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Grubby. Internet approves!

Looking good Waaazag!

I'm sorry I haven't posted in ages. A lot was going on, including a new job (that I've since been let go of) and my father's ultimately losing battle with stage 4 bone marrow cancer. He died on the 3rd of January this year, after a nearly year long battle where he was in and out of the hospital. In the end he could neither eat nor drink without puking it all back up. He wanted to live, but there was no more hope to have. In the end he chose to starve to death. And he did so in my living room for 2 agonizing weeks. I have never known a more stubborn nor tenacious man and I hope that I have inherited even a fraction of his resilience.

Here is my latest project. I am working on a quick and easy tarmac using thin, soft foam sheets. Here I am testing to see if I can make it look worn in an easy and realistic way.


Thanks for looking. I appreciate any feedback. Thanks for being here, friends. You are a lifeline in a sea of darkness.

Sorry to hear of your loss - that's a truly awful way to go. Great part of Dakka is the community - we all have crud (some more than others...) but we can come here and get away from it for a while.

So in classic British style, chin up old chap, let's see where your experiment with the foam goes... It's a medium i'm getting very familiar with at the moment, just not for model purposes, but costume / cosplay...

 Ruglud wrote:
Sorry to hear of your loss - that's a truly awful way to go. Great part of Dakka is the community - we all have crud (some more than others...) but we can come here and get away from it for a while.

So in classic British style, chin up old chap, let's see where your experiment with the foam goes... It's a medium i'm getting very familiar with at the moment, just not for model purposes, but costume / cosplay...

Thanks, Ruglud.

Foam is looking good. RL is a beast, and this is a wonderful place to escape it. All thoughts with you and so forth.

Sorry to hear, 'boss. All the best.

Tarmac seems to work. Paint will seal the deal.

Thoughts and prayers are with you and your family, (lost Mum-in-law couple years back to that same ) echoing others here, chin up and for what it counts we are here bud.


As to the foam, looking great, I wonder how the surface would take a denting, say from a nasty spiky rock or some very coarse sand paper. Not all over just in spots to add that worn bit.

Best wishes sir.

Thanks, everyone. I really appreciate it.

@Cam: that's a good idea. I have to try that.

@Dr H: yes, the foam takes paint for this purpose pretty well. It doesn't stick exceptionally well, but it takes smudging quite nicely

@graven: thank you much

I'm so very sorry for your loss. I've seen first-hand what a prolonged battle with cancer can do, and I can empathize completely. Do not hesitate to get help if you need it. Please. Family, friends, whoever.

The material, it looks familiar. if it is the soft foam that they sell at craft stores, it is something I've been experimenting with... cutting it with a knife will be the way to make some realistic wear and tear. Lots of bevelled cuts. I have no idea how well sand paper would work. And I think it that it may need backing. I was planning on using 1/8" MDF. That way I could add a few deep potholes and such.

Yes, Red, your assumptions are correct. I've used the material without backing (or rather I glued one wooden craft stick to the back and it was enough), but now that I'm trying to make a damaged road I'm thinking I'll need more. I was thinking of using a fine grit sand paper and just gluing small sections underneath the potholes I make. The sandpaper is pre-textured (I've used it as roofing tar paper and it looks spot on) and is light weight and cheap. The foam cuts with conventional scissors if you get it thin enough. I buy 1mm thickness. It retains its flatness really well on its own - doesn't tend towards warping, you know? I'll see if I can find a picture of the other roads I made with it.


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Yeah, here they are showing 3 layers of grey paint in stages:


Then with simple road lines:


And the "ultra-sophisticated" stiffness backing:


After I glued that craft stick on I piled sheets of MDF on them to make sure the glue and sticks didn't warp them.

Speaking of MDF boards, some craft stores and most art stores (at least here in the States) have started carrying precut sheets of MDF for artists ranging in size from 4" square to as large as 48" square. They're inexpensive and perfectly shaped. I use them exclusively now.

These. I highly recommend them.


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Also, thanks for the condolences, Red.

Amazing thread, and some good advice about commenting more. It's fairly heartbreaking to post something you've worked on for ages and have tumbleweed rolling around, even if you know people have been looking. I've taken a lot of inspiration from this and will be following from now on. Thank you for posting!

I'm also really sorry to hear about your recent loss. I know there's nothing anyone can really say that will lessen the blow of something like that, but I found this a helpful way of thinking when I had a death in my own family. Either way.

Sorry for your loss, Warboss_Waaazag. My condolences.

Going to look into the pre-cut MDF boards. Thanks for the tip.

I like the road sections you're making. Looking good.

 Scarper wrote:
Amazing thread, and some good advice about commenting more. It's fairly heartbreaking to post something you've worked on for ages and have tumbleweed rolling around, even if you know people have been looking. I've taken a lot of inspiration from this and will be following from now on. Thank you for posting!

I'm also really sorry to hear about your recent loss. I know there's nothing anyone can really say that will lessen the blow of something like that, but I found this a helpful way of thinking when I had a death in my own family. Either way.

Welcome, Scarper. And thank you.

 Cleatus wrote:
Sorry for your loss, Warboss_Waaazag. My condolences.

Going to look into the pre-cut MDF boards. Thanks for the tip.

I like the road sections you're making. Looking good.

Always glad to help, Cleatus. I'll have a new update later today.

Later that day/a few days later. Meh.

I'm continuing a long term project to build a modular, dynamic city board. This part of the project is the road sections. This piece is the first of many sections that will allow players to change the level of the battlefield without having to change all if their pre-existing terrain. Essentially i take a 6"x6" square of mdf, cut a similarly sized chunk of pink foam (widely available in the states in DIY stores and now available in some art stores (such as Blicks) as blue foam sheets. Either color is fine. Anyway, I rough cut a 6"x6" square of that material and sawed in an angle of roughly the highest point to the lowest. After breathing in styrofoam dust fir 5 minutes, I realized I have no vaccuum cleaner and paused to work on other things. The rough sawed piece is white-glued to the mdf and a square if craft foam is cut. I realized too late that the foam needs to be slightly longer than 6" because the angle adds length. Le sigh. At least these sheets are cheap. After the glue dries I have to take the project outside to shave down the angle with a fine grit to make it mostly smooth. The idea is to create irregularities in the pink foam's surface to try to create a lumpy road. Updates on this project when I have them. Comments always appreciated. Thanks for looking and have an awesome day!

Now the black foam makes sense. Cool!

 inmygravenimage wrote:
Now the black foam makes sense. Cool!

Yeah, it's a cheap and easy way to get a road surface

I smoothed down the foam ramp with really fine grain sandpaper and (after breathing in enough toxic dust) got the surface smooth enough to lay the foam over with confidence it will stick. Next I pressed my finger tip into the black foam while it sat on the pink foam and anyplace I made a depression I outlined in pen. These will be the spots where I carve out the potholes.



Sorry if it's difficult to see the pen outlines. It's blue ink on black foam in bad light.


I feel like I've been working on this project in 5 minute chunks.

I used an exacto blade to perforate the outlines I made and added a few more. Then I realized I'm going to put a 1" sidewalk around the edges that will cover up some of the cooler bits. Oh well. Live and learn. It happens with every first piece in my projects. I also remembered to cut 1/8" slices off the ramp sides for the "stone walls" I'll be modelling onto the edges. And finally I measured where the sidewalks would be and then estimated where wheel ruts would happen.

For the wheel ruts I used a straight edge to mark a line and then wrapped the handle of a small file in fine sandpaper to sand the grooves in. Then I smoothed the edges with a flat bit of sandpaper.




Wall gap on one side. The other side looks virtually identical.
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The perforated sections waiting to be plucked.


And plucked they became.


Next step is to distress the roadway.
Distress level 1.


Outlining the potholes on the foam. Then after pitting them a little deeper with the tip of my knife, I sealed them with white glue.


Distress details.


Then I painted the potholes and added medium ballast to the paint. It's impossible to see it in this photo. You'll have to take my word for it.


And then distress level 2.


I painted the pot holes.


And added the first layer of grey paint to the road surface.


And it turns out the pot holes are insanely deep. Not sure what I'm going to do about that. It may not be as bad once the road surface is glued to the base material. But, hrm.


More pics when I've done more work. Thanks for looking and have awesome day!

Really interesting! IMHO I think you will get a pretty effective result from that! But I do agree... those pot holes look like real "car killers"

To be honest.... the thicknes of the "asphalt" material, looks like it would be thing enough to give a convincing look.... maybe just sprinkle some sharp sand under the pot hole areas and then put the road finish ontop..... just a thought!

Inventive use of the material though! Looks cool!!

Awesome!

I'll agree on the potholes being deep, although you could very easily keep them that way. The universe of 40k is grimdark. Even the potholes are worse than today they do have tanks driving over them after all...

Plus, I've visited a couple of places where those might be considered 'routine'

Brilliant work, looks really effective. If the depth bothers you you could just pour in some sand and drop some watered down PVA in , let it set then paint it grey like gravel, so it looks like the broken up tarmac. Or I do not know where this is bound for but you could maybe put in water effects and make it look like a puddle, I know this is on a slope but it would not look too out of place.

Potholes like that remind me of Rome, though you'd need to break the road up a lot more before it truly captures that city.

Some lovely terrain work you've got going on, looking forward to seeing it progress.

love the road work, very clever

Thanks for the feedback everyone! I wound up reapplying some sand and stones to all but one of the potholes.



Then mixed black paint with white glue and highlighted it up.


I also abraded the underside of the bottom pothole aperture. Might be difficult to see in this photo.


The depth looks a little better.


Next I sealed the edges with black craft paint.


Then plucked some tiny bits of foam and lightly painted them in grey...by whicj I mean I touched them with a paintbrush and smeered the paint with my finger tips. Coin for scale.


Coated the underside with a smooth sheeting of white glue and then weighed the thing down so it dried in place.


Next step will be to construct the sidewalks. In case you're wondering, the tiny foam fragments got glued into the deepest pothole in the road.

Thanks for looking and have an awesome day!




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Beginning with heavy cardstock (I can't remember the thickness, but it's probably 2mm) I drew some lines to mark off the sidewalk thickness and support stones for the sides. Not shown here are the lines for the individual sidewalk panels.



Then i cleaned up the left side of excess glue (which was a massive pain in the body part) and trimmed the iverhanging roadway.


Then I trimmed the first "support stone" for the ramp and sanded the edges down.


I also cut a section of brick-pattern plasticard and glued it in place. And then I did all the ither work of sanding down panels and gluing them in place. The left hand sidewalk is done.


More progress tomorrow. Thanks for looking and have awesome day!

Excellent work really coming to life.

Thanks, Cam! I'm both looking forward to and dreading the right sidewalk as I've clearly placed a challenge for myself there with that crumbled gap.

Nice experiments with the potholes.
I've swerved around holes like that in the past.

Thinking as I type; you could cut cracks into the foam around the hole(s) in places and push the (not quite cut-off) pieces into the hole, glue them in place, to show the process of how the potholes grow; from pieces breaking off the edges.

This adds to the realism and makes the holes less abrupt / seem less deep.

Maybe.

 Dr H wrote:
Nice experiments with the potholes.
I've swerved around holes like that in the past.

Thinking as I type; you could cut cracks into the foam around the hole(s) in places and push the (not quite cut-off) pieces into the hole, glue them in place, to show the process of how the potholes grow; from pieces breaking off the edges.

This adds to the realism and makes the holes less abrupt / seem less deep.

Maybe.

That's not a bad idea. This piece is more or less a prototype for other road sections to come, so this idea is worth a shot. And if it doesn't work, I won't be broken up about it.

Thanks for the suggestion, Dr H! Feedback is always welcome.

They're looking really great! The sidewalk stones are a nice bit of realism, really pull it together. Going to look fantastic when there's a whole bunch of them! Possibly a silly question, but what technique are you using to get the lovely paint finish? It's a really realistic road effect!

Also: "won't be broken up about it"? Arf...

 Scarper wrote:
They're looking really great! The sidewalk stones are a nice bit of realism, really pull it together. Going to look fantastic when there's a whole bunch of them! Possibly a silly question, but what technique are you using to get the lovely paint finish? It's a really realistic road effect!

Thanks for the feedback, Scarper! As for the paint technique, after i distress the surface with sand paper and files (I fold the sandpaper to get a really small surface area along the crease and run it more or less horizontally across the roadbed to create those lines) I use acrylic craft paint in various shades of grey and sort of drybrush, sort of smudge the colors directly onto the foam in a consistent, perpendicular to the lines fashion. The foam sort of absorbs the first few layers of paint and diffuses the color quite nicely. So long as you don't overload the brush and keep the bristles merely damp with rather than full of paint, you should be good to go. And if you find you've layered on too much paint, you can just smudge it away with your fingertip and it has a similar effect. I usually start with black craft paint mixed with a medium grey, then do a straight medium grey, then grey mixed with a touch if suede, and sometimes a light finish of suede mixed with a touch if white, depending on how weathered I want the road to look. I also use photographic reference to give me an idea where to highlight. The darker areas of this road section are just largely unpainted areas. This material is wonderful.

Also: "won't be broken up about it"? Arf...

I can never let an opportunity for a pun to go unused.