+ inload: Warden Titan base +

+ Warden Titan base +

In preparation for a new Titan arriving via the uncertainties of warp conveyance Royal Mail, I've polished off this 80mm base. 

Not, perhaps, the most exciting inload update I've ever posted, but it does flag a couple of things that might be of interest – scale basing, and lighting.

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+ Scale basing +

Last inload I showed a Titan base that included a couple of Epic-scale figures. I include scale hints like this on Epic bases more often than not, and the reason for that is to reinforce the scale. 

As you can see here, however, things are a bit more neutral. There's a couple of small boxes and some sort of resin engine that's come from my bits box, alongside a big rock – but none of these items really tell us much about the size of things. After all, are those boxes shipping crates or small parcels? The grass tufts I've used are no more helpful. Are they long grasses or shrubs? 

Basing is important, but it's easy to get caught up in trying to be too clever by half. Do we need to tell the viewer the scale? It's useful sometimes, particularly when you're trying for a specific effect, but it's far from necessary. Sometimes you can just use the bits you have and rely on the model – or the broader context of the force – to tell the rest of the story.

The thing we learn here is that there are basing items that are scale-agnostic, which just add texture and interest to break up large areas. This is the key here. Rocks, boxes and so forth won't suggest scale in the same way as ruins, vehicles or figures. Roads and foliage offer a halfway house – the scale they suggest will depend largely on other prompts – the markings you add to a flat road will tell us whether it's a single track or a multi-lane motorway. Foliage and greenery can likewise be a bush or a tree with a little work.

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+ Lighting +

While I'm no photographer, I do work with them, and their insights have really helped me with getting clear pict-captures. The below notes are intended for absolute beginners to photography, who are struggling to get good shots of their models to share; but there's a huge amount of info available online, so do traverse the noosphere – there's a wealth of brilliant info available to inload from far more talented and skillful adepts than myself!

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In an ideal world, we'd all have time, budget, space and inclination to get beautiful colour accurate shots of our models – but I suspect I'm far from alone in taking quick snaps with a camera phone and relying largely on natural daylight. I take the vast majority of the pict-captures for this noospheric node by an east or south-facing window, which means there's a suprising amount of difference. 

Pictured below are two shots taken with the same phone camera, at different sides of the same neutral grey room.

Just look what a difference the daylight and angle can make. The warmth is absolutely washed out of the shot above, and the contast looks really stark. Neither is in direct light, so the shadows are relatively soft – but what a difference the angle makes to the big rock at the back. It's washed-out above, with strong shadows, while below it's much more evenly lit.

If you're finding it hard to get accurate shots of your models, even something as simple as changing where you're taking your pictures can make a real difference.