Cobblestone help

[robofreak]

I'm working on a couple of figures that are within the 1/10-1/8 scale range and I want to make the groundwork for their bases look like cobblestone. The problem is that I can find anything on the net where anyone has actually tried to do cobblestone. I know you can buy resin cobblestone streets, but those won't do me a whole lot of good since I'm using those small wood bases from Michaels.

Has anyone here tried building cobblestone or knows of something that would work?

[FichtenFoo]

Easy peasy man! First off, check out my lighthouse. Also check out my road work for my Type 61 that's now in-progress.

http://fichtenfoo.net/blog/tag/lighthouse-standoff/

While there's obvious differences between a street and structure, the technique is the same. For a cobblestone street, you'll first want to pour some Plaster of Paris onto your base or into a square mold. Nothing cardboard for a mold or it'll stick bad.

Then take a ruler and pencil and lightly draw your stones onto the flat plaster. Take a dental pick or other such tool and start carving the plaster. It carves REALLY easily. Then rough up with a cheap dollar store wire brush. (3/dollar) You can prime it or dye it with watercolors and inks.

[Sticky Fingers]

Easy peasy man!

Or how's about "split peas, man"?

Dried split peas, or dried lentils, make for realistic cobblestones. Nice size (there are loads of different shapes and sizes to choose from), roughly the same shape, cheap. Clue with flat side down, sand top to remove some of the dome-shape to imitate wear and tear.


And you'll always have some emergency food in the house.

[FichtenFoo]

Interesting. Although I'd be afraid of using something so edible/rottable. How's their longevity?

[Sticky Fingers]

Well, I used them for a cobblestreet once, yonks ago when I were a wee lad, and threw the base away after oh... only 20 years.
Just don't soak them first, like you would if you were to eat them, and you might want to "seal" them with a layer of FFA or what-not. Though I didn't do that (what did I know) and it still looked good. Btw: the reason I threw it out was because over the years I lost most of the peas (I used plastic cement tube glue back then, again, what did I know, I'd use something else now), not because of any mould.

But I agree with you on the edible/rottable bit. The only other foodstuff I ever used was cacao powder dusted on thinned whiteglue to imitate dried mud. That was before the time when we knew about pigments. I still have that base, I could make a pic if anyone thinks it's worth it.

[FichtenFoo]

The cocoa sounds interesting. Could love to see that. Probably smelled great too!

I use spices all the time for builds, but don't worry too much since they're not food-food. Good to hear the beans lasted, and you live somewhere with water "issues" so if mold was going to happen, that'd be the place.

One could probably find an appropriate fish-tank gravel to use as well.

[robofreak]

  I completely forgot about the lighthouse and that was one of your builds that I followed closely.

I've got the plaster. Now I just need to construct a decent mold. Do you remember what kind of inks and acrylics you used?

I would try the split peas, but I'd rather not risk it rotting. While 20 years is pretty good, I don't want to wake up one day in the future and have to redo the base.

[FichtenFoo]

Acrylics are just the cheapie Michaels type ones. Whatever's on sale. Apple Barrel, Americana, Liquitex...

Ink is Higgins Black India Ink circa 1992. I've had it since high school back when I did more illustrations (and comic reading) than anything else. They still make it though.

[robofreak]

Awesome. A big thanks for everyones help.

I gashed my thumb open so it's kinda hard to do much for building, but I'll experiment and try to have something to show next Saturday.