 Extra Crispy  | 26 Mar 2015 3:29 p.m. PST |
I did an experiment by flocking some left over plywood bases, then drilling holes to make 6mm forest bases. The trees are not fixed so can be moved around to accommodate troop stands or micro armor:
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| 14Bore | 26 Mar 2015 4:13 p.m. PST |
Basically that's what I do to my whole game top, but then I'm old school and just use forest green painted plywood. |
| whitejamest | 26 Mar 2015 5:34 p.m. PST |
Can I ask what trees are those? I like the look of them a lot. And the bases look great. |
| Extra Crispy | 26 Mar 2015 6:52 p.m. PST |
The trees are pretty cheap ordered off Ebay: auction |
 Yellow Admiral  | 26 Mar 2015 8:08 p.m. PST |
This is how I do all my 3D "decorative" terrain – trees, buildings, bushes, etc. I put down some kind of outline (usually a felt shape) defining the borders of the terrain piece, then decorate it with clumps of trees or buildings or bits of lichen to make it look nice. When the troops move in, the 3D stuff is moved out of the way. This can also be used to "ambush" players with terrain. Sometimes I put a particularly sturdy building on top of a felt rectangle just slightly smaller than the footprint, so when the building is moved aside the player discovers some "terrain" to slow him down (or hide in, or cower behind, or anchor a flank on…). Sometimes I like to encourage scouting. - Ix |
| CaptainDarling | 26 Mar 2015 9:51 p.m. PST |
Snap…nice basing…I base my 'cheapo' Chinese trees in fixed groups and individually…
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| Extra Crispy | 26 Mar 2015 10:11 p.m. PST |
I've got some of those same trees. Gonna try my "loose" basing and see if they stand up without being glued in place… |
| Extra Crispy | 26 Mar 2015 10:13 p.m. PST |
Oh yeah. My plan is to make cloth shapes with the same basing as the forest bases around the edge. So that cloth defines the forest area. Will probably make a prototype next week to see how the overall look is. But I would get some less square bases cut for the plywood tree bases so it looks less "gridded." |
| R1ch4rd | 26 Mar 2015 11:33 p.m. PST |
They look great, I often fund Chinas economy with the buying of 20 odd trees for a couple of quid,I think they look great and the price is hard to argue with! |
| Fish | 27 Mar 2015 2:43 a.m. PST |
Our club has generic terrain bases made from vinyl carpet IIRC. The shapes are more natural (no corners) and we've flocked them with materials that make them usable as rough (with nothing on) or woods (just add tree bases containing 1-3 trees on top of them). Separate wood stands makes it easy to accomodate models in the terrain as the trees can be moved when needed. Lovely pics in this thread but the rectangular bases don't work for me. Needs to be roundish natural shapes. |
| elsyrsyn | 27 Mar 2015 4:11 a.m. PST |
I use the same principle, but without the bases … my terrain is made of foam, so the trees get "planted" directly in the "earth." Doug |
 Doctor X | 27 Mar 2015 8:55 a.m. PST |
Do you think it'll be a pain moving trees around on the stand or will the trees pretty much stay in the stand between games? My thinking was setup time for games. If you have to plug in trees every game that could get annoying and time consuming. |
| Yellow Admiral | 27 Mar 2015 10:13 a.m. PST |
Lovely pics in this thread but the rectangular bases don't work for me. Needs to be roundish natural shapes. That's how I've done mine, but I was making bases from scratch, which adds work and takes extra time. Mark started this project using leftover squared-off bases, and I bet he slammed out that whole forest in one short sitting as a result. For my last project a couple months ago, I made winter forests by bending several bags of Woodland Scenics deciduous tree armatures into shapes and gluing them onto the corners of triangular bases (with rounded edges). These clumps of 3 trees and the cloth shapes they rest on were both decorated with pete moss stolen from the garden shed so they blended together. I later added bits of brown lichen to make winter-looking bushes around the wooded areas and give it a little "life" – the bare brown pete moss looked just a bit too dead, more like a forest fire than a winter forest…. The nice thing about having the trees in clumps:
- The trees never fall over
- It's easier to move them out of the way (3 at a time instead of 1 at a time)
- Each base can be permanently decorated with extra foresty stuff like bushes (or animals, maybe?), which either improves the look of the game, or saves setup time if you prefer "too much terrain" like I do.
I also built a bunch of individually based trees based on heavy washers so I could supplement the clumps, scatter individual trees around the farms and villages, decorate stands of woods too small for 3 trees, etc. - Ix |
| Ethanjt21 | 27 Mar 2015 10:34 a.m. PST |
I think they look awesome. Good job man. |
| Extra Crispy | 27 Mar 2015 10:57 a.m. PST |
As Yellow Admiral said this was an experiment using left overs (bases and trees). Am working out now to have a couple dozen "kidney" shaped bases made, to be paired with some ovals, circles etc. I think those bases took me 20-30 minutes to bang out over two evenings (glue down sand one night and seal, next night drybrush and glue flock). @Doctor X: The trees stay in place pretty well. So unless they need to be moved during the game they are ready to go….plus I have a place to store them as-is. |
worries about not losing his rules stuff.
