Ancient Asphalt


eTraxx

eTraxx

Member
Had a guy on another forum ask how to model "decaying asphalt" .. his diorama being a " .. post-apocalyptic Mad Max sort of setting .."

Anyhoo. I was curious and experimented a bit. Poured a thin layer of plaster mix (2 parts plaster and 1 part Spectra Lock Sanded Grout (powder)). When it set I glued some wedding veil to the back with yellow glue. That way I could flex and crack it but it would stay attached (more or less). Colored with AI wash. White glue/water to lock in place. Painted gray acrylic, black acrylic wash, sprinkled brown dry tempera paint and scrubbed that into the cracks with a brush and tap water. Sprayed with matt. The car is a 1:48 Matchbox 1912 Simplex straight out of the box. Not too bad for the first experiment .. worth exploring I think.

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When I made up the slurry of plaster and sanded grout my intention was to give it a texture. That worked but the plaster was weaker then I liked. I'm going to try this again .. this time try a verrrry thin layer of the slurry (for the texture) .. then a layer of full strength plaster .. then the veil material and finally a thin layer of plaster. Then .. LET IT SET UP (I tend to get in a hurry). What I would like is plaster that you could flex .. it would crack all to heck but stay held together by the veil material. Don't need 'apocalyptic' .. but would be cool if you could model an old decaying asphalt road. You see those in the country abandoned and overgrown with grass. Now, that would be cool.
 
Can you embed the veil in the plaster material while it's still wet? This might help it hold up to bending.
 
asphalt

ed i bought some sewing mesh at the thrift store when we went sat. that might work beeter then bridal vale it is stiffer
 
Looks great, all it needs is some grass poking through and a burned out car beside the road. :)
 
ianacole said:
Can you embed the veil in the plaster material while it's still wet? This might help it hold up to bending.
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I tried that at first but the wedding veil material is synthetic and floats. Ha. I could have let that set first and then poured on a second layer which would have embedded the veil.

okiecrip621 said:
looks like some of the oil field roads back home in okla. looks great
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It's more 'crumbly' then I wanted but that's because it doesn't 'stick' to the veil all that great .. and the fact that I mixed the grout with the plaster I think.

okiecrip621 said:
Ed I bought some sewing mesh at the thrift store when we went Sat. Tthat might work better then bridal veil as it is stiffer
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We can try. I was thinking about this later and believe that cotton would probably work better. They use that to make plaster casts .. gauze .. the plaster penetrates the fibers and holds tight. That's what would work for this effect .. where a thin layer of plaster holds tight to the flexible bit .. that way we can flex the thing to create the cracks. One thing I wanted to try and couldn't because it didn't adhere well enough was to use an air eraser to erode the cracks.

RW&C said:
Looks great, all it needs is some grass poking through and a burned out car beside the road. :)
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.. or .. you could have NO grass, drifting sand and a burned out car and you would have a 'normal' scene from beside the highway in Saudi Arabia! Har.
 
A bit of a Redux ...

Tried something different .....

1 - Poured a thin layer of plaster .. no coloring.
2 - When set laid a single layer of gauze
3 - Poured another thin layer of plaster
4 - let that set up and dry
5 - put the 'road' on a sponge and pressed all over to crack it
6 - Used Air Eraser to texture and erode the cracks
7 - Sprayed AI on both sides .. let dry
8 - Still had white in the cracks so used AppleBarrel Black Acrylic as a wash all over and down into the cracks. Let dry.
9 - Dry brushed FolkArt Steel Gray Acrylic

10 - on left third of road I brushed on Brown pastel powder (scraped from stick) then 'mopped' over with tap water
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11 - center third left as was in step 9
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12 - right third of road I brushed on Black pastel powder (again, scraped from stick) and 'mopped' over with tap water
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.. and .. yes it's flexible .. no kidding!
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