Snow Bases...the easy way.

I've finally come up with a way to do my bases that's simple, easy, and (in my opinion) fairly decent looking. #warhammer_40k #spacewolves

Start with your bases and some cork board. I found these 1'x1' tiles at Michael's for next to nothing. I have cork board forever now. Break cork board into rough bits and pieces. You can dry-fit on the base for ideal placement; but if you're like me you'll just forget which piece went where so you might as well just glue the bastards on already.

A little Tacky glue and you're off.

Looking nice and rustic.

To the shop for the first layer of spray paint. Here I'm looking to get the plastic edge of the base fully covered. The cork will soak up the paint, so don't try to spray it until the cork is white...you'll end up with drips all over. Just give the bases a good dusting and let dry.

Here they are after a second spray down. The cork is pretty well coated, but the natural color still peeks through a bit...especially in central cracks where the paint couldn't penetrate as well. That's fine; the model will cover most of it and the snow drifts will take care of the rest.

Dry brush the edges of the "ice." I use Teclis Blue.

Edges dry-brushed, starting to look a bit icy.

A brief detour: I've been using more legs like this as they look way more dynamic (as seen here on my homemade Ragnar). The problem is that they have little contact between model and base, which is exacerbated by mounting them to cork (which isn't as solid as plastic). So you've gotta pin.

Foot surgery. He took it like a champ. 1/16" drill bit and steady hands. Aim for the thickest part of the foot, and go slow...you only need to penetrate enough to glue a pin in. If you mess up and drill all the way through a foot, feel free to throw a tantrum (I've done it several times). Then just use some greenstuff for an easy fix and move on.

Little stub of copper wire I cut and glued into his new abscess. Paper clips work fine too. Ok, Ragnar's ready for mounting!

Stab hole slit in cork board where pin will go.

Aaaaand glue into place. Note that the plastic of the model doesn't sit fully flush with the cork board...that's fine, I can easily hide that with the snow drifts. Main thing I'm concerned about is a good, solid bond.

Mix up some Elmer's and baking soda. I use the same brass wire I cut for pinning to bases to stir the snow mixture...easy to stir and makes application easy. Straighten out a paper clip otherwise ("But OP, I just cut up my good paper clip to pin bases!"). In this pic the mix is about equal parts glue and baking soda. It's still pretty liquid, and if applied like this will lay fairly flat. Good for spreading a layer of snow over largish areas.

Same amount of glue w/ about twice as much baking soda. This is "spikier," and will allow you to build more character as you mess around with it. This is good for laying into crevices, at places where the base meets cork to create "drifts," etc.

Smearing it around.

That annoying little gap between the model and the cork...gone!

Blood Claw getting some base love, too. This is the part you really can't mess up, and get to go all Bob Ross. Put happy little snow piles here and there (great for soaking up heretic blood!), pile them up in crevices, whatever looks good. If you accidentally get some of the mixture on your model, don't worry: it'll knock right off then and there, and also after it dries (assuming you haven't thoroughly pressed it into a recess or something).

Off to the snow chamber. I happened to have some "model snow" (I'll stop buying crap from Michael's when they stop sending me 50% off coupons every week), but I'm sure more baking soda would work fine. Cover liberally to get it into all the nooks and crannies.

And done! I usually bang these out in groups of 5-6 (as that's what I'm typically building model-wise).

Ulrik, Njal, homemade Lukas, and a bunch of Bloodclaws looking for trouble (bases for Lukas and Ulrik are manufactured bases I won in a tourney, I followed the same steps as above starting with the spray painting).