Ground Work in Full Swing
Continuing on with the base work, I began with a basic acrylic earth tone painted over the entire base. Next, I added Heki Grass, #1576 Wild Grass, sheets placed in the desired areas. I found pulling and stretching the sheets gave a decent appearance for my purposes. After the Heki grass was set I scattered crushed cat litter over a wash of water thinned Elmer’s glue onto the open areas, but leaving the outhouse area clear. Before going any further with any more grass effects, I gave the cat litter a thinned oil wash of Burnt Umber for depth, then finishing off by highlighting all the gravel with an acrylic light earth tone. Placing sand and small stones in the small wash area was the last step until minor water effect is added. Time to work the brush.
As mentioned before, tomato and even rosemary, roots seem to work really well when making these bushes and shrubs. Pretty much any dried roots will work, but I preferred the tighter clusters for making the shrubs. Mini-Natur has a full line of useful vegetation for what I’m attempting here, even for the larger scale of this diorama. If it looks natural it will work. The root clusters were placed on scrap foam board for easier manipulation. Now it’s just a matter of making the bushes and shrubs look as realistic as possible.
I also tried out Super Leaf from Scenic Express. These tiny leaves are more in the 1/35th scale but I wanted to see how they would work for shrubs which would have a tighter foliage than the other bushes. I still need a bit more experience with this material, but I think these two shrubs will work well with my planned placement.
Next on the list in the sequence was the ivy crawling up the sides of the outhouse. Using some of the more open pattern dried roots I placed the skeletal frame work in the desired locations and then went back and filled in some areas with tighter root clusters. There is no easy way to make a realistic ivy vine without printing up leaves and cutting each and every one out with an Xacto knife. This is very time-consuming and tedious.
After I cut and pasted the desired leaf photos to a Word doc and printed them onto heavy paper, I painted the back sides of each sheet a dark green tone. Save a step and do it now, right? Once all the leaves are glued to the vines you still need to go back with a light green acrylic tone and touch up each exposed edge. If not, you’ll have quite a few white lines showing all throughout the structure. This too was time consuming and required a steady hand. The ivy work was close to two weeks in the making, but I just had to have that old over growth appearance.
There is still quite a bit more veggie work to do, but the major heavy lifting is done. Once all the bushes and shrubs are in place I will go through and add plant debris and more grass clusters as well as alter grass tones where needed.
More to follow and thanks for watchin. Cheers, Ski.
101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Give Blood, Play Rugby, cause everyone knows football is for wimps!
- Stikpusher
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Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
This keeps on getting better and better!
"Surely I have made my meaning plain? I intend to avenge myself upon you, Admiral. I have deprived your ship of power, and when I swing 'round, I intend to deprive you of your life."
FLSM
FLSM
- Medicman71
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Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Man that looks awesome!
Mike
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Sponsored by Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Saab, BAE, and Dassault
- tempestjohnny
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Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
That looks real too
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Leaves of three, leave it be!
To make each build less crappy than the last one. Or, put another way, "Better than the last one, not as good as the next one!"..
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Thanks, Guys, we're getting there, almost at the finish line.
Almost, Lyle, almost. These are a bit larger than poison ivy, lol.
Give Blood, Play Rugby, cause everyone knows football is for wimps!
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Unintended Consequences, or Not.
Just a heads up, I’ve run across a fluke, or unintended consequences, that can't be changed and will now become part of the narrative. The plaque has already been ordered and reads accordingly.
At this stage of the game one might panic, freak out, soil one’s drawers, or go berserk, but I pulled some heavy G’s climbing out of this mess and it looks like I got lucky with an additional useful effect completely by accident. HA!
I knew there was something up when I used Rust-Oleum Matt Varnish to secure some of the ground work. I would normally use Dull Coat, which has a much finer spray, but the Rust-Oleum was just handy at the time. I went a little too heavy on the spray leaving a beading effect on the Heki grass, but a surprising effect was created when I continued on a few days later.
I won’t reveal it now, but I’ll give you a hint, DEW. I don’t think I’ll become a hero of the creative effects world or make a mint from discovering this accidental effect, but it could prove useful for other applications, who knows. Regardless, it stays now, too late to change.
More to follow soon and thanks for watching. Cheers, Ski.
P.S. I’ll need to work the path from the tracks and wheel, and maybe even some footprints, but this shouldn’t be too difficult to adjust.
Just a heads up, I’ve run across a fluke, or unintended consequences, that can't be changed and will now become part of the narrative. The plaque has already been ordered and reads accordingly.
At this stage of the game one might panic, freak out, soil one’s drawers, or go berserk, but I pulled some heavy G’s climbing out of this mess and it looks like I got lucky with an additional useful effect completely by accident. HA!
I knew there was something up when I used Rust-Oleum Matt Varnish to secure some of the ground work. I would normally use Dull Coat, which has a much finer spray, but the Rust-Oleum was just handy at the time. I went a little too heavy on the spray leaving a beading effect on the Heki grass, but a surprising effect was created when I continued on a few days later.
I won’t reveal it now, but I’ll give you a hint, DEW. I don’t think I’ll become a hero of the creative effects world or make a mint from discovering this accidental effect, but it could prove useful for other applications, who knows. Regardless, it stays now, too late to change.
More to follow soon and thanks for watching. Cheers, Ski.
P.S. I’ll need to work the path from the tracks and wheel, and maybe even some footprints, but this shouldn’t be too difficult to adjust.
Give Blood, Play Rugby, cause everyone knows football is for wimps!
- Stikpusher
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Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
“The sun kisses the morning sky,
the birds kiss the butterflies,
The dew kisses the morning grass…”
Very interesting unintended results in your dio there both literally and figuratively.
the birds kiss the butterflies,
The dew kisses the morning grass…”
Very interesting unintended results in your dio there both literally and figuratively.
"Surely I have made my meaning plain? I intend to avenge myself upon you, Admiral. I have deprived your ship of power, and when I swing 'round, I intend to deprive you of your life."
FLSM
FLSM
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
This is just outstanding. So many details. The bottles and loafs of bread look just like the real things. Wonderful!
When the sun of culture hangs low even dwarfs throw shadows.
Re: 101st AIRBORNE AT CARENTAN, JUNE 1944
Lol. It was one of those, WT,... just happened, but became a wipe of the brow, . kinda, sorta.Stikpusher wrote: ↑Thu May 11, 2023 9:40 amVery interesting unintended results in your dio there both literally and figuratively.
Thanks, Mostrich!
Give Blood, Play Rugby, cause everyone knows football is for wimps!