Ponds

2025-03-24 terrain / hobby /

I wanted to make some ponds so low profile they almost look recessed into the table. Used some of the holiday harvest of clear stiff plastic packaging as a base, vallejo basing mud for the rim, a simple airbrushed gradient, and some resin water effects. There was some iterative learning.

First pass is on the left, not smooth enough and a brown base color wasn't really looking right. It almost passes for a thin mud pool in a desert. Second pass is on the right, I wildly overestimated how much color to put in the resin. Looks toxic and cloudy, not terrible, but not what I want.

Fourth attempts (we'll come back to the third in a bit) are this lot. Used a green gradient and a little blue ink in the water effects. Has more of a tropical look than I wanted, but much better. There was however some tearing as the resin dried which I covered up with tufts.

The biggest problem though is the curling. The base material I used is too flexible, the resin as it cures put tension on it and it curves. Not too bad on the round ones, but no amount of weights and pressing or heat makes any long term difference.

The long pond though is pretty bad. I don't know that I'm going to keep it. There was a much larger round pond I did for my third attempt that had a mishap with the resin curing, namely I dropped something in it when it was partially cured that became stuck and it stretched and tore and ruined the whole thing.

I need a slightly thicker acrylic or plastic base. Something just under a mm I think. But for a few small water features, I've got some options now.