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Painting a dakkajet and figured i'd start with the base. What i intended to do is just a grassy field with a sand pathway + some cork rocks, but then i thought it would be cool to make a portion of it the edge of a lake or river.

I tried searching, but all i find are ice, lava, or sludge tutorials...nothing on just plain water effects. Resources are limited so i'd rather avoid fancy stuff like liquid plastic or something, already have a crapton of corks, and i have all ranges of glue except stuff that need to be mixed before using it. Also have liquid greenstuff.

Would it be a bad idea to simply coat the area i want to be water in Elmer's Glue, make it look a little wavy (if possible before it settles down that is) and just paint that? or is there a better/easier tactic (or one that looks better)?

Try Solid Water, its a 2 part clear epoxy resin. You can add colour to it to make different colour water.

For example here is my Realm of Battle board, this was done with a drop of Dark angels green and Hawk Turquoise









Here is their website

http://www.deluxematerials.co.uk/pages/scenicproducts.htm

Hmm...that looks pretty damn cool.

However i have to ship via APO addresses (US Military postal service crap) so, from past experiences, ordering from any euro website takes at LEAST a month to get to me. Usually 5-6 weeks.
Tryin to avoid that lol so many days of "DAMN IT WHERES MY PACKAGE" under my belt.

I do however have normal epoxy lying around....would that work? just wouldnt be clear is all.

Might be worth just trying it on a painted bit of board.

One thing I liked about the solid water stuff was that because its semi transparent when colour is added, it gives it a real feeling of depth.

Another one to look at is Magic Water,

http://www.ngtrains.com/Pages/Scenic/magic_water.htm

I think that stuff is made in the US so should be easier to get hold of.

I use woodland scenics water effects, it works wonders and you just paint it.

Elmer's Glue (regular white PVA) was a mainstay for creating water in models and what not for decades. It was later supplanted with clear resins and now to some extent with clear acrylic (gels and liquids).

On a budget, you can get good water effects with acrylic clear coats or even just PVA. Keep in mind though, one part water based materials like acrylic and PVA are prone to shrinking and can be problematic. You can avoid it by applying several thin coats allowing time for each layer to mostly cure between applications.

Clear epoxy is also fairly inexpensive. While the specific "water" substitutes tend to be more optically clear than regular epoxy - for most water...the cheap twin tubes you find in grocery and hardware stores are clear enough to be water for ponds, lakes and rivers. A package can be had for a few dollars and provides enough to dozens of bases.

You can also get acrylic mediums which shrink less than paint varnishes and PVA glues from art stores for cheaper than the specific "water effects" and they are effectively the same material (provided you find the correct consistency). They range from very fluid to almost butter like - with the thicker materials being useful for things like sculpting waves and current eddies around rocks.

hmm i'll see if i can find any of that two-tube stuff you were talkin about, elsewise i'll just use the elmers glue. My only issue with it is that stuff takes decades to dry and tends to move during the drying