Last of the Mohicans-esque cliff terrain? -- Finished, 9/14/13

[mikedemana]

Hi everyone,

Crazy me, with a month to go before the convention, I've decided to do a major terrain piece for a French & Indian War game I'll be running at Advance the Colors, Sept. 20-22. If you're a fan of the 1992 version of "The Last of the Mohicans", you know doubt remember the climactic, clifftop battle. Well, I want to do something inspired by that -- not necessarily replicating it, though. I want it to be the centerpiece of a 3'x3' board. Oh, and yes, it has to be ready to gamed on in a month!

Anyway, here's my initial thoughts. I want to build it in 5 sections forming a rough arch shape. The two lowest sections will be on either end, followed by the two taller middle sections. In between the middle sections will be the tallest, center section. I am not a foam core cutter, so that is out as a material. Here's my first thoughts (and I'd be glad of feedback). I will buy wooden boxes from the craft store of the varying heights and use those for the base sections.

The boxes will have pine bark wood chips glued down to them to replicate the stone texture. I will stack the chips so there is a natural staircase of sorts leading from low to middle, and middle to high. The bark chips will also be glued to the sides as the cliff face. I'll probably base each box on styrene so I can brake up the boxy silhouette with irregular triangular pieces "joining" each box. A key point for storage is that the sections will be individual and placed against each other on the table top -- not actually all glued together. I can place lichen to cover up unsightly cracks.

Anyway, I am planning on spray painting the whole thing black and then dry brushing the stone surface. I'll add in trees, vegetation, etc..

So, thoughts...? Suggestions? Experience working with bark as stone? Advice on multi-piece terrain sections...? Oh, and I'll also use this as a step by step record of it, including pictures along the way.

Mike Demana

[Constable Bertrand]

  Good luck Mike. It does sound clever though.

I think you could setup the sections as a whole, then glue the wood chips on from bottom up. That way there will be a fair bit of overlap between the cliff faces to make it look more unified. That way they will fit together like a jigsaw.

Perhaps if you use a hot glue gun it will be quicker to mockup than whiteglue, and will give a tighter fit.

Cheers
Matt.

[Furt]

The http://maiwandday.blogspot.com.au/ has some excellent use of cork as rock formations.

[mikedemana]

Bottom up....I'll remember that! Thanks, Constable.

Furt, it looks like he also uses wood chips, which is what I plan to do. Speaking of plans, we've all heard the truism about no battle plan surviving contact with the enemy. Similarly, no scratch build plan of mine seems to survive unscathed with the trip to Hobby Lobby. I found "block O" shaped wood trays of different sizes for cheap. I've scaled back the number of pieces to 3 -- one middle "high" one and two lower ones on either side of it.

I cut black styrene as a base for the boxes and used tacky glue to affix them to the styrene. Drying now, pictures to follow. The middle section is two trays high, while the end sections are one tray high. After that, I'll start gluing bark chips to the sides (cliff faces) first, then the tops.

Mike Demana

[mikedemana]

Okay, here is the barest of beginnings. Here are photos of the 3 wooden tray pieces I got at the craft store. They've been tacky glued to black styrene. The middle piece is actually two trays glued on top of each other. I'm going to go with a slightly off-set alignment like show here.



And here are my cliff sides. I bought a massive bag of pine bark chips at the local DIY store (Lowe's in the U.S.). This is about 20 times as much as I need, but was the smallest bag at less than $5. I've sorted out likely pieces and have them drying in the sun outside on a table. The texture of the bark chips looks like it will make good cliff scenery. Once dry, I will tacky glue (I've decided -- I don't own a hot glue gun and worry about the learning curve using one on my deadline...!) them to the sides and tops.

More to come!

Mike Demana

[Captain Blood]

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=12619.0

I used cork bark for mine.

[Dewbakuk]

I'm always jealous of the wood chips in the US. Over here our wood chip bags from DIY stores are full of random rubbish bark that's of no use for scenery. If you do try and buy pine chips it's either tiny stuff for terrariums or small pieces (around 30mm) if you find a supplier of pine nuggets. The good big stuff does exist but it's only really used for community playgrounds etc so is only available in builders style bags for around £100

[FramFramson]

Clearly this means you should be out there raiding community playgrounds. 

[Dewbakuk]

I may have picked up the odd piece
Should they ever give one a new covering when I'm around, it will be raided! The issue with the established ones is the amount of rain we have.

[Goosegog]

Once dry, I will tacky glue (I've decided -- I don't own a hot glue gun and worry about the learning curve using one on my deadline...!) them to the sides and tops.

More to come!

Mike Demana

I'd get a hot glue gun if you can. There is no real leaning curve and it will give a better bond than tacky glue. I've only had mine for about 18 months and one of the best purchases I've ever made.

Look forward to seeing this project unfold.

PS the only learning curve with a hot glue gun is how to avoid burning your fingers.

[mikedemana]

And here's the next update...



Since the three pieces are eight sided, I had to take my time when gluing on the pine bark to the sides to represent the cliff faces. I'm being a cheap skate and haven't gone out and bought a glue gun yet, despite what is doubtless the correct recommendation to do so. The tacky glue sticks quick enough and I didn't have any incidents with pieces of bark falling off after being glued down.

I glued each flat side (one of eight) one at a time. Then I would prop up the piece so what I just glued was laying flat. I would do all three pieces consecutively, wait a couple hours for it to dry, then do the adjacent face. So, although it only takes a few minutes to select the bark pieces to use and glue them down, there is a long wait period. After gluing the pieces down, I take the bottle of tacky glue and liberally cover any part of that face without a piece of bark. I then poured Woodland Scenics coarse ballast over the glue to eventually represent dirt and vegetation seams between the exposed rock. You can see it in the pictures as bright tannish colored gravel. It will eventually be covered by sand and then flocking.



When selecting which bark chips to use, I took a few minutes to play jigsaw puzzle and find ones that kind of fit together. I would trim pieces with wire cutters as that would give a more realistic natural jagged line, rather than a straight cut. I am liking how it is looking, so far.

Next step: Pine bark on the flat top surfaces. As always, any comments or suggestions greatly appreciated!

Mike Demana

[Eric the Shed]

Hi Mike

Great topic - and stuff is looking great so far...just slightly concerned that it all looks a bit too uniform. Might be better to break up some of the bigger bits.

Now if my geology is right you need to ensure the rock striations all follow the same direction. Plopping bark on top horizontally would create a weird affect..

Thoughts...

[pacarat]

Hi Mike

Great topic - and stuff is looking great so far...just slightly concerned that it all looks a bit too uniform. Might be better to break up some of the bigger bits.

Now if my geology is right you need to ensure the rock striations all follow the same direction. Plopping bark on top horizontally would create a weird affect..

Thoughts...

Nice idea and start. Hot glue gun is really the way to go. No wait time at all for it to "dry" -it  sets up in less than a minute. Basically all it has to do is cool down and it's stuck.

Agree on the striation comment - most exposed surfaces will follow a general direction - the strata is formed by deposits, compression, etc., etc. over bazillions of years. Upheavals will give you the odd change in direction or shape.

One suggestion, (I have seen this done and it works well) is to cut your pieces in half (top to bottom, or orthogonal to the "grain". If look at your pic of the bark pieces, the cuts would be vertical, looking straight down on / into the table.

Stack the pieces, with the smooth cut edge up against the hex trays. Then all the thin ridges are exposed and will look like the strata you see IRL. The bark can be split along the grain (use a chisel), if you need to fit thicker pieces next to thinner ones. Final step is to fill in gaps with bits and pieces as necessary, and camouflage with ballast and/or assorted greenery.

You could also cut the pieces in thirds, and use the two outer pieces as rock/cliff edges. More work, but you can get more coverage with same amount of material. This is what I plan to do with my rope bridge end pieces/abutments.

HTH...

[mikedemana]

Thanks for the suggestions and comments! I'm shooting to replicate cliffs in my state (Ohio). So, we're looking at shale as the likely stone. My friend is a big hiker and bicyclist so sent me pics of some shale cliff gorges in Ohio. It has a less regular pattern than you would see from standard erosion or weathering. I've got most of the top pieces glued on and will post another pic when they're done and ready to be primed.

Mike Demana

[mikedemana]

So, the first couple weeks of school have kept me pretty busy, so my work on these has been less steady. Here are shots with the three sections black primed. Tonight, I will do a "wetbrush" first coating of dark gray and dark brown in different sections. Lighter dry brushing of gray and brown to tan tones will follow, hopefully over the weekend.

As always, comments and suggestions gratefully appreciated...


The smallest of the three sections


The mid-sized section



Mike Demana
The tallest (center) section