Hi Guys
I have just finishe dlistening to the Water Margin... :lol: ,
Now then lets start with the dirt and mud: After fixing the base that came with figure to the wooden base, I arranged the treeclose to the back edge of the base work, Its my favourite item for use as a tree, its real apple tree root dried in the airing cupboard, this has been fixed to the base with a aluminium pin and left to dry. The next stage, I used an ordinary household filler and applied it with a thin wooden stick, and applied it in a rough swirling motion to give the strange folds in the mud and earth, once dry, this was then painted with Andrea dark leather acrylic and left to dry, then a wash of black was put around the outer edges of the ground area and left, Once dry, the airbrush came in and a light dust coat of the leather colour was applied from the top just around the edges to give an appearance of light and dark on the sides of the groundwork.
After giving the tree a bit of a dry brushing with Valejo yellow ochre, the grass was next. I started with the standard flock grass that is available from most model shops, not the etuff on the sheet but the loose stuff in a bag, I work in small areas at a time, using superglue straight from the bottle, letting it flow over the groundwork, then I pour a load of the flock over the small area, obviously while the base is standing in a lid of a shoe box, leave it for 10 seconds then turn the base upside down and let all the excess fall into the box lid, I do this over most of the groundwork making the grass look patchy and clumpy. Then comes the grass sheet, this is available from HEKI model railway supplies, just small peices of the sheet torn off nad placed in strategic places around the base of the tree.
Next stage is the long read grass, this is normal household bristle brushes from a hardware store. when you hold the brush, bristle up in front of you, you can see the hairs of the brush are tapered from the metal ferrul to the tip. I always cut the bristles so that the thinner end is the top of the grass on the model, always cut in varying lengths, a small amount at a time and glue with superglue into the place where you want it, I always apply the glue to the base then place the grass, if it falls over or the hairs fall in all directions, just leave it and add some more in a little while, this gives a more uneven look to the long grass.
Once this is all dry, then the airbrush comes back out and using all sorts of greens and yellows and browns, I give the grass its colours, patchy colour on the level ground grass, moving up to the long grass, spraying this darker at the bottom than at the top....
The leaves are a dead bonzai tree donated by my mother, it had been sitting in her back bedroom for years and I just happen to stumble upon it while looking for some of my old MilMods. I just cut off what I need and again glue with superglue, where I want them
Well I hope this gives you a little info as to how I ended up withios piece of groundwork...
Dave
