WIP: Yrsa, Witch of the Wilds

Yes, this project wasn't on my to-do list. Yes, I still have to finish the Museum as well. Yes, this project is stopping my progress on the Ravenloft painting. But, lady inspiration is fickle and when she decides to come out for dinner you make sure the romance the hell out of her.


That said, I had no intention of starting this. Then, I saw a package of moss hanging on the shelf. The package of moss had a lot of different types inside and one of them looked like it could be tree branches! Thats when inspiration hit and I knew what I needed to do.

I went to a different aisle and found a decent sized round wooden plaque, grabbed the moss and a couple of new brushes. The whole ride home I had ideas popping through my head for it. I knew I was going to use Yrsa from Red Box Games and I knew I wanted a swamp or forest, but other than that, everything was up in the air.

The following day I went out to my yard and went searching for sticks. I ended up grabbing an ash twig and a twisted willow twig. The ash twig was large enough to act as a fallen tree and the twisted willow had enough character that it would work well for a standing tree.

I took the ash stick and broke it in half carefully and cut the "stump" side down to the the height I wanted. Then I set it in place and took a rough idea of where to cut the "log" side at. I wanted the log to hang off of the
base and break the edge. I think it works well, though there have been voice concerns that it's too long and could detract from the miniature.

The twisted willow twig was broke to a reasonable height and pinned into place. This will be a live tree and it what the moss was mainly for.  Inside the package was some moss that had leaves on it similar to pine needles. They are actually tiny leaves, rather than needles, but I didn't realize that until I started playing with them. The height of the tree has also drawn concerns about taking away from the miniature.

It was suggested that I add 1 or 2 more minis to the base in order to add more to the

main scene. But I knew I wanted Ysra to be the only human on the base. That's when I realized that I had the warg I'd been saving for the Nektali and Blood. And since I won't be doing that piece anytime soon, I added him to it and he worked out really well. Now it looks like Ysra is pointing her sword at something for the warg to attack!

At this point, I've got the base mostly put together. The trees are mounted, the foam rocks are added, clay and sand are done for the ground and I have the branches of moss all glued to the tree.

I've also sprayed the moss with some matte varnish to try and help hold it all together. I didn't check it this morning, so I don't know how well it stiffened it up yet. But, that's it
for now! I'm really digging this project and it's not feeling tedious at all. Hoping it turns out as well as my mind sees it.