"Woodland / Terrain Dioramas" Topic

I've been gaming with single trees, rocks, bushes, etc. for many years.

Lately I've been dabbling in Ancient wargaming -- 28mm. It seems there's a lot of terrain in the Ancients rules where troops will never pass. Indeed it is classed as 'impassible' in some rules.

It seems to me that one could do some very nice mini woodland dioramas for this kind of gaming. I guess you could use something like a CD for a base, or use a base sized to the dimensions of the blocking terrain.

Does anyone do something like this? Any tips?

OR

Do you think this approach would be a waste of resources and too hard to store?

Certainly interested in hearing from those with experience.

mjc

I've got many trees based on old CDs. Also have some bases of rocky bits. If I need a larger area delineated then I set a couple of CDs with trees on a piece of felt.

No harder to store than other trees.

And you can add nice forest floor details; rocks, fallen tree trunks patches of bracken etc.

Currently, I use felt pieces to denote areas of woods in the marbled green color that is a close enough match to my gaming mat to not look odd. On top of these I place trees, bushes, and fallen trees (sticks really).

It works, but I am also currently looking for something else to make them appear a little more like actual forests. I want to keep with something flexible so the woods templates can conform to contours, which is one of the things I really like about them, plus it's easy to store.

I am considering just taking my felt woods templates and just snazzing them up.

I recently made some felt roads and then textured them with textured spray paint (Fleckstone IIRC-just hang them from the laundry line outside and spray paint them). It gave them a very nice look and kept their flexibility and ease of storage-though it did make them a little stiffer than I would like.

I am thinking of trying the same thing with the felt woods templates and then adding flock in patches, and around the perimeter adding a border of static grass to match the table so it will blend in a little better. I hope to make them look more like a forest floor on which I plan to place trees, rocks, bushes, and other clutter as I do now. I am thinking this will keep the things I like about felt, the ability to shape itself to contours, and ease of storage, yet with a more realistic look.

I haven't tried it yet though. If the felt doesn't work out, I plan to use the flexible PVC tub liner I have which also takes paint and texture very well still lies flat and stores easily.

CDs and wooden bases are nice because, like you said, they can be made into some really nice diorama type scenic pieces. The thing I don't like about them though is that it makes them stand out too much from the table and they can't be placed as easily on hills and other contours.

So I am not sure myself. I think there are good points about both methods.

"I recently made some felt roads and then textured them with textured spray paint (Fleckstone IIRC-just hang them from the laundry line outside and spray paint them). It gave them a very nice look and kept their flexibility and ease of storage-though it did make them a little stiffer than I would like."

This is a great idea. I spray this stuff on my tree bases -- really looks good.

I like my roads just fine (made of canvas and caulking/maestic) but if I starting over I would definitely try this -- much easier than spreading caulking with a putty knife. Using a coarse weave burlap rather than felt would make the roads tougher and the paint would likely adhere better but . . . hey, maybe the felt is 'tough enough'!

mjc

Give it a try. So far, I like it, and it is really easy and fast to do while looking pretty good.

Though, I have found that storing them rolled up will make them curl a lot when you try to roll them back out, and it can be tricky to get them to lay flat again…though I have also found that when using a static grass gaming mat, that the felt does a great job of sticking like velcro to the grass mat which keeps them in place really well. So this mitigates some of the curling. Because of this velcro effect, I would suggest just spraying them on one side.

One downside is that the felt roads won't take static grass or flock very well if you glue it with a glue that isn't flexible. Not sure of a solution to this yet, so my roads stay bare for now.

I use felt roads "as is". Sand coloured felt and used a green marker pen to colour in the verges and a middle grass effect line. Doesn't affect the flexibility at all and looks reasonable.

quidveritas and others,

I use sheets of vinyl floor covering (white waffle underside) for roads, rivers, forest, hills, rough ground, etc. It takes acrylic paint well and with white glue, I can cover areas with electrostatic grass. Any Floor Cover dealer should have scraps that you can purchase for a soft price or have for free.

Tip: tape the underside of rivers and roads together with masking tape. The entire length of road or river section will lay flat.

All my trees are based to triplex wood (1.2mm thick) and covered with flock. These can be moved about as troops enter the woods or used as a backdrop.

I also glue my farms and other buildings with hedges and trees to vinyl tiles. This saves my building needless handling and all in all, the entire table takes minutes to layout.

River: picture

Roadway and woods: picture

Farm: picture

Cheers,
Robert
18thcenturysojourn.blogspot.com

matakishi.com/fiwtable2.htm

I use CD for some 40mm Trees I am building. I do recommend that you use bases with holes to stick the trees into. Makes storage easy.
VR
James Mattes

Here are a few links to terrain I have created that is done on small bases so it can be arranged on a larger grassed base, the object being that small bases can be moved out of the way of large units of troops passing through and then reconfigured without loosing the "where" the edge of the woods or rough ground etc is.

Forest brush
link

River Edge items
link

Tall Pine Trees
link

Very nice Alfrik. I liked the tall pines. I was looking for a Clint Eastwood singing among them.

Question: Where did you buy the leafy pieces for the forest brush?

cheers,
Robert

link

Is how I make my forests, the dimensions when the 3 pieces are together is about 22cm x 26cm.

Cheers,

Glynn
Fernvale Specialty Scenics

"I love the smell of resin in the morning." ~ Apolyester Now!

Procopius,

What do you use as a base material?

mjc

The originals are made from DAS clay, then moulded, and cast in polyurethane resin.

Cheers,

Glynn

All forest leafy brush material is from plastic plants purchased from Micheals and JoAnns, I always do a walk thru those shops looking for the off season sale of plants when they are setting up the next seasons. You can get quiet a lot of plants for very cheap and use what you want.

Grab SNAPDRAGON's tree bases before he basically ceases trading in Nov! Really nice resin dioramas to build your wire core trees onto

I have a friend who is a florist and she gave me a few freebies recently…a green mat about 8 by 11" that is used as groundwork in floral arrangements. looks very real like dirt with grass tufts ,dense, about 8-10mm in height. the whole thing is easy to cut to shape and provides a nice top-down view of forest…yet can still move stands of minis through it

Mate of mine at my local wargames club uses old CD as bases for Trees etc
heres a link to his blog with some pics of them in use

scottyswargaming.blogspot.com

Hi quidveritas, please see the link to my blog, I've done something very similar to what you were asking about, I still have to finish of the big woods, but the are some smaller ones, have a look through the posts from this March. They are made for use with 10/15mm figures, but I'm sure the principle could be scaled up to fit with 28mm figures.

link

all the best

Airhead

I really like those woods, Airhead. Do you have a pic with the greenery on the top?

Cheers, Simon

Hi Simon, working on them at the mo, hope to have them finished christmas!! Life permitting. Check out the smaller woods on the single CD base, they are finished and the greenery effect will be the same just a lot bigger in size.

Love your blog by the way, one of my regular visiting places.

Regards

Airhead

Thanks re Blog, Airhead.

I have some resin 28mm woods that do a similar job to yours, but having seen yours, I really should try to emulate them, they look much better.

Cheers,

Simon