Zombie Legion - The Lost One

Part of the Zombie Legion

An idea came to me one day - to convert one of the controversial Stormcasts into a small, lousy zombie filler. I bumped him a bit, scratched, crippled his hand, stuck a stick in his neck, covered with mud and added some patina - and here he is! The one that got lost in the WFB universe. Painted in November 2016.

This giant, armored knight stumbled into the forest one day, looking somehow lost. Without a word, he got into a battle with the undead forces as soon as he saw them. While he proved to be a tough opponent, zombies just kept coming and after all the cuts and jabs, he was felled down just like any other and was quickly incorporated into the same horde he so valiantly fought. Constantin considers him an interesting curiosity in his horde.

Zombie Legion - WIP #2

Two fillers for zombies I did by converting Age of Sigmar miniatures. First one is a sigmarine / Stormcast Eternal - I really liked the idea of turning one of those into a lousy zombie filler.

The second one is the so-called 'Bloodstoker' - that guy looks pretty gruesome on his own and isn't yet another steroid monster like other new khornates - actually a pretty cool mini! He was way too fancy for my army, so I started simplifying him - by making his 'fake arm' much more proletarian. After that, I thought, why not go for something more - so I turned him into a fat cossack. A fun mini that was fun to convert.

Eshnuu

A necrarch vampire from GW painted in April 2017. First minis I did which were a single character in two options - which I think it's a cool thing. He's rather simple and I guess it works for a guy I think as an 'acolyte' of sorts. I wanted to add Babylonian script all over his black robe, but when I was trying it out in photoshop, rather than mystical, it looked like some cheesy pajamas. So I left him simple. Besides that, painting all those little details on him was really fun, I like those 6thEd. style minis when they each had vials, pouches and spare daggers all over them.

As a curiosity - his dagger was polished instead of painted. The possibility to do that is one sure advantage for metal miniatures.

At some point in his life, Lucan wanted to learn the secrets of magic beyond his innate vampiric ability. He ventured into far southeast in search of undead sages that study magic during eons of their life. Lack of patience and studious dedication prevented him from learning anything useful, but he met other learners. One of them was Eshnuu, a relatively young scholar in the whole assemblage - he knew a wide variety of magic arts but was more interested in testing his knowledge in the field, not to sit around, read dusty tomes and perform bizarre experiments. He remembered the stories about Varsavia he heard from Lucan and some years later joined him in this strange land to let the real world experience what he has learned. While he’s certainly not a master in what he does, he is helpful when flaming missiles or other traditionally non-vampiric magic arts are needed. Other than that, he helped immensely with the study of the language, customs and rituals of ancient Varsavians - all relying on preserved evidence, not stories told by unreliable wights.

Group Shot 03

When I finished and posted my Nagash on January the 31st 2016 I thought of it as a good reference point - so when 31.01.2017 came I decided to make a photo of everything I painted during that year:

And while I was at it I also took a photo of everything I had in Berlin back then:

Gudvanger's Flying Horrors

Heavily converted Carrions from the Tomb Kings range - painted in March 2017. This was a rather spontaneous project - there was a competition on Carpe Noctem, with the topic being "Special Unit" and I found three cheap Carrions on eBay. A quick burst of inspiration later I bought them and rather hastily turned them into what can be seen here. The general concept was inspired by this artwork. The mess in their bellies represents the first try of the visceral fleshcrafting / body horror I would like to add to the Bog Dwellers faction - think something like from The Thing.

The unpainted version can be seen HERE.

Built from strange varieties of bones, feathers and flesh, held together with steel and skin, the Flying Horrors are another mad creations of the flesh-stitcher Haralamb Gudvanger. What sets them apart from others, are their bellies - in which he planted seeds from the Lady of the Bog. Amongst all the dead, necromantic tissue molded by the stitcher, those writhing tendrils of the blooming flesh are the only living parts, twisted as they are. The hungry mass of viscera catches and consumes all nearby body parts - be they alive or dead - with unending appetite. As long as the Horrors won't devour themselves, Gudvanger can deem the experiment of joining dead mass with the living flesh as successful. When they are not fighting with Wretches over waste bodies, they are useful in flesh-stitcher's modest force for scouting and terror tactics.

Gudvanger's Flying Horrors - WIP

The painted version can be seen HERE.

A rather spontaneous conversion turning old Tomb King Carrions into a mix of something from this artwork and creatures from The Thing. The heads are scratchbuilt, teeth are needles, the fleshy sack on the middle one is made out of greenstuff balls covered with several layers of Liquid Greenstuff, the rest should be rather self-evident. It was a fun project, I plan to do more of such visceral horrors in the future.

First the three monsters together:

And some closeups:

Sirins & Alkonosts

Despite being quite distinct, my Slavic 'counts-as-Fell-Bats' are still supposed to be one unit - that's why I will show them together too. After some bad experiences earlier, I wanted them to fit together even when placed in direct contact with each other. It forced some larger variation in their poses, so that's a double plus!

There are also separate posts for Alkonosts and Sirins and the WIP post can be found HERE.

Sirins

Second set of my 'counts-as-Fell-Bats' miniatures - Sirins - my take on putting those mythical creatures on the tabletop. I didn't like any of the minis that could fit Fell Bats well so I converted my own - these are built around Wood Elf Warhawks from GW. The whole conversion process can be seen HERE. Those were even more interesting to paint than their light counterparts - bones in black hair, dark eyes, pale skin and how it connects to those dark-green feathers - I really like the style they represent, even if the shoddy sculpt made it a bit difficult to work with.

Those two together with their sisters Alkonosts can be seen HERE.

While very closely related and similar to Alkonosts, Sirins are never taken for a good omen. Their feathers are jet black and numerous bones are braided in their hair - they are believed to bring those deemed unworthy of a good death into Death God's embrace. Lurking in the dark forests, Sirins are vicious, bloodthirsty hunters and are often willing to support vampires or necromancers in their battles.

Alkonosts

First set of my 'counts-as-Fell-Bats' miniatures - Alkonosts. They are made after Slavic mythical creatures. I didn't like any of the minis that could fit Fell Bats well so I converted my own - these are built on bodies from Mirliton SG Giant Eagles. The whole conversion process can be seen HERE. It was quite interesting to paint them - the pale faces, very light hair, greenish feathers - very different from the usual undead standard.

Those ladies together with their much gloomier sisters Sirins can be seen HERE.

Alkonosts are the giant mythical bird-women from the Varsavian folklore, but seeing how tightly are they related to the Death God, they do respond to the right summons called by the practitioners of necromancy. While they may appear noble, closer inspection quickly shows something else. With their pallid skin and wicked blades posed as a mockery of a crown, they are the messengers of the Death God, fond of diving from high upon their unsuspecting victims. The folklore says that to see one and not instill its wrath brings luck.

Alkonosts & Sirins - WIP

You can find those painted HERE.

This is a project I started back in May 2014 when I wanted some Fell Bats in my army. I didn't like the ones offered by GW or other companies so I decided to make my own - and I looked into Slavic mythology for some ideas. There are numerous versions of birds with female heads in it and I choose two kinds of them to serve as my Fell Bats - THIS picture was especially inspiring for me.

I bought two kinds of birds for this - Giant Eagles from Mirliton SG and Wood Elf Warhawks from GW - two of each. Sawing their heads away was much more difficult than I thought - it was the first time I had to do such a conversion on a metal model. This is the first rough sketch of my idea for them.

Then I thought - I can make this even more Slavic! Instead of mounting them on gravestones, statues or other kinds of rubble I decided to make some Slavic sculptures for them, wooden ones, depicting mostly old, pagan deities. To spare on greenstuff I made the first rough shape out of plasticine and then covered it with two separate layers of greenstuff. Nowadays I just use cheap milliput for the 'core' part.

This is how they looked after I sculpted real bodies on those birds - still before adding eyes and other details.

And this is the final version, with details, hair, decorations, mounted on beforementioned sculptures. It was the first time for me to sculpt whole heads and that amount of detail - and while they look a bit wonky it was still a very good experience.

Side Project - Wedding Minis + WIP

Another side project - this time it's two minis I prepared to be mounted on my wedding cake - my 'input' into the preparations, so to say. Both miniatures are from Andrea Miniatures, 54mm scale - she is 'Verthandi, Sword of Light' and he is 'Brogan, the Bonecrasher'. It was an interesting change for me, painting much bigger figurines and in a much cleaner style.

And here you can see the unpainted versions - I had to convert them a bit to fit the occasion better - and to make her a bit less fanservic-y too.

Zombie Legion - WIP #1

Zombies were the first miniatures I painted for my Vampire Counts army and for a very long time I was satisfied with having only 65 of them. Then I thought - why not fill them up to 100? That was also an excuse for making some creative conversions, fillers, miniatures taken from other armies, etc. Thus my largest project ever started - in July 2016 - dwarfing even Nagash and the Necrosphinx - as I am writing those words I have 200 zombies painted and 200 more built, but unpainted. Those guys here were the first ones - single miniatures and fillers worth together 20 wounds on the tabletop.

First all the dudes separately:

And the whole 20-bases strong unit:

And a small picture of the troll from this batch at the early stages of the converting process.

The Effigy of Death

A heavily converted Necrosphinx from Games Workshop, painting finished in May 2016. After everything I did to him there's barely any original mini left visible - the process can be seen HERE. Painting itself was messy, I was often dissatisfied with it and redoing things - especially the stone parts. In the end, I think it turned out pretty good - it fits other wights despite being rather different - a good lesson for future projects.

The Death God is known in many forms. Sometimes he allows you to speak with long-dead relatives, sometimes he raises undead to work in the fields, sometimes he demands you to perform grisly rituals for unknowable reasons and sometimes he personally wages war against his followers’ enemies. A long time ago statues were built by Varsavians to resemble that war-like aspect of their god - and after King Zlyshko was raised, he organized a search for any remaining ones. Only one such Effigy of Death was found relatively intact. And strangely enough, while it’s strictly a Varsavian creation, Lucan quickly pointed out it’s strange similarity to Khemrian sphinxes. Sculpted out of stone, shaped with wood and metal, this monument is impressive enough, but only after sacrificing a childless human inside the statue’s belly and baptizing it with blood, the construct comes to life for a short time to wreak havoc against enemies of Varsavia. And while it relies only on its physical power, it’s usually enough to best most foes. Statue’s stone body, covered in metal, is durable beyond imagination - and its blades can cut through even the toughest monsters, even if with their weight alone. Woe betide those that stand in its way!

The Effigy of Death - WIP

The painted version can be seen HERE.

Nagash was my biggest project up to date, but it was the Necrosphinx that was supposed to be converted the most. I definitely didn't want it to look Egyptian, I wanted it to be vaguely Slavic and having a similar theme to my wights.

First thing I did was to scratch off almost all of the plastic surface. What wasn't completely scratched off was at least slightly bumped. Original was way too smooth. Then I started covering the body with milliput - I wanted it to look more like a rough pile of rocks in the shape of a sphinx instead of a smooth sculpture. The effect was quite weird at this point. Also, not knowing what to do with the belly of the sphinx, I made it with a hole - to put a caged skeleton there, as a sacrifice powering the whole construct.

I added a pointy helmet because that's probably the easiest thing to get that 'ancient Slavic' look. The blades are made out of plasticard. Now I think that I should have it hold them instead of them being fastened to its arms, but this works too - makes it more recognizable as a Necrosphinx. Also, to avoid having too much stone texture and add some variation, I added Grave Guard shields to its legs. As you can see, I broke off the tail - I really didn't have an idea how to make it fit the theme, so I got rid of it entirely.

After that was done I did the wings. Cut pieces of tin-can were used as bases - on which I glued pieces of balsawood to make it look like wooden planks. I carved little ridges on each 'plank' to give them 'wood grain' appearance similar to all the wood GW makes - and then poured super glue on it - for added resilience. Still, they're rather fragile, so they're magnetized for ease of transport.

Finished conversion below. It is certainly overdesigned, but that's how I tend to do things...

The Deadminder

A 'Chariot of the Harvester' from Gamezone Miniatures, painting finished in April 2016. Despite being rather small, this one took much more time than it should. The assembly was a bit demanding but it was nothing that greenstuff couldn't fix. The painting after that was just tedious - it was really difficult to discern what is what on the mini and my motivation wasn't the best at the time.

Either way, I am rather satisfied with it and it was an interesting experiment with basing. It's difficult to see it here, but I made a road with wheel-ruts on it and covered only the sides and the middle part with grass. This was the first time I used big tufts of grass and they proved most useful for this one.

A deadminder was a very important profession in the varsavian society of Death God worshippers. Wars were being waged, animals were being hunted in the forest, villages were being raided by bandits. All of that left many corpses - which left untended, were later eaten by animals, forgotten and unmourned. The deadminder was supposed to gather all the corpses - in whatever state they were left - and later perform the necessary rituals and send the deceased to the Death God's embrace. Many people had this profession over the centuries, but one particular was immortalized in the folk stories. He was a father pleading his loyalty to both his family and the Death God. He often spent many days far from home, burying the dead and then coming back to spend few days happily together with his wife and children. One time, he went away and weren't coming back for many, many weeks. Then the hard times came and the mother began having difficulties to feed the whole family. The youngest daughter saw her mommy overwork herself, only to get barely enough food for all of them. She decided to lighten her mother's burden - being driven with the love for her father and the devotion to the Death God, she ventured into the forest to find the deadminder, live with him and help him, for he surely had a lot of work. It's said that she found her father, worked together with him and for their devotion the Death God let them stay in the world of the living. Some think they both died in the forest, but others can swear by seeing both of them traveling slowly through Varsavia, minding the dead as always.

Nagash / Avatar of the Death God

After many difficulties and obstacles, I managed to finish painting Nagash in January 2016. The conversion work was extensive (you can see the whole process documented HERE), but painting itself took even more time and energy. The size of the model, the freehands, difficulty of reaching everything, many different surfaces - it was surely challenging - but I also learned a lot.

I painted the floating idols to look like 8 different minerals, to symbolize 8 lores of magic in Warhammer universe. I tried my best to emulate real stones I choose to represent them: beasts is amber, death is amethyst, metal is gold, fire is karneol, heavens is moonstone, life is jade, shadow is chaldedony and light is golden beryl.

Speaking with newly raised King Zlyshko, von Greifens were able to learn that their Death God sometimes allowed to summon his avatar in times of great need. Striking such a deal with him came most often with great costs - even after a huge amount of sacrifices, the summoner would find his own life in the hands of the unpredictable deity. But when it succeeded, great hosts of undead warriors could be easily summoned and enemy armies quickly obliterated. Vampires were really unsure about dealing with such an unpredictable power, but decided to remember about it, should great danger arise. They also put Hautfell under much stricter watch, expecting the necromancer to try and subvert this power for himself. Only time will tell if he'll try it - and if it's even possible to control such a being.

Only after doing the photos above I got a tripod to properly make photos of the base. I spend so much time doing it, it seemed a waste that it wasn't good visible in the main photos.

Nagash / Avatar of the Death God - WIP

Painted version can be seen HERE.

I started working on my Nagash mini in the beginning of September 2015 and it was my biggest project to this date. I wasn't very happy with GW's design and I wanted to convert somehow, making him similar to my wights and maybe a bit Slavic too. The popehat had to be removed and I wanted some parts of him to be covered with bones - that last part was inspired by Nito from Dark Souls video game.

The subassemblies were done in the same way as Duncan showed on the Games Workshop tutorial for building Nagash - I really recommend that.

I started by doing a rough draft of sorts - plasticine was used to simulate bones covering him (it did a mediocre job doing that). Then, pieces of paper were used to make a spike crown for him - which would then create only a silhouette of a pointy helmet. Folks at Carpe Noctem helped me at this design stage, sharing their opinions and observations - such as those bones on his robe being similar to linked sausages...

Out of all that deliberation came out this sketch. He got a cape (which would be made to look like pieces of flayed skin) and bones were then on top of the cape. His hat got a full-blown onion dome and the number of spikes surrounding it got smaller. This would be the final draft and the real conversion work would start.

I started with the base. I didn't like the fact that his spirits were sort of 'sliding' around the ground - the mini looks neither grounded or floating that way. The fact that there are skulls and skeletons in the ground wasn't helping. The solution for that was to put the spirits in the cracks in the ground, as if Nagash's floating spirits were raising the dead buried there, ripping the whole landscape apart in the process. I did all that by surrounding the spirits with pieces of cork and then easing the transition into the rest of the terrain with some milliput.

After that, I filled all the free cracks with skeleton parts to get that 'dead are being raised in his wake' effect. But the spirits themselves were still rather badly connected to the ground and the base was still showing in the cracks. To remedy this I started pouring watered-down PVA glue into the ravines - it would stick in the crevices the most, filling them in the process. After MANY, MANY layers of it I finally got what I envisioned - a flowing river of spirits.

Nothing was deemed 'too much' for this project so I made some additional Slavic-themed decorations for this base - gamayuns! The heads are taken from High Elf Sisters of Avelorn and the rest was sculpted. They would rest on wooden greybeard sculptures on the front of the base - which seemed a bit too empty for me.

Another idea was to put some small Slavic idols around Nagash to push the Slavic feel even further. I followed a tutorial I found on CMON and copied the original to get 8 of them.

After all of that, I had the base ready. The pieces of cork are included in the picture because I was using them to sculpt the bark on those tree stumps below - you can find the whole tutorial describing the process HERE.

The only piece that was missing was the cape. I started with making a rough base for it out of greenstuff.

And then I covered it with more greenstuff to make it look like small pieces of flayed skin. On that, I glued a writhing mass of skeletons from Wargames Factory - all to make a necromantic impression of a thick fur cape.

With that done, the conversion part was finished. Well, almost - I had to add some more skeletons connecting the cape with the armor, but that came later, after painting some hard-to-reach parts. While making those photos I noticed that I completely forgot the sword sheath! It was too late for that, so I had to accept him as he was.

This was in late October 2015.

King Zlyshko

Plastic Wight King from GW painted in November 2015 - kinda as a 'byproduct' when painting Nagash with the same color scheme. He got slightly converted to look more Slavic than the standard version, much less clean too. The idea about him came from the visible part of the shield which I interpreted as a spider - and then I spun the narrative around that, also painting a fitting design on his cloak. There's also a tiny bit changed that should be easier to spot after reading the backstory.

Zlyshko got a nickname 'the Spider' during his youth for having six fingers on his right hand - and while it was said with derision at first, he embraced the moniker - for he has cunning as a real spider during his rule. Later he became known for being the first ancient king to bend his knee before the Avatar of the Death God. While others before him perished without even a memory of them left in the world, Zlyshko was clever enough to notice when should he put his pride aside. Thanks to that, he was blessed with extreme longevity and eventually - undeath. Ruthless warrior and an effective tactician, he led many armies against the enemies of the ever-expanding Varsavia, before eventually being put to a rest in an exquisite tomb. While still susceptible to some degree to the necromantic powers of von Greifens and Hautfell, he manages to show a large degree of independence from those who raised him. That, coupled with the fact that wights tend to listen to him rather than the necromancers, makes him a dangerous wild card in modern Varsavia. Thankfully for the vampires and necromancers, he considers the younglings (as he calls the denizens of the modern world) useful allies.

Serrana - the Strigoi Sister

'The Harpy's Embrace' miniature from Gamezone painted in August 2015, converted to serve in my army as a Strigoi Ghoul Queen. The idea to make one came to me when someone on the net mentioned that there's no rule against giving vampiric power 'Beguile' to a Strigoi Vampire. One thing I changed to make her more 'vampiric' was adding bat ears - the conversion post can be found HERE. Just as her brother, she too can be mounted on a Terrorgheist base - which can be seen HERE. The painting itself was much more challenging than expected - it was the first time I had to paint so much smooth skin and it was difficult at times to discern what is what. Despite that I still think that the mini's sculpt and design is outstanding - the way she's cradling his head, the way she blocks his hands with her legs - tender yet deadly.

While von Greifens tend to look down on Strigoi vampires, Haralamb Gudvanger isn't so discriminating. He took care of two Strigoi siblings and helped them crush the witch hunt that was following them. Thankful, the feral vampires help the flesh-stitcher as shock troops and ghoulish commanders on the field.

Gavros' sister Serrana is a rare sight - a female Strigoi. One would be gravely mistaken to think she'll be docile though. While not as rage-driven as her brother, she definitely makes up for that in sadism and cunning. Loft upon giant bat wings, she often beguiles her prey with her sleek, shapely physique and a bit of vampiric magic - when the poor fool notices her wicked face it's already too late. Draining one unfortunate completely, she just jumps onto another one, more often than not playing with her meal before finally snapping the neck. Being the only other person her brother listens to and having a cooler judgment, she makes manipulating them a little more difficult than Gudvanger would like to.

Gavros - the Strigoi Brother

Strigoi Ghoul King from the Terrorgheist set from GW - painted in August 2015. I built this one to be used on foot instead of riding the Terrorgheist - but if there's a need for that, he can be mounted on the monster's base no problem - which can be seen HERE. I changed his pose to fit his status as a foot vampire better, added some bestial bat-ears to him and changed his hands to ghoul ones - the conversion post can be found HERE. Much of it was inspired by Rob Hawkins and his Marduk the Ghoul King. The mace, taken from a chaos warrior, was added to accommodate the idea of giving him a magical weapon on the tabletop. That was valid in 8th edition, but I really don't know if that's still a thing in Age of Sigmar.

The color scheme is the same as with all my vampires - pale blue, red and black - and proved to be a bit troublesome on this one. There are not much elements on him that are not skin and at first, I painted his loincloth red - which made him look like a stripper... In the end, only the handle and the little pouch are red.

While von Greifens tend to look down on Strigoi vampires, Haralamb Gudvanger isn't so discriminating. He took care of two Strigoi siblings and helped them crush the witch hunt that was following them. Thankful, the feral vampires help the flesh-stitcher as shock troops and ghoulish commanders on the field.

A muscle-bound brute, the brother - Gavros is all one can expect from a Strigoi Ghoul King. Fuelled by rage and hunger, he's easily manipulated by Gudvanger. He also possesses a peculiar knack for leadership, somehow inspiring the flesh monsters to perform better on the battlefield. Known for very short bursts of extreme strength bolstered by blood magic - during this moments he can crush stones with his hands and rip apart fully armored knights - that together with his supernaturally quick strikes makes him a truly terrifying foe when on the offense, even if somewhat lacking in defense. If not fighting with his poisoned claws, he enjoys using a monstrous mace he took from a killed Chaos Knight.

Strigoi Siblings - WIP

A short post showing my conversions of two minis I use as Strigoi vampires - Gavros and Serrana. Both of them got large ears - which was inspired by Turelim vampires from the Legacy of Kain franchise - I just really like feral vampires with laarge ears. I heard also people saying it reminds them of gremlins, so there's that too. More detailed info on them is in their separate posts.

Gavros the Strigoi Ghoul King is first:

And his sister Serrana, the Strigoi Ghoul Queen:

Cheap basing tutorial - bubbling swamp / tarpit

When I was doing my Terrorgheist base with the intention of using what I already have at home I thought - why not document all the process and make it a tutorial? So I did exactly that, it was published on Carpe Noctem, now I am moving it here. The TG base is kinda specific, but some tricks could be helpful in other areas

What is used in this tutorial:

- 100x150 base
- pva glue
- 3mm x 3mm balsawood sticks
- wooden dust [I'll explain below]
- plasticine
- small greenstuff balls
- tissues
- super glue
- sand & pebbles
- citadel paints & 'ardcoat
- TG bits and optional decorative bits

On the first picture you can see the basic framework. I already positioned the stones on which the TG is standing - and made a place for the optional Strigoi Ghoul King to stand - inspired by ROB HAWKINS. I positioned the 20mm base where I thought the 'rider' would not interfere with the TG and glued 3mm x 3mm balsa sticks there. I also placed some decorative bits, glued to stones to set the range of the swamp pool and outlined it with a pencil.

After that - as you can see still in the picture above - I cut/filed the edges of the balsawood square, to make it slope easier into the rest of the base. After that, I built the hill to cover the balsawood and some additional mounds with plasticine. Nowadays I would do it with Milliput, but back then I didn't have such things. Besides, it wasn't a heavyworking structural element anyway.

Next - I covered the plasticine with a single layer of common tissue.

And then - I put super glue on the tissue - it absorbs the glue, hardens, joins with the plasticine and makes a rough surface to which sand glues neatly.

Next thing - the PVA-glue-sawdust mix. At first, I mixed PVA glue with a bit of water - about 3:1 and then started adding the dust. The resultant mass is a modeling concrete of sorts - malleable at first, hard then. Other than what I am showing here, it could be useful for some cave / other planet basing ideas.

The mixture needs to be wet enough to actually spread and build with it, but also solid enough to not collapse into a puddle under it's own weight - after some trying out it should be easily attainable.

And using it I made a border for the pool.

You can also see that I added the 'bubbles'. Those are small greenstuff balls cut in half and glued to the base. Every time I have some greenstuff left over after sculpting I roll them into balls to be used later on things like this. The wooden dust takes some time to dry so it's a good moment to add this.

It becomes darker as it hardens and dries and looks not unlike cookie dough being cooked. I tried to speed the process using the heat of my lamp, but the plasticine started to 'sweat' from beneath the tissues - I don't know what that was, but I didn't like it - so be warned.

In the meantime, I also glued some larger pebbles onto the base.

When it's ready it's time to sand the base as you would normally - I use sand one can find on the beach for this purpose, glued with PVA glue to the base.

Now the painting process for the base. The first step was to spray it all with Chaos Black paint. Then I added a very, very heavy drybrush of Burnt Umber acrylic paint - it's cheaper than Scorched Brown / Rhinox Hide and looks almost the same. I use lots of it on this step and the quality of the paint doesn't really matter now. On that, I apply a heavy drybrush of Mournfang Brown / Bestial Brown.

Next step is adding a drybrush of Steel Legion Drab / Graveyard Earth. The last one is a light drybrush of Ushabti Bone / Bleached Bone. You can also see here that I painted all the scenery elements - it's good to have them all done before continuing further, especially for everything near the pool.

And now it's time for the swamp/tarpit!

I am using a water + PVA glue mixture to get the liquid for the base. At first, I tried using a 1:1 mix and then 2:1 with more glue, but that wasn't a good idea. I'll explain later why.

All the swamp painted with watered glue:

And after drying - as you can see - it was way too watery, pooled close to the bubbles, stones and scenery and didn't leave almost anything on the actual surface.

So, the next mixture was more like 3:1 or 4:1 with more glue than water. It became more viscous and seemed kinda uneven at first.

Don't get anything unwanted stuck in the glueswamp!

And after drying - it's much better, but there is still some texture of the base showing through.

So I added yet another layer of the thick mixture - and this time, after it dried - it was good enough for me. Using so much water made it sticks very much to anything in the swamp so it looks very thick and viscous in the end. It's all right when it's tar - but you'll need to use more glue and less water when trying to make something less thick, like blood or normal swamp.

When it dried it was time for painting. I painted it black using a big brush - the glue absorbed water somehow, so to make an even layer of paint you need to brush kinda quickly - but even if there are some faults, you can always paint it over once again.

Too much blackness was kinda dull for me, so I decided to add some color variation to it. I washed all the swamp with water and then added small splotches of dark green paint into it - it flowed and dissolved in the paint, creating watery/swampy effects. I recommend using various shades of greens, browns and greys for this particular kind of dirty pool.

And after that is done it's time for the Hardcoat - or any glossy varnish to be precise. It's important here to use a soft and big brush and also to water down the varnish a bit - it needs to flow freely and make an even surface. I did three layers of it. The last one was pure varnish straight out of the pot with water added later - I poured some drops of water on it and then tilted it until water created a smooth surface. Be careful for anything to land in the varnish while it's drying - I got two small hairs inside and it's impossible to get it out without destroying a large portion of the varnish. Leave it on an even and horizontal surface and wait for it to dry - and that's all!

Thanks for checking it out!