Tip: Icycles can add to a mountain pass or a snow fortress. You just put water effects on a piece of wire at a 45 degree angle. Let it drip down and hang from the wire. When dry pluck it off and you have a cool icycle to add to your terrain. Be sure to have newspaper under it to catch what drops off.

 

A river, swamp, or lake is the same way. You just start off with darker blue and go to light blue or blue green.  

 

You can use Water Effects for lava rivers and lava falls also. The trick to this is simple. Lava is molten rock, so it has a thin crust of black on some parts. Some will flow and some will harden in mid stream of a lava flow. 1. Get your hands on some lava rock. Place in plastic bag. Wrap with old towel, then beat it with a hammer. 2. Pour the Water Effects on without the lid. a good 1/4" thick river of lava or lava flow. 3. Place the lava rock in different places around in the flow. 3. Use a stick to direct the flow around the rocks or down the falls. 4. Let it dry over night. 5. Use the fine powder in what is left of the plastic bag to put on the crusty black patches of lava. PVA or Elmers glue will work fine. Mix the powdered rock with the glue. 6. Make little patches of triangle and odd square places on top of the flow where it is calm or smooth. Let dry. & 7. Paint orange, burnt orange, and black, but leave a little natural lava rock showing. 

1. Design your pattern on the computer with MSPAINT or some simular program. Keep all pieces of color below 1/4" for 25mm or 30mm figures. Also keep in mind the shape of the window.

2. Print in black and white to check the size, and either increase or decrease accordingly.

3. Print the final result on transparency paper in color, and cut out your stained glass windows.

 

I did this for a customer- He got it from the movie "WILLOW".

 

Take the character you wish to be frozen. Paint it up.

 

1. Get fiber glass resin and hardener.

2. Take a soda can and make it a crinkled up square.

3. Place the character with no base in the can standing up.

4. Mix up the fiber glass resin real well with hardener.

5. Let it dry.

6. Peel away the can.

 

You will have a character that is in a block of ice. 

Note: You can cut the resin with a razor knife before it hardens all the way. Once it is all hardened you can't do much with it.

 

 

 

 

 

This cork board is great stuff. It can be used to make a piece of terrain look like dirt. Get the 1/8" sheet of cork. 1. cut to fit the floor of a house. 2. prime when you prime the whole model. 3. paint a shade of light brown and highlight the high trafic areas of the house with a lighter shade of brown. It makes a great dirt floor for a simple house or ruin.

 

This is where I come in. I make all sorts of accents for models. You can order pieces from any of my lines of furniture. It makes a model house look lived in when you add the details to it. To place these items you just need to imagine yourself being there. Where would you want a table or a barrel? Use a little commen sense and place the details in places that would not be in your way. EXAMPLE: ( A table would be in the way in the middle of a room unless it is a large room. So place it by a wall. ) This way your model characters can move about to shoot from a window.

 

Some models may need to look a little fancier than the others. This will work for wood or concrete designs.

1. Take a piece of thin card and make your design with a pencil. Push down hard to make a indention in the card ( A simple cross hatch will work such as this ////// or this \\\\\\ )

2. When you have the entire card covered in the design spray both sides with clear spray paint. Be sure you let it dry well.

3.Cut out the strips of your design. If some curl, straiten them and place in a thick book for a while.

4. Glue in place on your model, and cut to fit the pieces.

5. Now you paint it, then dry brush with a lighter shade. You may have to dry brush several times getting lighter each time. 

 

 

If you need to fill in some gaps try Elmers glue with baby powder mixed in. It can be as thick or as thin as you need it depending on the mix. I make it about like toothpaste and use a piece of card to smooth it on where I need it.

 

Caulk can be a good filler as well, but it tends to be glossy after you paint it. I try to use Red Devil quick dry spackle for much of my terrain filler, and it does paint up well. The finish is a flat finish like most of the other parts of a terrain model. It also works good for snow models. You just have to play with it a little to see what is possible.

 

Take a 1 quart pan or bowl. Make a basic terrain piece around it.

 

1. Put a 1 x 4 plank all the way around your game table.

2. Place the bowl you made in the center.

3. Add water to the bowl or pan.

4. Drop in chunks of dry ice.

5. Watch the fog or smoke fill the table.

 

The 1 x 4 will stop the fog/smoke from going off the table. It is heavier than air so it will fill the whole table top. Dry ice can be purchased at ice cream shops, and if you have a Randall's food market they also have it.

 

Have fun...

 

There are many products on the market for snow scenes. Almost any of them work well. In a pinch Arm & Hammer baking soda works well mixed with PVA or Elmers glue. Also baby powder works well mixed with glue. Make the snow drifts with a mixture about like tooth paste. Then use it with a spray adhesive to coat any rocks trees or baren terrain. Also hair spray works to make it stick to terrain. Play with it till you get the result you want. 

 

 

With this you can start to build the pieces and build yourself a model.