In Progress » Dagobah Diorama » Trees

It took me a bit to decide just how I wanted to do the trees. My first idea was to mount CPVC in holes and cover them with celluclay/sculpy/whatever. (cpvc because it has a higher tolerance for heat in case of my using sculpy)  Then while doing a plethora of research I realized that the Dagobah trees trunks do not start at ground level, but instead their thick roots create a lattice similar to a mangrove swamp holding up the trunks. Okay… a challenge. Marc Reusser gave me some ideas involving Balsa, but the roots were still a problem and Balsa in the amount I’d need would be cost prohibitive anyway. I’ll file that idea away for another time.

What I’m doing makes use of the cpvc and wire I already have. Plus I have a TON of celluclay so I’m making use of it as well. I cut the pipe into roughly 9″ segments and stuffed the bottoms with raffia-wrapped wire for the root armatures. Then I posed all the roots and trees in place on the base and applied celluclay to two of the trees as a test. These look really good so far and will only need a little additional texture plus a lot of random vines and roots made from wire and thread.

Here you can see the entire “forest” of these trees. You can also see the levels I made with additional MDF board. These levels were screwed into place and will later be covered with a thin layer of celluclay for texture.

Twisted wires will be just one way I plan to make all these roots. For the thinner ones I’ll use teased out jute twine that I usually use for tall grass.