In Amongst the Undergrowth

Progress on the mini photo diorama has reached the point where I can say that it is complete - for now... when we saw it last I had just added the foliage material to the bramble/undergrowth patches and promised more scenic features to come. They did, as we shall see, but not until after I had taken a couple of test photos which led to me reconsidering two of my areas of undergrowth. I realised that the two patches in the front sections were never really going to be seen in photos and actually had the potential to be in the way causing out-of-focus blur in the foreground of images. Plain grass has now filled these areas.

Once the various smaller scenic effects were added to the undergrowth. It becomes tricky to see them in helicopter shots, so this next picture should give a better idea of the effect. I have used a combination of Peco grass tufts, Martin Welberg weed tufts, MiniNature flowers and some small leftovers of sea moss branches combined to fill in around the brambles/undergrowth areas.

Despite probably never being seen on camera, I added some extra texture around the areas where the newly added grass joined the old, an exercise in newspaper masks, hairspray and scatter material. This blends the joins (not that they are really visible) and just makes the plain grass areas have a little more interest to them. The reverse-shot shows the treatment along the edge of the grass.

You may have spotted that I have not gone to any effort to create a nice looking surround to this scene, just spraying the edge of the cat food box in grey primer when the track was painted. I really ought to at least gibe this a coat of something suitable, but I will probably refrain from any timber trim etc as this is really only a photographic tool rather than a display piece.

The next job will be to actually take some photographs...

Colin