In part two of the rapid terrain board build, I have some images of how I tried to make some swamp style trees with the few materials on hand, and in the shortest amount of time possible!
These terrain pieces would be very important for Bolt Action, and they would serve a further function... covering seams between boards!
I cut some pieces of the thin pink foam to create the "area terrain" of the forest, as this line needs to be defined for game purposes. However, I wanted it to match the floor of the forest, so that it would not be obtrusive to the eye.
You can see the wood glue, the sand and gravel, etc. along with a few tree branches that we gathered from outside. I shaved down the base of the tree into a point, which was speared into the foam. Rocks and gravel were added to make the texture.
This variety pack from a craft store was perfect, with all kinds of reeds, and most importantly moss!!
The moss was added to the branch with wood glue and the spray too.
The spray glue proved to be vital to the process. This would allow me to add all kinds of great color and texture to the moss, which is not very tree like, and some of the colors would not match what we wanted either.
As I added the reeds and bushes to the board, I could add the flock on top of the moss, which would make it look more realistic for the little time invested!
You can see how just a few tree stands and some scattered bushes make this board look much more 3 dimensional, and also give you minis plenty of things to hid behind, and rough terrain for vehicles to struggle through.
For now, the water mill dominates the landscape.
The original plan was to have a Wild West shanty town around this mill, but this will soon be taken over by Eastern Front villages and other marshland areas in France/Belgium... Russian and even England! Sea Lion here we come ;-)
These views give a sense of how the tree stands can be moved around from game to game, and also cover those seams.
In this image, you can see the process of the swamp tree develop, starting with the application of the glue and moss. I took the strands of dried moss and soaked them in glue/water for a while, and then hung them from the batches of sponge moss.
This was sprayed with the 3M glue, and further layers of flock and foliage added over the top to blend these textures together. I sprayed the base, and added more flock there to match the board itself.
I painted in a trail leading to the island in the center, because the original intent was to have a structure there. We may still do this at some point in the future, but that will wait until after we have done many games of Bolt Action first!
Stay tuned, because we still have to show those water effects!!
