Hey all!
Well, I have a host of 10mm Napoleonic stuff on the way... the table has been disassembled after a super top secret Civil War project (nope, not even a single photo of it!) and has been reassembled to portray the countryside of Spain, complete with some all new scenery!
Anyway, before I start in on table shots, I thought I'd show a piece of the 10mm grape vines I was making for the Spanish countryside! There are a few physical "traits" that I feel are very "Spain" and grape vines are definitely one.
I started off by cutting lengths of plastic card, and then drilling toothpick sized holes in it. I cut toothpicks down to the appropriate size, and then sanded the plastic card down, both to smooth the edges and to give it a little grit.I then sanded them and, once that was dried, gave them a good black undercoat, followed by a coat of matte varnish to help keep the sand secure.
I then went ahead and gave it brushes of a darker brown, lighter brown, and then a VERY light brown... I figured that would help with the sandy look of Spanish soil.I then painted up the wood for the stakes the vines would be on, and pulled the vines out of foliage clumps. A touch of glue, and voila! Grape vines!
I'll show more of them tomorrow when I do a little photo spread of the table undergoing its transformation from 15mm Virginia countryside to 10mm Napoleonic Spain!
8 comments:
Another beautiful piece. Your board is what inspired me to build all the terrain features into my first board.Do you think this method would work well in with bigger sticks?
I did some for my 10mm ancients. Bit of a different technique (as ours had to be robust and portable - and allow figures to enter the terrain). I used a similar technique for plantations (specifically olive groves).
http://philbancients.blogspot.com/2010/02/vineyards-making-vines.html
http://philbancients.blogspot.com/2010/02/how-to-make-plantation.html
Hey guys!
CForance, thanks much... everyone needs pictures to get ideas from... lord knows, I've stolen enough fro blogs I love!:) Glad it could help. And I would certainly think it would work with bigger sticks if you are working towards a bigger scale!
Phil, some very nice and thorough work! I like the removing each piece as you go. I flock mine into the table to hide the gaps between base and table, but I think both methods work nicely. Mine are probably not as robust as yours, but...
I am wondering if I should have used a darker flock. I had originally tried it but found that it blended in too much with the sand of the base. Now, however, a friend mentioned that they seem to blend in too much with the TABLE. It may be a case of six of one/half dozen of another. Should I do another four with a DARKER foliage and see how it works?
PLEASE! Tell me what flock do you use!
Hey man!
Actually, funny you should ask; my next post was going to be about the table and the flock!
To be honest, it isn't one kind of flock.
I started with two shakers of Woodland Scenics "Mixed Flock." I then added a a bunch of their "Coarse Turf" to give it a bit of depth. Lately I added another thing of "Fine" turf in a darker color. I lay out the roads using a lighter turf, and use small stone ballast pieces for different terrain bits. I think that it really comes together when I dustbuster it all up when switching layouts... it picks up all of the different flocks, as well as lots of pieces of ripped up bushes and stuff, so that when I join it all together it REALLY is a nice bunch of variable grade stuff, a real mess of fine and coarse grade stuff that looks very nice.
Tonight or tomorrow I'll put up the next post and try to give you a look at the turf... I thin that mixing up the fine and coarse stuff, as well as mixing in random little bits of gravel and bushes, really helps:)
Oh, and also; when you flock the table, flock it THICK. I honestly use ALL of my flock when flocking my single 6.5 x 4 foot table, and it is maybe four shakers worth of stuff!:)
Thank you for helping and advice!
I want to flock my table in generic grass :)
I've already done desert table.
Lord A, those are fantastic! They really look the business. I read the other day that wine is produced in every US state - hard to believe, perhaps, but true..
Best wishes
Giles
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