I never have enough trees for my gaming table. Either they all look the same (cheap railroad trees from a bag) or just forlorn and mangy (Woodlands Scenics armatures missing foliage clumps), and they never look like a forest, maybe a copse or a spinney (the English language has a surfeit of words for “small group of trees”).
Last winter, on a frigidly cold night, Madame Padre and I were leaving the local library, and she stopped, as she often does, to examine the garden beds. The fact that she will do this, even in the dead of winter, is one of her more endearing traits, in my opinion. “Can you use these for trees?” she asked me, showing me a twig she had snapped off a bush. It was hard to see in the dark, but it looked rather spindly. “I could try,” I said, so we snapped off a bunch more and headed home, where the twigs then sat at the back of my painting desk for much of the following year.
“What do you think of this face?” I asked her the other night, holding up my latest masterpiece. She glanced at it for all of a second. “Too dark". Madame Padre will be the first to admit that she’s not much interested in my “little men” and I knew that was all the feedback I’d get from her. Then her glance wandered to the back of my painting table. “You’ve never done anything with those twigs I found you” she said, her tone somehow both hurt and accusing, as if to say, “You never listen to my ideas". “No”, I said, lamely, “but they’re working their way to the top of my to-do list”, which was sort of true and I had been looking at them the week before.
Legolas is (pardon the expression) dwarfed by the spindly trees of Mirkwood.
So, the following week, I went to a craft store, found a spray can of dark green paint, and blasted the four most useful-looking of the twigs. Once dry, I took some dark brown craft paint and brushed it onto the “trunks” and those of the “branches” that I could easily make. Then I put some children’s plasticine on washers, and stuck the ends of my “trees” in. They are too tall for anything but 28mm or larger figures, and even then they would be big trees, 40-60 feet tall or so in proportion to the figures. I suppose they could pass as poplars … I think there are some kinds of poplars that don’t have white bark. I don’t know. I’m not really that good with tree spotting.
I’m not even sure what plant these twigs are from, exactly. Madame Padre thought they were from Sorbaria, sometimes called False Spirea. If you look up close, the green clusters are more like dried up seed pods than leaves, but from a distance they look ok.
I still need to flock the bases, but last night I couldn’t resist leaving them out on the gaming table, which lives at the back of our TV room, and was pleased when she noticed them. “My trees!” Madame Padre cried out happily, then looked at me and her eyes narrowed. “Did you paint those just because I complained that you were ignoring them last week? You do have free will, you know. I’m not an ogre”. I didn’t take that remark seriously, it’s a standard move in her repertoire of verbal chess moves that keep me on my toes. “Of course not, darling, but it was a good suggestion, and I’m glad I took it. They do look splendid, don’t they.” She glanced at them again, her face going neutral. “I’ve seen you do worse”, she said as she wandered off.
Such is love. And now I have four more trees …. and they are nice trees, I think. Even if I’m not sure what sort of trees they are.
MP+
Fab post. I too have a Beloved Other Half who shows but a cursory interest in my 'little models'.
ReplyDeleteThanks HW. I hope I did not make my missus out to be too harsh. Secretly I think she admires the creativity and the imagination that the hobby inspires in me, but she'll never admit it. And, when it really counts, she can be lavish with her praise and support. God bless our Beloved Other Halves.
DeleteThese examples of arboreal greenery are in my view quite sufficiently tree-ish to pass muster on any game board. Don't you worry about that! I've seen less convincing pretences at aforestation from commercial sources. Only thing: if you haven't already, you might find it a good idea to 'fix' the foliage with a PVA spray, or similar. I also reckon that if you make lots of these and group them closely enough together (as it were a thick woodland) you would obtain quite a convincing forest canopy. The slight inconvenience to moving troops around beneath would I believe be offset by the look of the thing.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about you, but I have often found the ... impressionistic(?), expressionistic(?) ... approach to war games scenery a whole deal more appealing that the realistic approach. One can sure admire the depths of realism achieved in the eye-candy photographs of the more commercial (and expensive) war games publications. Yet one feels there is something soulless about it all... a sense of a heck of a lot of effort for small return. OK, the people who do build these elaborate and admirable terrains won't agree that it's wasted labour, deriving from the visual effect a large measure of satisfaction, I dare say. But I would not even want to spend that amount of time and money. But that is a small consideration compared with the overall claustrophobic impression that forms within my mind when I see these efforts.
Even then there is an element of what I tend to think of expressionism in a well-thought-out battlefield. We express a town as a few buildings, probably slightly underscale; several underscale trees scattered about represents a forest, roads that on the ground scale might be a hundred yards broad, rivers and streams look little more significant than a stormwater drain. There is one blogspot I follow whose author obviously makes do with whatever materials are to hand: a playing surface from a cardboard carton (I think), liberally splashed about with paint to suggest the casual variations of ground cover; hastily scratchbuilt buildings, forests of ... well, I don't know what they are (were), but model trees they weren't, and they had a height maybe half that of the figures, but you still knew it was a forest... This guy's blog is one of my favorites to visit regularly, for its extemporaneous inventiveness. Inspiring stuff.
I like your trees, and strongly suggest you make as many as you conveniently can - a whole forest, withal.
Cheers,
Ion
Thank you Ion, my friend, you are, typically, as wise as you are eloquent. I am not sure what blog you are referring to in your penultimate paragraph, but it doesn't really matter. The people who achieve that expressionistic effect are, I think, truest to the imaginative roots of our hobby. I admire the model-railroad type realism that one sees in the high price mags, but it's not for me. I can't do it well, and I have other things to do with my time.
DeleteThe though occurred to me, and this depends upon the twig availability, is that rather than basing these trees individually, you might consider grouping them on larger bases in twos, threes and fours. Each base could represent a copse or spinney its own, but they can still be grouped to form larger tracts of woodland. But they will also be a little less inconvenient for moving troops through the tall timber. Just a thought...
ReplyDeleteAgain, thanks. I think you, Moterei and James are all urging wisdom upon me. I think I need to go back to that library and see what's there.
DeleteNow I'd say they look a lot more treeish than lots of other stuff I've seen on some tables yet so I'd be happy if they'd grace a table I was playing on. They somehow look a little like those wind torn trees you sometimes find in coastal areas. While I don't really go along with Archduke Piccolos admiration for ex-/ or impressionistic (never managed to grab what means what with this kind of art) terrain, I have to agree about the trees probably looking even more convincing when grouped together in threes or fours.
ReplyDeleteWhat sort of trees? Family trees surely.
ReplyDeleteVery clever, Ross. I'd stand you a pint for that if we were neighbours (fond thought, that).
DeleteThose will do nicely Padre. I think most of our wargame trees are far to short.
ReplyDeleteYou should consider the suggestion for multi-basing, since on their own I think those might prove somewhat fragile.
And as with our 'little men' basing sets the model off considerably.
you should be able to get spray glue to set the foliage at a Michael's.
Great trees- really like the forlorn look that they have. If you want to toughen them up before they dry out try dipping them in watered down PVA. A friend did that for seafoam trees and it worked well.
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Pete.
They look great, Mike. And as for size, have you ever looked at a fully grown tree with a person standing next to it? They are bloody huge! Look at this random pic of people riding through a Swedish pine forest.
ReplyDeletehttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mkWX7g9-GWo/Tbg77mP6StI/AAAAAAAADAY/j_8al26afT0/s400/tallskog2.jpg
The trees are easily five times as tall as the mounted figures and these are not very big pines. If I wanted to represent a Swedish (or Canadian) pine forest in scale with 28mm figures, the trees would start at a foot tall. How is that for a storage nightmare?
They look absolutely great. As to what type... well, with Legolas there, who cares, as I'm sure Middle Earth have other tree species than we have. In a fantasy setting you don't have to go for a specific species. For an Earth setting I'd say the same, who cares if they are a poplar sub-species or whatever, because they look so much better than most of the stuff that usually decorates our gaming tables.
ReplyDeleteInspiring, I'll have to find my stash of twigs and sprigs...
Apart from the sight of your wonderful trees, I think I take heart from the fact that Madame Padre's idea has seen fruition. In the short time that I've been involved in this most wholesome of hobbies, I've realised that inclusion of one's spouse, even at the most superficial level, can often lead to the most unexpected of benefits. In my case the Saintly Mrs. Awdry insists on naming any creatures that might grace the painting table and consequently no longer baulks at any parcels that might contain said livestock - it's amazing just how many random beasties, I now have in the lead pile!
ReplyDeleteHa! This post put a large grin on my face.
ReplyDeleteThe trees look very nice. Question - the bases seem rather small? Are they top heavy and prone to tipping over because of this?