Lava Field Tutorial -- Added Huge Volcano. Page 4.

[Crypto-Knight]

Here's my method for making lava field (and to a lesser extent molten lava). Hope you find it useful...

I ordered some spare asphalt tiles for this purpose, from Auggie's or Miniature Market I think; I didn't want to diminish my master set.

First, coat the surface hex with wax. I used a silver crayon. Any color that would contrast with black and red would be fine, but here's a hint: no kid in the world will ever miss their white crayola. You want to apply a decent coat, but don't press so hard as to fill in the cracked areas of the hex terrain.
http://i1121.photobucket.com/albums/...F2YTEuanBn.jpg

Next, spray paint the tiles red. I used a semi-gloss and like the lava's warm comforting glow. But if you like a matte finish, that might look even better. The paint will pool on the wax. This is fine.
http://i1121.photobucket.com/albums/...F2YTIuanBn.jpg

After the paint dries, gently scrape off the waxed areas with a razor blade. (I guess I should here insert the usual disclaimer of not acting like a goofball when you mess with a razor.) I used a dremel with carbon fiber brush attachment to buff it down and get rid of the remaining wax flecks, but any semi-soft hand brush, like an old shoe shine brush, should work.
http://i1121.photobucket.com/albums/...F2YTMuanBn.jpg

Here they are set up in a 'dungeon at the center of the Earth' type situation.
http://i1121.photobucket.com/albums/...F2YTQuanBn.jpg


The molten lava, I made using spare shadow tiles so that any eventual scratches wouldn't matter so much. I had sprayed them with Krylon neon orange, which was really cool. But they faded to this funky pumpkin color I did not like at all. I ended up brushing them lightly a few times with a shade I could really appreciate.

So, that's it! And sorry for inserting links rather than photos directly; I did this from my Blackberry and the Insert Photo clicky thingy doesn't seem all that accommodating.
Cheers, all!

[nyys]

Nice!

...and here are the pics pulled into the thread so they don't have to be clicked.

[Crypto-Knight]

Thanks -- and thanks!

[Quack188]

That's a really interesting way of doing lava terrain. You're molten lava looks like it would be too hot for even that fire elemental. Good job!

[CNCfan101]

Wow. This looks awesome. I was thinking about doing something similar to make some tiberium spaces. I was thinking about using my friend's plastic modeling lab to copy some spaces in a light grey color, then painting bright green cracks onto them.
Which do you think is a better Idea? This would probably look a little less sloppy, as the other would be easier to duplicate. If I was trying to make some rocky spaces infected with some green crystal materiel, how do you think I should do it?

[Crypto-Knight]

That sounds pretty cool. I like the bright greens.
You can do a wax resist technique with hand painting. Maybe start with gray tiles, do the wax, and hand paint over the cracks? I'd be sure to wax around the edges in case of runoff.

And thanks for the compliments. I was musing over doing a slimy pink/bone sort of thing, like some sort of fleshy Marro field on their homeworld. I don't think it would see a lot of use though.

[Son of Arathorn]

Great tutorial, +rep for sure!!! I also had to make my own Wasteland terrain, but I just painted using a very small brush in the cracks. Asphalt actually looks a bit better than the grey of the original terrain, IMO.

[JC McMinis]

Very cool work here

[Crypto-Knight]

Wow, thanks everybody.
CNC Fan, I just thought, what about pressing crystals or stones into your mold material before pushing the hex tiles in? Then you could use masking and resist techniques to paint it all in one go. Any rules thoughts for tiberium?

[CNCfan101]

Basically, Tiberium would be somewhat like lava, although with sometimes a small chance of mutations. At the end of each round, you deal one wound to any creature standing on tiberium spaces, in tiberium-infected water, or by large tiberium crystals (glaciers cast in green). For every figure killed by this tiberium, roll the 20-sided die. If you roll a 1, replace the destroyed figure with a Visceroid. This mutant would be extremely hard to kill and would automaticly attack any figure within it's movement range. Tiberium would also act like deep snow, making Fields very hard to cross.

About your idea, It would probably look great, but I don't know exactly how I would do it. It's my friend who knows about Casting spaces, and I do think I will add it to my order. I am sending the request today, this project could turn out looking great. One of the few expansion sets I don't have is the lava set, so I can't make any comparisons, but the end result is breathtaking!

I don't want to hijack this thread, however, so I will give a more complete statement in a new thread when I get these spaces cast.

[Crypto-Knight]

I'll watch for it. Sounds pretty cool. And I just remembered -- Auggie's games sells some custom crystal tiles! I'm pretty sure one of them is green too.

[Glottengeich]

Hey man these are awesome! I've always wanted to make lava tiles but I really didn't know which way to approach it. I ordered all the silicone and things to try out to make my own actual tiles but I think I want to do this just for the experience side of customizing heroscape.

So a quick question before I go all crazy for this; what did you do with the crayon in the beginning? You melted it down in a pot or something then just dabbed the tiles in it enough to cover the flat surfaces and not the cracks?

** EDIT **

Okay, I'm super excited for this, and I actually have a couple more questions, if you don't mind! I'm just going to list my questions in an "orderly fashion" before I start ranting off topic into a couple of stories, haha.

1) you said you used a Dremel with a carbon fibre brush, I'm trying to find the exact pieces here so I can do it myself, but I am having troubles on Google finding these things. I found out Dremel is the manufacturer of the hand held tools, but I don't know what kind of brush I would use, and honestly, what kind of Dremel I would use.

2) For the awesome, and I mean AWESOME, molten lava tiles, you said you used Krylon Neon Orange, but it came out a ugly pumpkin colour. How did you make it as it it after that? You said you shaded it, with what? I really like those and they look like a "meant to be" set with the other tiles. I would really appreciate understanding your method on that.

There probably will be more questions as I go crazy kookoo for this tutorial. I am so impressed with your detailing... good job, and kudos!