First bases and my old dice box.

I have now made a start on texturing the bases, having  thought long and hard about just how I wanted them to look. The washers were ugly if functional, and detracted from the painting so they had to be covered up. I have gone back to basics here (Old School?) and cut all the bases by hand from 2mm card which was then sealed with PVA before sticking the figures down. A 50/50 mix of powdered filler and PVA was then mixed and colour added from here (click). The result was a light tone that reflected the Spanish earth shade of this region (Valencia). I then applied by brush (not too watery so it does not dry flat), and once dry added a few fine stones from cat litter ground down in my wife's pestle and mortar which made sure I thoroughly cleaned afterwards! This morning I applied static grass sparingly and the result is as you see below. I'm still pondering if I should slightly tone the stones down with sepia ink, but for now I'm not sure. I had in mind when doing this the basing style of Bill Brewer of the Rye Stamp and Hobby Shop, who had on display some of the first 15mm figures I saw with fully textured bases. I was a regular visitor there in my lunch breaks when I worked for IPC Magazines in Southwark and would cycle over to Peckham Rye to buy my Minifigs. he was always painting or basing when not serving, and I enjoyed watching him work.

I'm starting on the French cavalry, which now comprise 48 figures in 8 x 6 figure units, 3 dragoons, 2 lancers, 1 Hussars, 1 Chasseur and 1 Horse Grenadiers, the latter to represent the C&C 'Guard Cavalry' type.

I don't intend to remove casualties, but rather mark them using 6mm micro dice (see below), these are quite non intrusive when placed behind a unit only when a unit takes it's first hit.

On the subject of dice, I thought I would share a couple of pics of my old dice box, 30 years old now and given to me a present by my sister in law for my birthday. The brass plate in inscribed 'Lee's HQ' with my date of birth 19 January 1958, and it holds my collection of dice.

Light Dragoons, 2 x 6 figure units.

Royal Horse Artillery.

A battalion of Guards.

A battalion of foot, possibly the Buffs!

The bases are slightly darker than they appear here.

6mm micro dice - unit reduced to 3 'blocks'.

30 odd years old, dice box.