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Hello everyone!

I started my small army of EC a few days ago and now I am looking for a possible Base color/design.
I try to keep it simple but cant make up my mind what to do. Enclosed a picture for you guys to see the colors and may help me choose a fitting base theme ^^

Snow? Grass? Desert? What makes the models pop/look better and not drown.

Thank you so much!

I think these alien tufts are nice colours for EC army if you want the bases themed for the army

If you're going to use Tufts, I'd use the turquoise ones. That will contrast the purple nicely. I base my EC on white marble floors, but the striations in the marble are that turquoise colour. A snow base with those tufts would give a similar effect

Thank you guys!! I will most certainly look into these tufts! Looking good

At Anne-Queens-Revenge, how did you paint those bases? They look nice!!

I use the airbrush through dry baby wipe technique for the marble. I'm crap at it for some reason though, so I normally end up finishing them by hand any way.

Okay, so the first thing you could think about when it comes to basing is what colours are complementory to the primary colour used on the mini. In this case it's the purple power armour of the Emperor's Children, and the complementory colours to purple are green and yellow. So, maybe a yellow desert theme? Or a green jungle theme / toxic waste theme?

Another cool idea I recently saw, from a YT video of someone painting every legion in the new HH box, was a nice marble floor effect to go with the opulence and elegance of the Emperor's Children. It seemed like a really simple yet striking effect in the video;




Maybe you could combine the above technique with the first point to create a yellow or green marble floor? Or even the pink works well, I feel.

You don't want complimentary colours in too high a quantity or to be too blatant though. This is the problem people make with complimentary colours. Bright blue and bright orange works well on a jaffa cake box because it catches your attention when you're not consciously looking for a specific thing, but if you actually consciously look at it it's garish and clashing, meaning the compliments need to be subtle. On mine I purposely use a warm nmm gold trim to let the desaturated yellows within it compliment the deep purple of the armour. Lerufus' EC model already has yellow in the flames and within the golden parts. I would've probably made the flames a different colour personally, because of what I've said above, but still. Large amounts of yellow on the base wouldn't work well for this reason.

Yeah that's a good point to consider. It's easy to over do it with the complementory colours if they're used heavily, too bright / garish / clashing, etc. So maybe keep it more muted / pastel greens / yellows maybe?

Take a look at how GW bases their models. While they may not be unique, the schemes work on almost every model regardless of it's paint job

Aye but come on, they're incredibly boring and uninspired. You want the model and base to come together as part of a whole piece that's not only visually pleasing, but also visually interesting.

So far I really dig the whole marble or tourquise tuft stuff.

As i dont have airbrush (shame on me?) i am just not quite sure how to do it, but i will watch the video above and see how they do it there

Awesome guys and gals, really appreciate it ^^

You can do marble without airbrush, it just gives a different look, but seeing as marble comes in every colourway under the sun and never looks the same, that's ok. It is effort though so might not be best if you're planning lots of guys. A good snow effect makes basing easy though. I use precision ice and snow.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Aye but come on, they're incredibly boring and uninspired. You want the model and base to come together as part of a whole piece that's not only visually pleasing, but also visually interesting.

The base is the background for the miniature, you don't want it to be competing with the miniature for your eye's attention.

I've always found that the colours used, whether they be complementary, triadic, analogous, neutral or whatever is less important than having the right balance of tone/value and saturation.

Using a specific set of colours (complementary, triadic, analogous, neutral, etc) seems more important when painting signs, to know whether the colours you're picking pop from each other or blend together due to them being perceived on either the same or different cones within your eye.

At least that's what I've always found as a non-artist type, tone/value and saturation first, colour 2nd (if a consideration at all).

Well... so... this is it ^^'

I would give the base Rim a quick tidy with a hobby knife or piece of sandpaper to smooth it off, then paint it black. This will frame it nicely and prevent the white from being a little too overpowering, which I think it is at the moment.

Allright, will do, thanks for the tip!

I thought maybe the white is not all that bad, cause the playmat is white as well, then it would blend nicer so i left it like that, but thats a fair argument.

It's your call. As a display painter I look at everything with a heavy bent towards aesthetic and composition, so if blending with your playing surface is more a priority that's cool too, although I don't think a black rim would affect that too much, and might make distinguishing your models a little easier when playing ha.

LeRufus wrote:
Well... so... this is it ^^'

Love it