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Scratch Tree. IMPROVED METHOD, PB FREE.


Badder

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Working on my 'Carry on regardless' diorama, I again attempted to make realistic trees. Whilst I had some success with trees in my previous diorama, Lost in France, the trees portrayed were definitely in their 'Autumn clothing', that being, in a state of undress. This was because it was simply too time consuming to place individual leaves on the twigs. Instead I settled on 'scattering' the leaves over armatures coated in PVA. The resulting hedgerows received many positive comments, but I know I'd 'chickened out', portraying an Autumn scene rather than Summer.

This time, I was determined to show trees in their Summer clothing. In the WIP I experimented with various methods of construction, but all based on the idea of using nylon monofilament fishing line as 'armatures' for the foliage. Gradually, I narrowed down the,best method for producing REALISTIC trees in the shortest time. (for the given materials)

 

Materials required:

Several twigs, suitably 'twiggy'.

Garden twine with a wire core, or any narrow gauge wire.

Basil, or mixed herbs.

PVA glue.

CA glue.

Nylon Monofilament Fishing Line. I used 6lb breaking strain Maxima.

Braided Fishing Line (optional. I used 6lb breaking strain Drennan Feeder Line)

Acrylic Varnishes (matt or gloss)

 

PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL OF THE PHOTOS WERE LOST DUE TO THE PHOTOBUCKET DEBACLE. HOWEVER, SINCE POSTING THIS TOPIC, I HAVE IMPROVED ON THE METHOD AND HAVE MADE A LARGER MORE REALISTIC TREE FOR MY DIORAMA 'EVER EVOLVING DIORAMA' AVAILABLE TO VIEW IN THE WIP SECTION. PAGE 1 WILL LIST WHICH PAGE TO VISIT TO VIEW AN IN DEPTH DESCRIPTION OF HOW I CONSTRUCTED THE TREE.

 

I SHALL POST PICS HERE AS WELL THOUGH.

 

 

THE METHOD:

 

First, select two or three suitably twiggy twigs and bind them together at their 'trunk end' using twine, or wire. I play mix and match with several twigs until I find a set which make a pleasingly shaped armature. I also add finer twigs cut from a different species of plant, just to fill out the spaces.

Alternatively, you might be lucky enough to find one suitable 'twiggy twig', like the one in the photo below, which was kindly donated by a 'gardener' who dumped it and several tonnes of its companions at an illegal fly tip.

 

PHOTO 1. A VERY TWIGGY TWIG.

 

388842DSC09287.jpg

 

I set about removing a lot of the central twigs which weren't really needed. I only needed a few as 'attachment sites' for the foliage-carrying branches which I would be making. I also added a couple of 'branches' at the bottom of the canopy as it was missing some here. These were attached by drilling out the ends of the 'branches' and inserting wooden dowels into the holes with some PVA, then drilling out holes in the trunk of the tree and inserting the dowelled branch into the holes, again with some PVA. You'll also see that I thickened up the trunk and boughs with some Miliput, but as it turns out this was nowhere near thick enough. Ultimately the trunk was made much thicker towards the end of the construction.

748765DSC09295.jpg

 

 

 

 

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Now, to the 'leafing' of the tree.

Here, I will be demonstrating the method using Nylon Monofilament, but the process is the same for Braided line. Braided line is softer, limper, more absorbent and pre-coloured (usually pale or dark green)

Wrapping the line around my index and middle fingers 10 times, I formed a loop made up of ...er...  10 loops. I then took another piece of line and using a blood knot, trapped the loops of line together. BTW nowadays I wrap the line around my fingers 15-20 times.

451127DSC09300.jpg

 

 

652908DSC09301.jpg

 

 

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I repeated this process, forming a 2nd and 3rd bunch of loops and tied the 3 together using another length of line and another blood knot (more bunches of loops can be added to achieve an even bushier look)

I pulled and teased the loops into position so that ALL the blood knots were grouped together.

I then applied CA to the knots to fix them permanently. (Optional)

418212DSC09304.jpg

 

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Using scissors I then snipped through the loops at points roughly opposite the blood knots, By cutting INDIVIDUAL bits of line at slightly different points, I was able to introduce variations in length.

415402DSC09307.jpg

 

I then heated the ends of the fishing line gently with a cig lighter as below. Here I left the line sitting at its natural angles, but sometimes I bent the two masses together and fixed them with CA so as to form just one large 'clump of twigs' rather than having two smaller clumps splayed apart.

 

639351DSC09308.jpg

 

It's optional, but extra clumps of twigs can be added to the gardener's twine, simply by twisting one length of the twine around the other and trapping the clump of twigs in between. Again CA is used to further secure the bond. The twine, with its paper outer, soaks up the CA really well and bonds strongly. Sometimes I would add two or three extra 'clumps'. In the photo below I just added one, but even one extra is effective as you will now see....

828271DSC09343.jpg

Cut, and then crinkled with a cig lighter, the above structure would support leaves 'deeper' within the canopy.

So, I placed blobs of CA on a plastic sheet, and dragged the 'twigs' through them to coat them almost fully. Then I dragged the CA'd twigs through piles of Basil to get this:

183515DSC09316.jpg

 

The above 'bunch of foliage' is the basic building block for 'leafing the tree.'

This single building block could be attached to the tree by threading the Gardener's Twine in amongst the tree armature and twisting the twine around a convenient 'branch'. A trickle of thin CA on the 'knot' further strengthened the fix. I'd also sprinkle Dil Tops over the knot, hiding it and giving the impression of moss.

But I could also join several of these building blocks together and then join this new larger bulk of foliage to the tree in one go.... dependent on the room available of course.

 

Here's a large amount of building blocks joined together ready for fixing to the tree:

798108DSC09351.jpg

Out of shot on the left are lots of 'loose ends' of twine. These were wrapped and tied around twigs nearer the centre of the tree and fixed with CA and Dil Tops. The whole structure, or parts of it could then be bent to fill the canopy.

 

I found it easiest to start at the bottom and spiralling up to the top. The advantage of using the wire-cored Gardener's Twine as the 'branch' is that it can be bent so that the foliage can be positioned precisely so as to create or fill gaps in the canopy.

215327DSC09333.jpg

 

Below, working my way up to the top of the tree...... A lot of line is visible here and although it doesn't look bad I did decide to add more foliage into some of the larger gaps.

 

250080DSC09375.jpg

 

 

From the photo above the one above, you can see that I thickened the trunk to suit the bulk of the foliage. I thickened it first with Miliput, but realised I would have had to use a whole pack of the stuff  to get the thickness I required. So, with the trunk at half thickness I decided to use latex, paper stuffing and CA.  I thought I could take a mould of a real log and use its texture, but I had no really 'barky' logs. I made do with the mould below. This was twice the diameter of the trunk and so left a hollow all the way around the inside. I stuffed the hollow with paper and doused the paper with thin CA, dribbled in from the top of the trunk. Thin CA makes latex and paper set hard and 'plastic-like'.

674639DSC09384.jpg

 

 

The next job was to make a better bark texture, which I recreated using lengths of Gardener's Twine, glued to the latex using medium CA this time.

I deliberately left the twine protruding out of the top of the trunk and twisted and wrapped this around the lower boughs of the tree, thus creating a nice 'blend' between branches and trunk. Although in truth one would have to get below the level of the diorama and look at the tree from below to see any of it.

197192DSC09387.jpg

 

Green 'Grit Paint' added to simulate moss.

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Below... the tree was sprayed with dilute PVA and then sprinkled with Dil Tops. Any nasty clumps of herbs were then cut apart with scissors or a scalpel. The foliage was then teased and repositioned to fill any unwanted gaps, or to create gaps with views through to the interior structure of the tree. In a couple of places I actually added some more branches with foliage, just to get the shape of the tree more to my liking. There's a lot of flexibility for changing the silhouette of the tree and it has in fact changed shape slightly since this photo was taken.

Finally, the tree was given several heavy coats of acrylic varnish.

148957DSC09383.jpg

TFL,

Rearguards,

Badder

Edited by Badder
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For a sense of scale, here's a shot of the tree to one side and slightly behind my 'extended' MiniArt 'Ardennes Building. (I made the entire rear of the building with plaster casts)

993664DSC09421.jpg

Bear in mind that MiniArt make their doorways too tall so a 1/35th figure would be shorter than the doors suggest.

TFL

Badder

Edited by Badder
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Update: Whilst finishing off my 'Carry on regardless' diorama, I decided to add one small bush using the same method as described above but without using the twine or a twig armature. I just used the loop of line method and snipped with scissors as normal. But then I had the idea of making the splayed line more random by heating the line gently over a candle... The result?

Well, the line buckles and goes wiggly, forming completely random but 'natural' shapes.

So the trees I made would have been even more realistic if I had heated up the line before dunking in CA and Chervil.

TFL

Badder

Edited by Badder
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  • 2 weeks later...

Cheers Badder

I love little nuggets like this!......ever since getting back into this fantastic hobby I've been looking at everything in a different light....It's a case of "how can this help me"? & "how can I use this in a diorama"? One thing that came to my wine be-fuddled mind the other evening was what can I do with the cork?(Quiet at the back there!!)......anywho,5 mins with the cheese grater & I had homemade earth coloured scatter material.....just need to find some green corks now!

Keep up the good work,

Andrew

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On ‎28‎/‎03‎/‎2016 at 8:19 PM, dreadeddrew said:

Cheers Badder

I love little nuggets like this!......ever since getting back into this fantastic hobby I've been looking at everything in a different light....It's a case of "how can this help me"? & "how can I use this in a diorama"? One thing that came to my wine be-fuddled mind the other evening was what can I do with the cork?(Quiet at the back there!!)......anywho,5 mins with the cheese grater & I had homemade earth coloured scatter material.....just need to find some green corks now!

Keep up the good work,

Andrew

I think you hit the nail on the head there... it's 'what can I make from this' not 'what do I need to make this'. Fly tips are great, especially if they are frequented by cowboy builders.

Rearguards,

Badder

Edited by Badder
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  • 2 months later...
  • 1 month later...

So the trees I made would have been even more realistic if I had heated up the line before dunking in CA and Chervil.

TFL

Badder

The trees in your diorama are not unrealistic: olive trees, willows and oleanders have straight branches. Other species like mulberry take a similar appearance if they're pruned. However it's nice to have a choice. I'll definitely try this technique when I have enough space to build a decent crib!

Edited by Bonehammer
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The trees in your diorama are not unrealistic: olive trees, willows and oleanders have straight branches. Other species like mulberry take a similar appearance if they're pruned. However it's nice to have a choice. I'll definitely try this technique when I have enough space to build a decent crib!

I thought the trees were quite realistic as they are... they are certainly more realistic than the torn sponge types, but I realised that heating the fishing line and making it kink would be even better as it would mean being able to use less line. (Crinked line fills up the bulk of the tree more effectively). I have yet to make a tree using the crinkled line method, but I did make a couple of tiny bushes and they look great.

Rearguards,

Badder

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  • 1 year later...
5 hours ago, Getunderit said:

Starting to experiment with wire trees. They do take a long time to make - the trunk and branches, Have not yet added any foliage.

I have a question. What would be a good cheap way to fill in the gaps between the wrapped wiring?

 

i0bvoEr.jpg

 

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Fantastic armatures you've made there Pete. I've had a mess around trying to make wire ones, but I find it extremely tedious and not as easy as it looks. You have the advantage of proper tools, such as a vice, so I am envious!

 

I see now that this topic featured Photobucket pics, so I will replace them. I've also adapted the method described above and have since made a large tree (13 inches high x 8 inches wide) for my 'Ever evolving diorama'. I shall post pics here.

 

As for filling your 'gaps' in the twisted wires, I'd consider wrapping strips of PVA'd paper around the trunks and boughs.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

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