Finally finished my dinosaur fantasy terrain pieces. Works pretty well for either Frostgrave or Warhammer winter tables, etc.
I gave the dinosaur bones a basecoat of Vallejo white brush-on primer. I decided to use the primer coat also as the base color of the bones, since the primer was white. I then used Army Painter Soft Tone brown wash as a general wash over all the bones, making sure it got into all the cracks and crevices of the bones.
That's pretty much all I did for the bones!
A pic of the bones after the wash was applied:
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Once I had finished the bones, all that was left to do was mix up some snow paste and apply it to the base.
I went with the standard mix of white craft paint and baking soda. I also added the usual Elmers white glue. But this time I also decided to experiment with consistency and added some white acrylic gesso. I'm not sure the gesso does anything in particular. Seems like you'd get very similar results if you used white glue or gesso. The important thing is that the mix needs some kind of a hardener, which is why glue is needed.
The baking soda is really the key ingredient for consistency. The more you add the thicker your paste and the better you can control it. However, you don't want the paste too thick. If it's too thick you run into the problem of the "snow" not settling into natural contours and looking like artificial lumps. It's a bit of a trick to get it right so that it's thick enough but not too runny!
I've gotten fairly good at mixing up the right amounts.
The final touch for the snow effects was to sprinkle some Woodland Scenics snow powder over the paste and then let it dry. You can also use some of the dry baking soda itself to sprinkle on top for a flake effect.
Some pics of the progress and the finished winter pieces:
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Overall I'm pretty pleased with the results. I'm going to go on and attempt some proper city ruin winter pieces for my Frostgrave table as well. I've gotten confident enough with the process of using grass tufts and snow effects to try it with a bit more elaborate pieces.
!!