GCT - Grishnakh's Custom Terrain - The design of Valhalla?

[keglo]

Originally Posted by Grishnakh

It's next in line for me to work on. Right after I finish up my swamp terrain which I should have up on the boards sometime around the first of next week if not sooner. Trees too. It's been too long since I posted anything......

Sweet! I can't wait to see the swamp and the lava tuts. Thanks you for the time you take out to show us all this awesomeness.

[Utgar-Fan]

Awsome... I can't wait!!!!!!!!!

[Utgar-Fan]

Grishnakh... are you going to make up more customs.
I'd appreciat Jungle related customs.

[HS ~ KNT]

Utgar-Fan, when you were the last person to post, it tends to be a better idea to edit your last post rather than post again.


Great customs as always Grishnak, can't wait to see that swamp!

[Utgar-Fan]

Originally Posted by HS ~ KNT

Utgar-Fan, when you were the last person to post, it tends to be a better idea to edit your last post rather than post again.


Great customs as always Grishnak, can't wait to see that swamp!

Hey the second post was a different thing, I know to edit!

[Grishnakh]

Grishnakh’s Customized Terrain - Part X - Swarm of the Marro Swamp Tiles
Part 1 - Swamp Water

The first part of this tutorial is the same as my revised sparkly water tutorial back on page 22. I've included it here both because I've recently revised it and to complete this tutorial.

Materials:
Cover Girl Boundless Color Nail Sparkle Topcoat (available at Target and most drug stores). The total cost of this container of sparkly goodness: $2.99.

Woodland Scenics: Coarse Turf - Earth - T60

One jar paint: Folk Art - 449 Olive Green (Available at Michael's Arts and Craft Stores. Cheap stuff.)

A squeeze bottle of white glue. I use good old Elmers.



The first thing you should do is to lightly wash the tops of the water and swamp tiles. This is to remove any oils from your skin or from the manufacturing process. I have found that a mild household spray cleaner works just fine.

To apply the polish first shake the polish well and then pull the cap brush out, wiping any excess off on the inside of the jar.



You should link all of the water tiles you are working on together. This will greatly speed up the process. Start in a small area and quickly work your way down the tiles, smearing the polish as you go.




You should apply the polish all of the way to the edges of the tile and you should not go back over an area too much, unless it's to spread out any large clumps of sparkles. It's best to fix this as soon as you see it rather than move onto some other tiles and then go back to it. The polish will actually melt into the plastic somewhat. If you go back over it after it's been on the tile for several seconds you'll start to hurt the glossiness of the tile. The best thing to do is to experiment on the back side of the tile until you get the hang of it.

How much polish do you use? That's totally up to you, however I would recommend you try to spread the sparkles out somewhat so that it looks like light catching on the water rather than just clumps of glue.

Next comes the swamp tiles. Same as before, lay them out linked together.



Clean them well to remove any grease.



Start at the top and start applying the nail polish.



Work your way down spreading the polish out thinly.



Some photos of the sparkly swamp water tiles. You can see the amount I spread the sparkles out. Let this dry before procceding to the next step.



Next comes the scum on the water surface and other debris in the water. Looking at this photograph of a swamp you can get a feel for what I'm attempting to duplicate.



I take it one tile at a time. Important! You will not want to add flocking to all of your tiles. Not all areas of swamp water has material floating on the surface. Therefore leave about a third of them flockless to allow the swamp water to show through.



The glue is added in a very dotted on, random pattern. This is swamp scum after all. Don't make it pretty. (And make sure you don't draw "smiley faces" as I did on a few of my tiles without noticing it. My kids, however, did.)





Dip it into the flock. Again, the flock I use is Woodland Scenics "Coarse Turf - Earth - T60".



Shake off the excess flocking by banging the tile on it's edge inside the zip lock freezer bag. I use these bags to store all of my flock in because the large opening allows me to place all of the tiles (with the exception of the 24 hex one) directly into the flock without spilling it all over the place.



This flocking is very coarse. To get it to stick into the glue simply press it down into the glue with you finger.



The tile with pond scum glued on.



Continue to glue on flocking in a haphazard manor. I would suggest that you link some of these tiles, 4 at a time, to make it go a little faster.



A photo of my tiles showing the different patterns of flocking. Think floating muck as you glue this on.



Here's the Hive's base flocked.



After all of this has thoroughly dried it's time to paint it. Turn the tiles over and rub the surface lightly against a paper towel. What this does it remove any flocking material that is not well glued down. This stuff would flake off anyway, by doing this we just help it along.



The paint I use is Folk Art - 449 Olive Green. This paint is an exact match for the color Hasbro uses for the plastic of the swamp tiles.



Using a small, old, round brush dab the paint over the top of the flocking. This accomplishes a couple of things. It makes the color of the flock match the tile and gives it a more scum color. When it dries it tends to harden the flock and make it look more scum like. It also makes the flock less "poofy" if you understand what I mean. A problem with "Coarse" flock is that it's out of scale with the other finer flock and against the figures. It just looks too big. By painting it you lower it's scale and it looks much better. This also helps seal it to the tile a little bit more as well. Try to cover most of the flock since this is supposed to look like it's wet.



Let some of the paint go out onto the tile a little bit. You can also just dab it on in other places that has no flock. The paint dries flat so it dulls down the shine of the plastic tile and looks like scum floating on the surface even more. (In fact I do this to my non-flocked swamp water tiles as well.)



Some more shots.



On to the blue water tiles. Why keep them bright blue? Lets add some scummy water to them as well. Link the tiles and paint along the edge, covering the blue as shown.



Now take some paint and thin it down with water.



Take this thinned down paint and start working the leading edge of the thicker paint, thinning it down as you go.



Next clean most of the paint out of the brush and just add some water to the leading edge of the paint, thinning it even more.



This takes some artistic talent. You can see the effect I'm shooting for below. Slimy water.



Here are some shots of my finished swamp water tiles taken from different angles and lighting.

[Grishnakh]

Grishnakh’s Customized Terrain - Part X - Swarm of the Marro Swamp Tiles
Part 2 - Swamp Marshland

In part two I'm going to discuss giving the land tiles a marshland look. I am not going to cover making the rock/sand/grass tiles that come with the game. Please reference my first tutorial back on page one of this thread to do those.

Materials:
Black acrylic paint

Woodland Scenics: Coarse Turf - Earth - T60

One jar paint: Folk Art - 449 Olive Green (Available at Michael's Arts and Craft Stores. Cheap stuff.)

A squeeze bottle of white glue. I use good old Elmers.

First up, stack all of the tiles together like this.



Using a thick, flat brush apply the thinned down, black acrylic paint wash to the edges of the tiles. (Again I cover this in my first tutorial on page 1 of this thread.)



After that dries it's time to paint the tops of the tiles. I do this to cover that ugly, unnatural green Hasbro used to paint the raised areas of the tiles with. This way when you see through the flocking it will have a more natural color. I just squirt out some paint, wet my brush and spread it over the tiles. It can hang over the edges slightly to give it a more natural appearance.



Some painted tiles.


Flocking comes next. Start squeezing glue out along the edges of the tile and then fill the insides with glue. I just use the nozzle of the glue to do all of the work. Of course you should be somewhat careful that you do not spread the glue off of the raised areas of the tile.



Dip the wet glue into the flock. Here you can see how "poofy" the coarse flock is. As with the water tiles, push it down into the wet glue with your finger.



Here I'm gluing the larger, 24 hex tiles. In this case I sprinkle the flocking on top of the tiles making sure I have paper underneath it so I can pour the excess flock back into it's ziplock bag (not shown).



Let this dry. Do not rush this, I let my tiles sit over night.

Next we paint the tiles. I use the same brush that I used to paint the edges of the tiles with.



Pour out some paint onto your palette (here I am using a plastic plate) and thin it down a little bit with water.



Try to cover most of the flock but if a little bit of brown shows through that's OK. It will add a little more interest to the the tile and look like dried dirt. Add some of this paint to the tile thick, right out of the bottle. In other areas thin it down. Since this paint is mixed into the foam of the flocking it will take a while to dry. I'll go back two hours later and still have wet paint in places. Here are some various shots of my tiles to show the amount of brown I let show through:



Here's what you are looking to achieve with the painting:



This is what you don't want. It looks too patchy and not wet enough.



That's it! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. It's been a while since I posted anything new but I hope to have a few more new things in the coming weeks including swamp vegetation and trees.

Here are the tiles in play:

[Grishnakh]

Coming Soon!

Grishnakh’s Customized Terrain - Part XI - Jungle Palm Trees

Are you tired of waiting for Hasbro to release their jungle trees? Me too. My next tutorial will outline a cheap, fast, easy way to crank out cool looking jungle palm trees.

[Onacara]

Grish....one day I am gonna have to take a ride out to the Island just to shake your hand....absolutely amazing as usual...you next one is the most anticipated one for me.

[Grishnakh]

Originally Posted by Onacara

Grish....one day I am gonna have to take a ride out to the Island just to shake your hand....absolutely amazing as usual...you next one is the most anticipated one for me.

You would be welcome anytime. I'm not sure how far away from Long Island you are but you should check out our monthly games.

http://liheroscapers.com/

We just played our first game on the new swamp terrain tonight. (I lost. Oh well, win some, loose some. The main point is that we had a blast!)

[skyknight]

Excellent post Grish...I loved that swamp. I really want the instructions on those palm trees you are going to make!!!!! That is my next goal. Those are looking extrordinary!!!!

[elf326]

AMAZING!!! Can't wait for those palm trees.