WarFactory - Arid Driftwood

Arid Fallen Trees

One of Games Workshop's prototype marines leads some mercenaries.

Materials

Driftwood or well dried pieces of rotten wood. As these will form the centrepiece of your scenery, essentially unmodified, then it is important to pick a nice interesting bit. Don't just use a fresh stick, but look for one where the wood is starting to disintegrate.
Arid style base

Construction

Attaching to base
Once you have found the piece of wood, almost nothing needs to be done except to stick it to the base. Large items such as these should be stuck to the base at Stage 2 of the arid terrain piece process, before the terrain piece has been textured. This will make it more realistic as it will look as if they are almost embedded in the ground rather than perched on top. Use plenty of PVA or epoxy resin.

The almost skeletal knuckles on this bit of wood are a particularly pleasing feature.

Painting

The trunks shouldn't need much painting, just a little washing and drybrushing to bring out the texture.

1) Dark brown wash - It may be necessary to wash a little dark brown ink on if the wood is very light, otherwise the drybrushing won't show up at all. (This wasn't used in either of these examples).

2) Drybrush - A delicate drybrush of 'Beige' Sandtex was applied over the top of the whole shell. This made the spots look less stark as well as providing final highlights for the main shell.