Wednesday, June 3, 2009

The Hills of Mars...

I am doing a little bit of terrain work these last few days. I have finally come up with a method that I like for using pink 1/2" thick foam insulation board.

I have a hot-wire foam cutter, a cheapie I got at Hobby Lobby a couple of years back for $10, I think. That's what I am using to shape the pieces, cut smooth bevels for the hillsides, rough faces for cliff sides, that sort of thing.

I'm using spray adhesive. Sounds a little crazy, I admit, but it seems to hold like cement and doesn't eat the foam. This way I can stack multiple layers for more impressive rock outcrops and hills.

So I cut the foam to the shape I want using the hotwire. Then I glue the layers together. So far so good.

The next step is painting. I found some black latex wall paint I had leftover from a DIY project, so I used that. Painted it on the foam, let it dry. Now when I spray paint the colors on the foam, the foam doesn't dissolve away!

Finally, once the black is dry, I hit the foam with three colors of spray in at least two layers of each color. You don't have to wait for each layer to dry - I like the mixed look, it seems mroe natural.

I'll post pictures once I get some decent lighting. I tried to take a few shots tonight, but... too dark.

1 comment:

Eli Arndt said...

Have you tried gluing then cutting? This will allow your to get the same contours through your levels and reduce the amount of sanding and shaping you will need to do to bring it all together.

-Eli