Vegetation

I like well vegetated battlefields. Having realistic looking trees and forests really enhances the visual appeal of the game. As a kid, I made trees by scrunching found lichen into balls and sticking them on some melted bits of sprue. The worked, but looked rough.

Now I have access to a wide range of flocks and bits and a bit more time to make things look good.

First is a forest, from the Architecture of War tutorial about making small forests. Nails were stuck onto a 3mm MDF base board then the ground textured, painted and flocked. A removable canopy was made by hot glueing chopped up clump foliage to another bit of 3mm MDF.

A couple of locating holes were made to fit two taller nails on the base. Now troops can be placed inside the forest.



Next up are some trees I made using some broom hairs and wire. Bend the wire into a loop, put a bunch of broom hairs along it. Attache one end to a vice and the other to a cordless electric drill and twist it up. A bit of shaping once it is done to tidy it up. Then spray with spay adhesive and rub it in  some flock. Base them up. They came out much better than I expected.

Lastly hedges. You can never have enough hedges, especially for Napoleonic battles. 10mm hedges are very economical to make. Using one green scourer you can make plenty of hedges. Cut into strips, glue to 3mm MDF based, sand and flock and a  bit of paint.

From one scourer!

The tree in the photos was also home made, some twisted wire for an armature, air drying clay, paint and some clump foliage.

I like the Autumn scatter, which makes nice flowers at this scale. A little container goes a very long way.

Now I have some places for the troops to hide behind.