In a past post, Realistic laser-assisted brickwalls, the building of a brick wall on foam board was exposed. In the same line, this post covers the building of a stone wall in a aproximate 1:87 scale on a 5mm thick foam board using a Acmer S1 laser cutter...
In a past post, Realistic laser-assisted brickwalls, the building of a scale brick wall on foam board was exposed. In the same line, this post covers the building of a stone wall in a aproximate 1:87 scale on a 5mm thick foam board using a Acmer S1 laser cutter.
Preparing the stone wall base
As the stones have a more marked texture than the bricks, instead of just cutting it on black foam board, I decided to do it on white drawing paper, a kind of surface with a more marked texture than the foam board.
So a piece of 60mm x 37mm of white drawing paper was glued on a 5mm thick foam board piece by using Polyvinyl Acetate (PVA) glue. In order to keep the result as flat as possible, a weight should be put on the piece until the glue has dried. If not done in that way, the resulting piece could be curved instead of flat, what is a problem when the piece must be cut.
Cutting the base
After drawing a self-made stone wall mosaic or getting a free one from Internet (as this one, used in this post), the stone wall pattern is engraved using an Acmer S1 laser cutter equipped with a 450nm 3,5W blue diode laser, using as settings a speed of 450mm/min with the laser module power set at 75% (2,6W).
With the above settings, the base is not fully cut but just the paper and the upper foam side, keeping the lower side uncut.
Then the cut paper between the stones is randomly removed, some stones are pulled whereas other are pushed from the board bottom by using a clip to give the piece a more tridimensiona effect.
Painting
Painting the stone wall is all about deciding what colors are being used, or said in other way, what kind of stones are being represented.
Depending of the geographic area, the stones can be greyish, brownish, more ochre,... Once decided the base color, subtle differences must be randomly applied from one stone to another by mixing the base color with a more clear and darker base colors and gray, mainly used for desaturation purposes. Remind to keep differences small, as no big differences in color are found among stones in the same wall.
Firstly, a grey primer base is applied. The purpose here is simulating concrete between the stones. For those modeling a dry stone wall, ie, those walls built by simply stacking stones, I recommend going for a cutting pattern with narrower spaces between stones and a black primer base.
After applying the primer base coat, a random dark gray pattern is applied to create differences on the stones and then a random diluted Vallejo plastic putty layer is applied in order to give the stones a marked 3d texture.
Depending on the stones to be represented, the putty can be applied diluted, as here, to represent more round stones, as those taken from a river side, or not diluted to represent sharper texturized stones as those coming from a quarry.
Time to apply the chosen stone color range. As shown in the above photo, different tones of a brown have been applied here.
The colors used have been Decoart Americana milk chocolate, asphaltum and slate gray. Americana paints are great for this purpose as they are thick and allow giving the stones even more texture. The paints are not applied unmixed but mixed in two or three combinations to create a wider color chart.
Once painted, a sponge soaked in a mix of the previous paints and then dried is applied to create random spots. It can also be done with a grayish green to simulate lichens on the stone, something not done here.
Finally, brown soft pastels (Koh-i-noor 8522 brown pastels set) have been applied randomly and then softened with a brush to create an even more random finish.
A diluted, light matt barnish coat has also been applied in few stones to represent some differences on their surface finish. This coat can be more intense when representing wall stones in humid areas, whereas it must be kept thin, or directly not being applied, when representing wall stones in dry areas.
The final result
The final result becomes very realistic, even more considering that it is done in an aproximate scale of 1:87.
Putting all together, some steps can be omitted, as for instance using a base of paper glued on foam board: Since there are several steps in which texture is enhanced (by using thick paint, putty or by directly pulling and pushing the stones), this step might be omitted therefore building the wall directly on black foam board.
In this latest photo, by courtesy of Mike the Playmobil, the real size of the scale stone wall can better be seen. Moreover, zooming the photo the final stone textures can be clearly seen.
Thanks for your help and inspiration, Mike!
(*) The post heading image is included by courtesy of Cathy Mü and is available on Unsplash.
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