Mr Saturday's Porridge - Making a Decent Basing Mixture

 Basing. Sometimes overlooked, it can make an average miniature excellent, and an excellent miniature average. I love basing miniatures, especially if you can give the model some narrative, or add to the theme of your army, gang and such. With the wealth of resin bases and resin basing kits, it's easier than ever to make your bases groovy. There's always room for a good basing mix though. After using various materials, fine sand, rough sand, oyster grit and so on, I found the results fine, but a little unconvincing at times. This then, is my recipe for a good mixture to set your minis on, and it's easy to incorporate resin basing bits into it. I give you Mr Saturday's porridge.

 It's what I use for the general earth, stone etc on bases.

Get 4-5 different types of basing material. Oyster grit, fine sand, rough sand etc. Get a tub with a lid, anything as long as it's pretty airtight. Pour in a measure of the 4-5 basing materials, depending on how much porridge you want. Mix in PVA glue. It's important to get the consistency right, about the same as, oddly, porridge. Too much PVA, the mix will shrink on the base a pull off the edges after a few days, too little and it won't spread well. Add sawdust of flock to mitigate shrinking. I don't know why this works. Mix well! Use a scalpel or sculpting tool to add it on the base, in small amounts. Make sure your resin bits are attached already. I often wait for it to dry a bit, then cut a tab and add the mini, or leave a little space under the mini's feet when you glue it on for the porridge to flow into. I HATE when the feet get obscured by basing. Let it dry for 24 hours. The random nature of the different basing materials mixing together works a treat.

If you've made a lot, the airtight container will keep it usable for a week or longer. If it's drying out, add more PVA. Ta-da!