Hi guys. At the moment, Im making a base for M8 Cargo tractor. The base is just big enough to hold the tractor, but soil/groundwork is visible.
I have the soil painted a mixture of browns and reds. It looks OK, but Im not 100% convinced ... mostly because I haven´t the foggiest of what it really should be.
Any tips for a realistic colour?? What is your favourite mixture for Vietnam earth colour? I paint with Humbrols, but all is of interest as I can mix to get it.
URL links to good Vietnam bases would also help or actually any tips at all !!! This is the first time I have made such a base. Thanks in advance for your help or ideas! Cheers.

PB - you'll want to go with a terra cotta color with a bit of red. I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with the actual Humbrol colors.
When I did my CF dio for Splash I research asian dirt color and found lots of redish tans. Lots of iron (rusty color) in the dirt. Very heavy clay consistancy.

Hi,
I used a base red-brown colour - just cheap artists acrylics mixed directly into the celluclay. I then did a light wash with dark brown oil paint and drybrushed with a pastels - various shades of brown + orange and pink.
Came up pretty nice if I do say so myself :-)

Havent tried this mix yet Frank.. Its based on tamyia colours... xf XF 52, flat earth - 5 parts
XF7, flat red 4 parts
X 21 flat base 1 part

Hope it helps

Dave

nam soil,
depending on where you're at and what season. it went from mud that sucked you in to sand so fine that it would fill everything around.
color went from rusty red to regular sand beach color with dark black or grey thrown in. think of a worst case scenerio and multiply by 10 and you got the soil you have to hump in.
cheers
c6o
carpe diem

Thanks very much guys for taking the time to reply. I don´t have an exact setting .. just Vietnam. So that gives me a lot of room to play with according to all your answers. Any dios I have seen have quite a variance in the red/brown soil colour as well.
The base is just that ... a base. Its a track with some grasses and vegetation on each side. I was out and bought some aquarium and plastic plants today. I will paint these to give them some life as I dont like the plastic look. I´ll show some pics when its ready! Cheers.


The colour I have is a rich dark red/brown colour. All Humbrols
50% - 160 (german camo red-brown),
25% - 29 (dark earth)
15% - 100 (red brown)
10% - 153 (Insignia red)
Ive dry brushed with this colour lightened with sand and also #100 red brown straight.

Frank, have you tried MIG's Vietnam Earth pigment?

Might just solve all your Vietnam earth problems in one fell swoop.

Regards,
Graugrun

Howdy Frank,

Unfortunately you hail from Ireland (not a bad 'thing'... )...but it just means you probably don't have ready access to Mexican cooking spices.
A fairly large assortment of different Mexican cooking spices are dead ringers for just about every colour you might need regarding 'Nam ground colourings....give it try.

Tread.

Looks like everybody has pretty much covered the colors. However, I'd go easy on the red Plasticbattle. As Phantom Major said, not all soils are red in Vietnam. It isn't as much red as it is an orange reddish tint.

I've not used humbrols but if you can you might want to reduce 2 parts of the flat red and maybe add 1 part orange or vermillion instead. That would give it a more orange-red tint which is closer to the color imparted by the high iron content soils found in that region. Scott's description comes pretty close in that its terra cotta color with a slight tinge of red.

Frank
Just took a look at your M8. Very very nice. If you decide to use the red soil; just remember that when the soil was dry it was like powder,into everything and when it was wet it stuck to everything. Sort of a no win situation. It had a high clay content.
I served there to. The jungles were a rich lombe color.( If I spelled that right it'll be miracle :-) ).
Would love to see it when you're finished.
Jerry

Guys, your answers have all been very helpful. They gave a wide range of options but still directed to where and how I did it. The result is below.

So how does this look in your opinions ... as one small unspecified area of Vietnam?
I didnt want to model the jungle but feel it still is a vital aspect of the scene. I bought two little plastic plants and one plastic aquarium plant. I painted bits of them to lose the plastic bright green, but fear some look more like something I picked from a tree outside now. I sprayed the stems with tamiya earth. The sprayed all leaves with a tamiya green, faded with grey from the bottom. I then sprayed them with humbrol grass green from the top and used some insignia yellow to give some colour. I want them to totally contrast with the greens from the truck!

Final assembly and touching up will happen over the next few weeks. Im concentrating on the figure now and will touch up the base as I go along.
The Legends figure is as shown below.

Beautiful work on the vehicle and the figure, Frank. Very well weathered. Its a beauty alright.

Just a super minute nitpick really. Will you be adding some pigments to the rucksacks and windscreens coz the fine soil always manages insidiously find itself in every fold and corner?

Plants look great since your painting has taken out the plastic's monotone green. You may want to clump them as putting them far apart draws attention to their plastic features. Painting some of the lower leaves brownish gray to simulate decaying, dying leaves will help add to the reality. Another way to get rid of the plastic "feel" is to clip of edges of some of the leaves to give it a shredded look as though caterpillars had taken a chomp at them.

Thanks CK
Thanks for the kind words.
The figure is not painted yet ... this is the image from Legends homepage .... just hoping it´ll come out as good.
I already have semi-discs cut for the windows and when everythings in place, I´ll give it an overspray.
The plants will be bundled together .... this is only the paint set-up and a quick picture to give an idea of whats happening! As the plant with the long grass-like leaves, overhangs a little, I cut off some tips and painted with sand ... and brown flecks and it does look the part.
I´ll take new pictures when the figure is added. This may take a little longer as Ive 3 figures to paint at the same time. The other 2 are for a friend.