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I want to do some casting for terrain I'm making but I'm having a hard time figuring out where to start. Can anyone point me to a guide and materials for the making of molds and the resins preferable to terrain?

Moving thread to P&M forum. There is loads of stuff there and also in the Articles.


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What sort of terrain bits do you want to make?

http://www.amazon.com/Moldmaking-Casting-Pourable-Starter-Kit/dp/B000QCHVC2/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1380914118&sr=8-5&keywords=oomoo

This kit is great and as entry-level as you can get. And being 50ish bucks, if you decide the whole thing is a huge PITA and you don't want to do it, you are not invested much.

This kit will do maybe 15ish small objects or maybe one medium terrain. So if you are looking to make small objects or bitz for terrain, this could be a good kit.

How large are those terrain pieces? Because casting larger pieces can get really expensive.

I use the already linked starter set but only for smaller infantery sized stuff.

I have no personal experience with terrein casting but isn't there a better alternative for larger terrain pieces than resin? You probably don't need the full detail grade that resin can provide. Maybe plaster casting?

 btldoomhammer wrote:
I have no personal experience with terrein casting but isn't there a better alternative for larger terrain pieces than resin?

Nor do I, but I've seen an interesting technique using multiple materials in a single mold. Terranscapes did a video on his Youtube channel about it, although his was a complex piece, requiring a latex glove mold and rigid mother in multiple parts. He slush cast (partial fill, rotate the mold and/or use a paintbrush to spread material over all the faces, creating a hollow shell containing all of the details) the outer faces in resin, then filled the inside (once cured) with an expanding foam (polyurethane, if memory serves, as a 2-part mix - not the canned insulation). The resin takes care of the surface finish and gives good detail retention (and is reasonably robust) while the foam provides rigidity, reduces weight (not a huge issue with resin, but still), and keeps down costs. Perhaps not an ideal beginner project, but it looks like a viable method for large pieces once you have some experience under your belt.

For smaller pieces, especially solid shapes, plaster (dental plaster is more expensive, but stronger - I've heard that a mix of plaster and cement gives similar cured properties, for less money) is a viable option. The Hirst Arts site has tons of info on casting in plaster, as well as general mold-making. For resin casting and other mold-making info, head to the Tutorials sub-forum on Dakka. Think there's a good article or two on the topic, as well, as Kilkrazy says.

Oops, thanks Killkrazy!

As for the terrain size, it varies. I want to make some more elaborate crystal formations similar to the ones from GF9:

http://www.flamesofwar.com/gf9online_store.aspx?CategoryID=13336

But I'd also like to cast some of the custom buildings I've been making so I can easily reproduce them. For example:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/544300-Scratchbuilt%20house.html

http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/544301-Scratchbuilt%20house.html

I'd also like to cast small feature pieces like tables and chairs.

The smooth on starter kit is pretty good. I found myself spending a couple hundred bucks to get a larger supply once that was gone.

I would check out Hirst arts as oadie said. I have 6 of molds from them and they are a great for terrain details. They have a few molds for furniture that you may like. I find that plaster works pretty good for these.

You could probably do the molds for one of those buildings if you designed them to be 'flat' walls.

For the most part, casting is not going to be a cost saver in most situations... The cost to make the original for the crystal, make the mold and then cast them is going to be way more than the 25$ for the GF9 kit.

Economy of scale is usually what you need, or else you are making a real original piece you need.

Start off small! Those houses may be a good choice to start with.

nkelsch wrote:
You could probably do the molds for one of those buildings if you designed them to be 'flat' walls.

For the most part, casting is not going to be a cost saver in most situations... The cost to make the original for the crystal, make the mold and then cast them is going to be way more than the 25$ for the GF9 kit.

Economy of scale is usually what you need, or else you are making a real original piece you need.

Start off small! Those houses may be a good choice to start with.

This^

The silicone alone for one of those buildings might be $40-60, or much more.

The resin would not be much cheaper (unless you buy it in bulk) but you may get ok cost effectiveness in the casting if you use plaster, but that has all of its own issues as well.

I would suggest going to youtube, and watching as many videos on resin casting, or rtv casting (room temperature vulcanizing) as you can find.

Then go to smooth on. com and watch and read all of their tutorials, and then some from brick in the yard. (yeah, that is an actual company, google them).

Casting is as much an art as a science, as there is a lot to how to make the molds to be efficient and work well with your source piece.

As pointed out, casting rarely will save you money, but it can save you time.
(I make a lot of custom bases, and then cast them so I don't have to make 100 of them....).

best of luck, and enjoy your research!

(cool buildings, btw).

The buildings can easily be cast by making a flat, one piece pour mould for each wall and roof section. I assume the inside walls are flat. If you want a texture on the inside walls, I would add that at the painting stage with fine sand.

You need a flat tray such as a small baking tray, or you could make it yourself. You glue the wall section into the middle with the inside down on the metal surface. Mix and pour the moulding compound so it completely covers the wall. When dry, it will pull off and give you a flat, one piece mould for that wall section. You need to make the mould maybe 2-3 times the thickness of the wall, for strength. You might fit more than one wall section into the baking tray.

You could design your original buildings to have mix and match wall sections so you only need make six wall pieces to get a wider variation of finished buildings.

To make your resin pieces, obviously you put the mould on a flat horizontal surface and pour the mixed resin into the top. Gravity makes the resin fill the mould and gives a nice even back (inside). There are resins that have the thickness of milk and cure hard in 30 minutes. A thin, wide piece like a wall is ideal for this technique.

That looks to me like a fairly easy starter project, though, as said above, you may use up a lot of materials for making the moulds.

Chairs and tables are a lot more complicated to mould. You would probably have to cast several pieces for each item, using two piece moulds, and the bits will be quite thin and fragile.

I can see how crystals could be done with one piece moulds. You design your master as several sections that can be cast using a similar technique to the house walls.

I would do the house project first to learn the materials.