Finding a way to come out with an inexpensive way of creating diobases for my photoshots, I came across organic material that has the same effect in photography and display.
Years ago when my budget permits, I would buy Warhammer flock and debris packages for the dioramas which were more suited for my original 1/72 lines. This however is not cost effective for the 1:18 line, which utilizes much larger space and more material.
I looked at my kid's tiled playmats as a recyclable diorama piece, and since having a lot of them, prepainted them with basic acrylic paint as a base.
Then using the same residue from the paint, thinned it to a paint solution and mixed it with sawdust and other tiny organic debris, creating homogeneous mass that can be applied to the base material.
Initially i used glue to place in the flock, then found out its more cost effective to use woodglue instead. A canister of woodglue cost less that two to three artcraft glue here in my part of the globe.
I create different pigments, by thinning out water color or even poster color into a liquid solution. The material being near powder in nature soaks it up, making several sets of colored material possible. Its possible to have beach sand, yellow ground, red soil, green flock and brown sand made as pigment soil.
Experimenting on application techniques, the pigment soil can be applied wet to make a thicker flock base with a leveled elevation or sundried to powder, making a thinner surface with flock. You can use a plastic tool as an applicator, in my case I use my hand instead, just to make sure it applied evenly. The wet technique is best for the green grass surface, pressing it down to the glued surface, and in some cases a 2nd and 3rd application to build mounds of material. The dry technique just needs the powdered pigment applied to the surface and brushes to areas or shaked into place. Remaining pigment soil can be brushed away after the glue dries, where a 2nd application can be made or the residue reused again.
The results look well in diorama shots:
I find it better not to completely cover the tiled platforms with the pigment soil, instead leave some of the base material left to give it a natural elevated feel. I am still looking for a final matte spray to keep the material in place, since these things suffer tear, however i am not in a hurry since the cost of creating the material is cheap and can be easily be repaired.
I hope this helps. I am a big fan for diorama terrain and builds sold online, and it occurred to me, it is really expensive to create large surfaces of our chosen scale. Thus employing the playmats, i can easily interchange dioramas as needed, creating new terrain and spaces for a fraction of the cost.
Happy viewing!
