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@ Beverley B/A: Thank you very much for that, I appreciate it .
As for the bases, I use a mixture of crushed bits of dried plaster of various sizes, very fine stuff goes on first followed by
bigger pieces, building it up layer by layer depending on how much detail you want.

But you can use other materials to get the same effect, For instance pet shops sell bags of fine or gritty sand, which works really well.
It's just a case of trial and error really, anyway I hope this helps.

Heres a quick update of my entry for Skalk Bloodaxe's junk pile contest.

Not sure if this is going to be my final entry, as I have another idea that I want to try.
Here is a list of bits that I used to make this piece:

Old broken toy parts
Toy digger arm
scrap plastic card
plastic tubing
Old electric cable
metal wire
circuit board parts
green stuff cables
foam board base
some old 40k parts

That is just plain excellent. The little open access hatch at the back is an inspired idea on this piece.

Looks great. Of course all junk piles need a crane...
Good job.

Thanks guys.

Its probably a good think that Skalk limited the base size, other wise I'd have built an entire scrap yard .
I'm now half way through making my second piece, an abandoned mech.

I know what you mean. With just the "select" pieces I pulled out for mine, I could have easily tripled the size...

In the beginning I didn't think i'd be able to build anything on such a small base, but I proved myself wrong,
and also discovered that I'm completely incapable of building anything simple , I just want to keep adding more detail.

Again, exactly the same thoughts went through my mind when I looked at the base I'd chosen.

And yes I kept adding things until no more would fit on in a sensible way... Now I've started painting it, I realise that an airbrush would be very useful at this point (to get into all the holes). This is going to be tricky with a paintbrush...

It makes me think of portal...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dr H wrote:
Again, exactly the same thoughts went through my mind when I looked at the base I'd chosen.

And yes I kept adding things until no more would fit on in a sensible way... Now I've started painting it, I realise that an airbrush would be very useful at this point (to get into all the holes). This is going to be tricky with a paintbrush...

nah use washes.

had to repost that pic for the sheer awesomeness.... damn... there goes my hopes and fears....argh...

there should be a law against such builds....(read :wonderful work...)

, Thanks Vik, for those words of encouragement .

And especially for you here's my other possible junk entry.

I like your work. I'm currently working on some scenery of my own and you're very inspiring.

A downed walker??? Bloody help!
Is that left arm a broken off one? Wonderful work, yet again...*grumml*

Yeah one of it's arms is broken off, or maybe someone nicked it for spare parts .
The whole thing will make more sense once it's painted, when the bodys one color (with paint chips, rust and weathering of course).

Oh...don't fear that it doesn't make sense yet, cause it does very clearly already! I think these are very good examples of scratch building...and why everybody should practice it...

Subscribed. Fantastic work here, well done

Damn hk1x1 both piles are very nice...and your in my group /cry...

The robot/mech is really cool. Someone might find that on a junkyard, fix it and enter it in a robot fighting match...kinda like the movie real steel.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0433035/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_11

Very nice.

Hah, yeah what Chelnov said - I straight away though Fighting Robot

And indeed this is also too awesome - you should be in your own category: Greater Deamon of Awesomeness

Yeah the movie Real Steal was definitely in my mind when making this, Also the Iron Giant animation was a source of inspiration too.

@ Vik: I couldn't agree more, I think everyone should give scratch building a go at least once.

@ Ruglud: Thanks, I don't think i'm good enough for my own category, but that would be a great Category name .

You are sculpting genus!

I've been casting and selling my terrain pieces for a while now, and they've been doing quite well,
but up till now I've been using a hard casting plaster, which has many drawbacks,
the main two of which are weight and durability.

So today I started casting in resin, which I have used before, but this time I'm adding a pigment to the resin in order to change the color from Ivory
to Grey.
This required a little trial and error, but has yielded some very nice results (see pics below)

I'm in the process of casting up my other piece's, and will post pics of those when their done.

Wow a carpenter too I always wanted to build my own table/workbench.

@ Theophony: Yeah me too, It's been a long time in the planning that,
but it's so much better to have a proper workbench, plus I don't get clay all over my computer .

I had a thought while looking at yon angels of death...
Wouldn't it be nice to have two variants of said angle with symmetric folded hands? For that protective decorative look whilst guarding gates and suchlike?

@ Vik: I had a similar idea, but what I might do is sculpt some new Statues, with more dynamic poses,
and just like you said, have them as symmetric opposites, so they could be facing each other, as if their guarding some entrance or gateway.

Even better

The added colour really makes all the difference. I'ld bet the lower weight helps on postage too
do you get less bubbles in the plaster?

I really love the junk pile(s) mine feels underwhelming now :(

@ OneManNoodles: Yeah the weight difference definitely helps, especially considering the postage prices over here.
As for air bubbles I get more when using the plaster, the resin casts have come out a lot cleaner with hardly any bubbles.
That's mainly due to the one piece open molds that I use, as I think bubbles can be more of a problem when using an enclosed two piece mold.

It's amazing how being grey makes the casts look more professional...

I've had very few bubble issues with my recent resin casting adventures. Depends on the resin, of course, but it's less viscous than plaster for longer and so bubbles have time to escape.

@ Dr H: I noticed that, I've also found that this grey color really helps show up the detail more, regardless of what light you may have on it,
where as light color resins tend to reflect more light off the subject, which can be a pain when trying to photograph them.