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Just a quick question to ask the good people of Dakka which colour of base best suits my Salamanders. It's been over a year since I last posted up some pictures of my work and one of the main criticism I received last time I did so was that my bases were a touch bland. So, I've switched from using GW's Astrogranite to using proper sand and rocks. I'm hoping that with the addition of a bit of static grass, they won't look so bad this time around. That said, I've yet to make my mind up about which theme I like the best, so I thought I'd put the question to Dakka.

Apologies for the roughness of the pics - they were done in a hurry with no lightbox or tripod (Eventually, I may get round to fixing that ). So, if anybody wishes to give me some advice - it'd be very much appreciated. Cheers.




PS: Oh, there's a poll for those who don't wish to leave a comment.

Yellow. It makes for a more visually-appealing contrast with the model. To me, at least.

I vote yellow/desert with Black around the trim though.

@Scourged - Interesting. I liked the desert base - but I thought most people would go for a more traditional ash base. I thought the darker ash would make the green pop more - seems I was wrong.

@Gunzhard - I usually try to tie the rim in with the colour of the base. However, I'll give it a go with the black and post up a picture tomorrow. Cheers.

the brown band at the bottom of the ashe base distracts me eyes. otherwise i would go with that

Desert is definitely better, it contrast more.
Can you show us a "ashlands" without the brown band ? Maybe black ?
I have to say it distracts me, too.

I think you will find the model will pop more with the ash waste when you have the black rim. At the moment the brown rim is confusing and detracting.

I agree with Winter, go desert if you must have brown rimmed bases - go black rimmed if you want ash.

 Gunzhard wrote:
I vote yellow/desert with Black around the trim though.

i agree, i like both, just the brown trim throws me off though.

I think contrast is over rated, I prefer the ash ones. But I agree that the brown band makes it look strange, would like to see it with a black or maybe dark grey band instead, probably black.

Maybe the ash ones with a black band wouldn't contrast enough and just look like nothing, hard to say without seeing it.

Again - hideous rushed image (even worse this time due to no natural light ), but I've updated them with a black rim as per request - thoughts?

Hmm ...I like them both now! :-)

I still prefer the tan desert base, but the ash looks better now.

Both work.

I like the ash one more now. It's hard to see from your images, but is the sheen on the base rim the same as the shoulder pads/backpack?

If it is, I'd change that. Either giving it a matte varnish (to make it duller than the shoulder pad) or a semi-gloss (to make it shinier than the shoulder pad). It's a trick you can use to give separation between different materials that are the same or close to the same colour.

That way it adds a bit of contrast without adding more colours and doesn't look like the base is made from the same material as the shoulder/backpack. As I said it's hard to see from the photo though, it might already be different enough if you used pure black on the base and a dark grey on the shoulder pad, I just can't tell from the photo.

Well I'm disappointed with my photography, as I can't show them at their best, so that kind of mars my opinion of each base (Because overall I'm disappointed.) If I had to be put on the spot, I'd err on the side of the desert base - mainly because I'm finding that the black rim sets a baseline and helps to draw the eye towards all the upper parts. I suppose the natural follow on question would be how I can improve my bases to enhance the model - but I doubt anybody can see the picture in enough detail to answer that. Anyway, many thanks to everybody who's taken the time to vote in the poll or provide some advice - much obliged to you.

EDIT: @AllSeeingSkink - The models do have a slight sheen to them as I haven't varnished them (Don't know what to use, too scared to feth them up), but a lot of the sheen is down to lighting glare. I took the pic on my work desk with very poor lighting, so the result is very dodgy.

Just a side note I've been experimenting with some varnishes. Vallejo Game Varnish - Gloss and Matte thinned with water are excellent.

I made the mistake of not thinning them at first, yikes, lots of brush marks - but I was surprisingly able to fix that with lots of thinned coats after it had dried.

Some paint-on varnishes cannot be thinned with water, like Liquitex and I still have no idea about GW:Ard Coat.

Also in the airbrush Vallejo Air Matt varnish with Vallejo thinner worked so much better than I expected!

I'll give that a go Gunzhard - thanks for the advice

Yellow/Desert definitely pops more. If you go ash you must do it in the second style

 Scourged wrote:
Yellow. It makes for a more visually-appealing contrast with the model. To me, at least.

My thoughts exactly.

Yellow, too

I voted ash, look at the bases of Mathew from miniwarming. It are the best salamender bases imh

I like them both (especially with black rims) but I lean to the Yellow/desert, it was the color that immediately popped in my eyes.
Also like the thought of your Salamanders operating on a desert world during the light hours, just to show off their affinity for heat a little

Just to round this thread off, I thought I'd come back and show which base I went with. He's still WIP (Needs Decals and I need to choose if I like his head), but this is the direction I think I'm going to go with all my salamanders from now on. Many thanks for all the input people:





(Once again, sorry that the pics aren't great quality - I only get a certain time to take pics in before the light fades and I don't yet have a lighting set up. )

I really like the base, and the model... great paint job dude, does your whole army look like this?

@Gunzhard - All of my army is painted in this style. Most of the images in my gallery are a few years old so quite a few of my models have since been updated - stuff like flame motifs and a few minor changes. When I created this thread, I was (Still am) in the process of updating all my bases. as I wasn't happy with them. you can see my old style of base in my gallery if you want. Once that's done, I intend to ditch all my old photos are redo them all properly with decent lighting and updated paintjobs.

grey for me. it makes the model 'sit' better imo

I went will yellow/desert as it just draws my eye and pops better.

But also, very nice paint job dude. Love the flames, excellent job!

The yellow, since they are salamanders ill see if i can dig up a picture of my recipe for a coal bases.

I prefer the Ashlands bases personally but they both look good.

They look really great!