I ATEN'T DEAD

HEAR, O MY PEOPLE, FOR I AM RETURNED...!

*crickets*

...where's everybody gone...?

Life has a habit of steamrollering you, and with assorted family health and work issues, it's been hard to find time to scratch myself, let alone paint, game, or blog. But we're out of the woods, for the moment at least, and I am determined to find time to stop and smell the flowers (or at least base a few flower tufts).

Just to show that I have not completely abandoned the path of hobby righteousness, here's my first project since March (yep, the Analogue Hobbies Painting Challenge, no less!) this year.

A birthday was approaching, for a family member who loves unicorns, so here was an opportunity to make something she'd enjoy, as well as getting my hobby mojo back.

Here's the dry run for the design; a Secret Weapon circular resin base, with a rocky crag made from blue extruded foam, and a 'tree' harvested from my mother-in-law's garden (the roots of a woody weed). The Unicorn is a Wizkids figure from the 'Nolzur's Marvelous Miniatures' range, and is quite a nice sculpt, with a good sense of dynamic movement.

The base was given a coat of sand and pebbles as groundwork, and sealed with a PVA/water mix. The tree and foam rocks had already been glued into place using the trusty hot glue gun.

The initial blocking out of the unicorn's colour scheme had Millsy and Russ calling him 'My Little Unicorn'. It's not finished yet, guys...! I dialled back the pink with a wash of purple ink, and the golden horn and hooves were inked with brown to tone them down a bit.

I then went to work on the base. I decided to use Milliput to texture the rocks and improve their durability. I hadn't used it before, but it works a treat. Extra twigs were used to make tree roots, snaking over and between the stones.

I hollowed out the top of the crag, and glued the figure into place, filling any gaps with Milliput. Once it had dried and been painted, it was time to dress things up a bit. Reindeer moss formed the foliage of the gnarled tree, while the ever-popular Tajima1 flower and grass tufts were put to good use to suggest a forest glade.

The vignette was attached to the wooden base of a cloche I picked up on eBay (since this is intended as a display piece), et voilà! 

Quite pleased with this one, and it's encouraged me to come up a few more vignette ideas for down the track.

And here is the completed piece, chilled to perfection and served under glass!

It's been good to get back into harness, and I'm glad to see that I can still work to a deadline when it comes to the crunch.

What's next? I'll be honest, I'm not completely sure, but there are some old Foundry figures which are piquing my interest in things Bronze Age, and monsters are always a good fallback when you want to go wild in the basing department. Or there's that half-finished Frostgrave warband left over from two Challenges ago...

Stay tuned!

Ev