Ranuska progress

Progress continues slowly on Ranuska, but between a honeymoon and starting back at work surprisingly little has been achieved.

However progress is being made. With Rachel's help I've started building up the land forms. First off some scraps of foam were stuffed in the gap between sea level and land level to form a ring of rocks.

Other lumps of polystyrene were used to build up the land forms:

Around the beach are I added some foam core where the beach is to be. I then mixed up some very ancient Woodland Scenics Scultamold, which is a sort of lumpy plaster that keeps its shape, and isn't a rock hard dense as regular plaster.

Rachel and I troweled this on then roughly shaped it to look like a beach. 

Some time later I contoured the polystyrene into land forms, using a saw, knife, and a Stanley Surform tool. All very messy work and there were polystyrene beads everywhere. However the land is now starting to take shape.

In the meantime track has been ordered, but has yet to arrive. Until the track is laid I am unable to complete the tunnel area so I am having to work on other areas. Today, I started adding plaster to the landforms. While at it I formed a few rocks around the sea boundary; these should look good with the sea lapping at their edges.

The sea wall was also given a coat of Das, which is an air-dry clay ideal for sculpting rocks, stones, bricks, cobblestones, etc. To attach it I first made a former from MDF, as detailed last instalment. Then Rachel and I painted on a coat of PVA and while still wet, squashed on a layer of Das. The PVA will help the Das stick to the MDF. Once dry, the roughly 3-5mm thick later of Das will be carved, either by hand or with the Dremel and a carving tool. Before the Das dried we roughed up the surface with paint brush bristles, so that the finished stone wall will have a bit of texture to it.

I also sanded down the beach area and filled in a few of the dips and holes. And the whole module, slowly taking shape...