Make HILLS that ROCK! Wargaming Terrain Tutorial

hey there everybody so I made this set of double-sided stackable rocks a few weeks ago to use for tabletop wargaming and I would like to have more of them plus I got a request for a tutorial on how to make these so here it is I'm going to try and describe my sculpting techniques as best I can I used a two inch thick foam sheets for this project I realized that those aren't available in a lot of countries but hopefully the techniques can be carried over and repurposed I get this stuff in four foot by eight foot sheets in Big Box hardware stores foam sheets are expensive so I always try and find one that's damaged and then I ask for a discount for our purposes the damage doesn't really matter and frankly I cut these sheets up in the parking lot anyway so I can fit them in my car also please do not damage a perfectly good piece of foam that's the stock boy's job right there you let the stock boys take care of that and then you can take the damaged inventory off the store's hands I've done that a few times now sometimes I have to check a few hardware stores before I find a damaged piece so as you can see this is a partially used piece of foam it's already got some great texturing on the one side I'm going to divide this up into smaller pieces varying in size from say a forearms length to a hands breath or to keep it simple two small pieces for every big piece one of the mistakes I made with the first set of these rocks was making each piece a similar size and I felt that was kind of limiting I wanted this set to have more modularity to it [Music] after tracing out the basic shape of the Rocks I used my trusty fiberware knife to stab cut some jagged lines watch out for those fingers after two passes with the knife I used a 2x4 to get some leverage and snap those suckers off foreign you wouldn't really have to do too much more texturing to the sides but those flat sides have got to go at this point I had about 10 slabs to work with but I did end up cutting a few of those in half I don't really have an order that I do these sculpting steps in but for the sake of this video the first thing I do is choose the top side and I start carving out some v-shaped cracks it's kind of like connecting the dots I connect the crack lines to the edges where I imagine the rock would have a natural break sometimes you have to actually create that natural break we're a mask by the way sometimes the cracks meet up in the center sometimes the cracks are narrow sometimes they're wide variety is key here is what I'm trying to say you can extend the cracks down the sides of the foam as well by pushing the blunt edge of the knife in and wiggling it back and forth this creates the look of like a deeper crack I'm going to be talking about cracks a lot here so it was pretty hard to write the script for this video without sounding dirty in addition to building those cracked paths I like to make shallow Cuts just below the top of the edge of the foam and then peel portions of that foam away that gives it the appearance of layered rocks I like doing that around the spots where the cracks meet the edges and then also I'll just go around the perimeter and just pick out spots usually where there's like a pointed Edge that's a good spot to pull off a layer of rock to add that layered Rock effect while I'm doing all this I'm trying to maintain an overall flat surface on the tops for The Minis to stand on and once one side is done I flip the foam and do the same thing to the other side I try to use a different pattern of cracks on the opposite side so that there's a little bit more variety another technique that I use a lot to create a layered Rock effect is this I cut a very sharp and Jagged line on the top side of the foam and I peel some of that away this is similar to what I do around the edges and I often use these two techniques together these Sharp Cuts should all be made from the same direction just imagine slabs of rock sitting on top of each other [Music] after I'm done texturing both sides of the foam I clean up the edges [Music] this section was cut out with a hot wire cutter for a previous project giving it that very distinct wavy pattern that you get with a hot wire cutter I don't want that pattern for this set of rock so I'm cutting out some bits here to kind of hide that shape when you break foam apart you get these loose beads you'll see them all over the place to me those beads really give away that this is foam so to get rid of them I use my thumb and I just kind of rub in a downward motion to peel them off this area was a little too flat so I added some texture [Music] this crisscross technique is great for creating a layered Brock appearance it's pretty effective but I like to use it sparingly and when I'm cutting the crisscross pattern I try and match the angles of any of the cuts on the tops and the bottoms of the foam the goal here is to create a cohesive layered Rock effect throughout the entire piece and that's one of the reasons I'm using it sparingly here because the tops might not always match the bottoms foreign [Music] also as I'm doing this I try to collect as many of the scraps as possible you'll see how many scraps I get from this project later on it's a pretty decent amount I didn't leave any clean edges on any of these pieces adding texture to the size allows for more options when you're combining pieces on the battle map just a few more quick notes about my texturing process I use a rock to blend in the remaining smooth areas and give them a bit more texture using a smooth Rock helps to avoid creating any unnaturally straight edges and here's another example of me using the blunt edge of the knife to cut out some cracks this whole process takes me about 30 minutes for the smaller rocks and upwards of an hour maybe even an hour and a half for the larger ones it's very time consuming and it's also pretty hard on the wrists so I like to do maybe four rocks at a time Max the sculpting is by far the most time consuming part of this but I think it's well worth it onto the painting process for the first layer I'm using a mixture of water Mod Podge black and white paint and black leather dye I'm just trying to use up some of my leather dye here I have quite a bit but you could use any black ink or even just black paint would probably be fine as long as you mix it with Mod Podge this is just a base coat to hide and protect the foam it should be about the consistency of syrup it's hard to get full coverage but I at least try and get full coverage with this layer then I set them up on an angle to dry for at least 12 hours do this in a well ventilated area foreign next I added some white paint and Mod Podge to the first mixture to get a lighter mid-tone gray I apply a thin coat of this and again I'm still trying to get full coverage so this step is optional because I know what a pain grout is to work with over a large piece of cardboard I'm sprinkling grout on top of this layer and blending it in with the paint by hand and you should definitely wear a mask and gloves for this this is sanded grout by the way groud comes in many colors I'm using a tan color for this on the first batch of the Rocks I really let the color of the grout show through but on these rocks I'm working it into the paint a little more because I want this set of rocks to be pretty gray and I'm mostly just adding it for the texture here I did do a little bit of color blending but not nearly as much as I did with the first batch foreign now doesn't that look nice see how the base coat shows through in some spots the addition of the grout creates this look of dirt and gravel and the cracks and crevices I think it really enhances the texture and obviously there are other ways you could achieve this but this is just how I do it the grout really soaks up the moisture so this layer will be pretty dry right off the bat but I still like to let these sit for at least a few hours to dry next we're going to mix up some paint and Mod Podge to make a lighter gray give the entire Rock a dry brushing using vertical Strokes on the edges and circular Strokes on the top and after that's dry we're just going to use white paint and Mod Podge dry brushing again just catching the edges this time using circular strokes and very light pressure just a hair and some air as a Bob Ross would say [Music] you could probably stop here if you want but I wanted this set to be darker so I mixed up a wash this was kind of like a really thinned down version of the first layer water Mod Podge dye paint and a bit of wood glue if you want your wash to have a bit more staying power just add some glue I almost forgot to throw on some gloves for this [Music] here's a comparison with and without the wash I like them both honestly [Music] I used a paper towel to wipe off some of the excess wash I laid these out on an angle to dry and I flipped them every 15 minutes or so to make sure that there was no pooling once I was sure the wash had settled on both sides I let the rock slabs dry overnight at this point I applied a matte clear finish I'd suggest doing two Thin coats of this one side at a time and make sure that that's good and dry before flipping the slabs I ended up having some spots for the varnish pulled because I sprayed too much on it wasn't too bad to repair though and here's the scrap foam that I got from this set I don't like to throw these away so I'm going to save them for some future projects now despite trying to get full coverage you're probably still going to have a few spots where the mat spray finds some exposed foam to eat just go in with some Mod Podge black paint and a small Brush and Clean those areas up and that's how I make a modular double-sided rocks I made some small one inch rocks for this set as well which I think really add to the playability of this set laying a few around the edges of the two inch foam prevents models from hiding just over the edges which seems to happen a lot since this set is gray it's going to go with almost any battle map especially with the incorporation of a little bit of atmospheric lighting for the first set I used to more a brownish color scheme and here they are side by side I think they both look good that just gives you an idea of what a brown version would look like maybe I'll expand that set someday too I built up a little mountain in the center of the map here as you can see this set has a lot of flexibility here are a few pictures of these rocks with a different lighting options [Music] if you want to see more builds like this I would appreciate it if you would like and subscribe I do tabletop terrain battle reports and reviews thank you for watching my video I hope you have a good day and I will see you later

Channel: Haunts' Wargaming

Views: 249,091

Keywords: Wargaming Terrain, 40k terrain, diy terrain, dnd terrain, rock terrain, stackable rocks, hills wargaming, rocky hills, modular rocks, modular hills, how to carve rocks, cliff terrain, mountain terrain, Easy tabletop terrain, terrain ideas, age of sigmar, dnd one, d&d one, dungeon terrain, background terrain, vertical terrain, terrain set, grey rocks, Sculpting Foam Rocks, No Hot Wire Cutter, Natural looking rocks, Stone, Stone Slabs, Rock Slabs, Modular, Hills, Mountain

Id: qg3nzWJ1x0g

Length: 12min 30sec (750 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 05 2023