlly toss a couple in a random places. As for lizards and spiders, likely going to be more tedious and time consuming than they are worth.

It's too bad you don't have any goblins, my roomie and I were talking about your model earlier and he mentioned how it'd be pretty cool to see a goblin or something else being choked or held by one of the vines.

Another thought we had was that you could put thorns all over the vines...not a lot of them, but enough to make it seem like if you got close, it'd hurt. Myb only around the base and then the ones up around the slann are new growths and dont quite have thorns yet.

You could also possibly try dragging a file across the vines for a tad bit of texture. Btw, take everything I say with a bit o' salt, as I'm just as new to this as you are.

Just got my slann today and his slot for the stand is so jacked up i have no choice but to make a custom base lol, so i'll be in this same boat here in a few days.

Hope some of what I said was helpful!

 

I was able to find plants that worked well as vines in the fake flower section of a craft store. They were pretty thin and had leaves on them so they would work well for adding an extra level of detail to the vines you have. You could also probably find plants with leaves you could clip off and glue to the vines you've already made. I think moss and foliage along the bottom of the vines would be cool and mask the area where the vines meet the base. If you can't find any small animals to add, small flowers might be easier to make or find. I definitely think you should have some things mixed in with the vines for contrasting colors since they will be mostly green.

 

oo oo oo dude! i love the goblin idea if you won't mind i'll steal that idea

 

not at all

 

Just posting to say I haven't abandoned the project, i've had a busy few days revising for my Network+ exam (which i passed today ) and Halo: Reach was delivered on Tuesday, so it's been a mix of revision and Reach.

Whilst looking on the WE army forum (asrai.org) I stumbled across a thread about using bits of bath sponge to make flowers or plants; they'd be easy enough to ge hold of and would easily take paint and probably glue well too, what are everyone's opinions on it? Has anyone tried it before?

 

Interesting idea, I could see it working. Good thing is its dead cheap as well, so give it a go and show us the results! As far as I know I haven't seen it mentioned around here, but I'm pretty sure my memory isn't good enough to remember everything..

Congrats on your exam result by the way!

 

Yeah Congratz anyway that base is looking great i do however agree with the goblin idea so coming allong great and it would be good if we could get a couple more updates if anything has been done?

 

Thanks for the congratulations In return i'm sorry for the lack of updates, but my work placement has recently managed to drive me back into a state of stress-related depression and i've had hardly any time to focus on stuff like this.

Latest updates aren't huge, but they're showing a test stage of adding leaves to the vines (trying to first mix enough milliput that you can use it all without it drying up is hard, trying then to cut it into leaf shapes and add a bit of leafyness to each individual leaf is harder still, with the real bugger being the application to the vines without A) Ruining the leaf details or B) Having it fall off):






The two giant things at the bottom of the base were things I made as "flowers" with leftover milliput that was too far cured to make into leaves, but too less cured to simply throw away as useless. They are by no means set in stone and I honestly don't know why I gave them that shape, but any advice on turning them into flowers would be great (if it is at all possible!).

 

A quick and easy way to sculpt leaves:


(right click and "show graphic" to view larger image)

1: Take a ball of putty. I used FIMO for this example, but milliput should work as well. Although green stuff would be better, because it sticks better to the surface you want to apply it to, and it is much more elastic, making the following sculpting easier.

2: Roll the ball into a cone. Stick the cone to your model.

3: Flatten the cone. This should also help affixing it to the surface.

4: Make two indentations, leaving a raied area in the middle and the rim. The blunt end of a brush is a useful tool for such smooth, broad indents.

5: Taper the tip of the leave until you are satisfied. Make small incisions into the back of the leave.

6: Round the heart-shaped end of the leaves just created. Form the "stem" of the leaf in such a way that it looks like it´s fused to the vines beneath

7: Using the sharp end of your tool draw lines across the surface.

And done. I included a picture of the tool I used, a wax carving tool.


Hope this helps and/or inspires. Happy sculpting!


Greetz, the Maniac