Over the course of the various restrictions and lockdowns this year I have assembled a pretty decent Moot of Ents. I wanted them to be a bit of a hobby project as my painting skills aren't that good but I enjoy modelling. It would also be a good way to have one of my armies "wow" my opponent as my painting is never going to do that!
One of the recent Ents I put together was a based on a willow tree and has sparked quite a number of people asking how I made them. I thought it might be useful to do a little tutorial so that if anyone wants to copy me they can do. A list of links to all the products I used can be found at the end of the article.
This Ent started life as one of the old metal Ents that were recently on limited release by Games Workshop. At time of writing (early December 2020) they are still available on the UK site but probably not for long! The kit comes with several pieces but no instructions. In the end I managed to decipher that you get a body with one leg attached, a separate leg, 2 sets of arms, 2 heads and 3 branches. This gives a pretty decent amount of customisation options, however the general pose of the body and legs is pretty fixed but can be changed a little with some bending.
After I chose the pieces I wanted to use and assembled the Ent (pinning is absolutely required) I attached several lengths of wire as the willow branches; this involved either drilling holes and gluing in the wire or simply wrapping it around some of the other branches. I then roughed up the wire using some clippers by just squeezing the clippers into the wire every 4 or 5mm - this made the surface uneven so that Green Stuff will cling to it better. I then wrapped all of the wire in green stuff, trying to keep the layer fairly thin. Keeping your fingers wet while doing this is essential otherwise the green stuff wants to stick to you more than it wants to stick to the wire. I then used a hobby knife to put a bit of detail on the branches, mostly just scoring it in random directions to look a bit like bark.
I then painted the whole model. If you are interested I undercoated with Corax White then used Snakebite Leather contrast paint with a drybrush of Zandri Dust. I also used Militarum Green on the leaf details and a light drybrush of Screaming Skull on some of the honeycomb-looking details as well as parts of the face. As I said, I am not a great painter so that was good enough for me. (At this point I also decided an extra branch was needed to fill a pretty big gap at the back, hence the unpainted Green Stuff in the picture).
Now on to the foliage. First I used green polyfibre and teased it out to be fairly thin. I cut it into strips the length of the willow branches and used a dab of super glue in 4 or 5 places on the branches to hold it in place (I wouldn't normally glue the polyfibre in place as it is usually possible to hook it over the branched but that didn't feel particularly secure on these long vertical branches). I then teased it around the branches so that it enveloped them completely and used some nail scissors to cut and long loose strands.
Once this was done I sprayed the polyfibre lightly with spray adhesive and sprinkled over some light green coarse turf. I made sure to sprinkle it from several different directions to ensure good coverage. I then repeated this process with a second layer of spray adhesive and coarse turf. Finally I gave one more very light spray of adhesive and sprinkled over a small amount of leaves. I didn't want to go overboard with these, they are just a highlight for the coarse turf.
Finally, I based with Army Painter Battlefield Brown and then a mix of two different colours of coarse turf and some static grass. I also stuck on some flower tufts to break up the colour a bit.
And there we have it! One completed Ent to join the moot. I really enjoy working on these, they always just look OK until the foliage goes on but then they wow me every time. I am looking forward to adding even more Ents, the Plastic kit in particular is amazing, you can do some much with it if you are willing to put in a bit of effort (and a lot of pins!).
More pictures and pictures of my previous Ents can be found here: instagram.com/drawncombat
List of materials:
