"Painting grass variation into a GM Battle mat" Topic

I have been using GM Battle mats. While I appreciate the tiny blades of grass and the fact the grass is not all the same color, the fact that the grass color variation is distributed such as to produce an almost uniform color I am thinking it could be improved upon. Has anyone tried painting some color variation onto the mats to make them look more realistic? If so, what paints and technique works best? Pictures would be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

What's a "GM Battle Mat"?

Sorry, I meant GW as in Gamer's Workshop or Citadel battle mat.

Maybe try airbrush or aerosol, if you're in the UK try modelmates spray, I think its a water soluble dye, so if it does go wrong it should be forgiving, all suggestions untried, so don't blame me!

Any thoughts on whether water colors would work?

Never used water colours so no idea as to how they may act, problem I think you'd have is the paint will be too thin and soak through, but if the paint is too thick (you could experiment diluting acrylic paint) then the hairs/bristles of the mat will stick together, when you try to drybrush it. My hunch is the modelmates product may be best, have a look on their website, saw it demo'd at Salute a couple of years back and it was pretty effective and its possible to wash off if you put too much down.

Thank you Lardie the Great,

Well I found it has been done:

link

I can't tell from the blog, but it sounds like this is regular model paint?

Any artistic suggestions on painting a realistic looking background where the grass isn't so uniform?

Well that looks pretty good and a lot easier than I would've guessed and going off the paint names regular GW paint. I'd go with lighter and dark blotches to suggest rises and dips in the land. Post pics of how it goes.

Am I correct in thinking this mat has been discontinued? Shame cos I was thinking of getting one…

I think they still sell it: Citadel Battle Mat