Hello all, yes I've been AWOL again. Exam board season at work and with not only remote working, we have all the Corona 19 Syndrome regulations to deal with so the hours have been brutal. However, I think we're over the first and the worst round of boards so I should have a little more free time - actually that should read "I should have some free time"!
The diorama was on hold if you recall my last post as I was waiting for something to improve it. Well that something arrived quite some time ago and I finally got the chance to test it out and then actually get to work and start on the improvement. What I treated myself to was a static grass applicator! I'd been looking at these for a while and wondering whether to make the investment or not being as how I like to put my models in some sort of setting. The ones I've seen on railway modellers videos were a bit big for my need not to mention expensive, but I then came across a lad on the Youtube who's handle is Lukes APS. He does some amazing wargaming dioramas and was using a static grass applicator from World War Scenics. I checked out their website (wwscenics.com), gave them a call and chatted to the bloke that designs their stuff who is a military diorama man. He recommended - and I subsequently ordered - the Pro Grass Precision Applicator which was exactly what I was after. Not too unwieldy and with the ability to cover large enough areas for my 1/72 scale stuff. It is pictured for you.
How it works is that the grass is placed in the hopper on the end of the wand. The hopper has a mesh in the end. Glue is brushed on to the surface you wish to grass over and a pin or nail is pushed into the base through the glue. The cable with the clip on is attached to the pin or nail to ground the charge and the device switched on - actually this is not necessary on the one I got because of the size, you only have to hold the clip near the area you're working on. The grass in the hopper is charged up with static electricity and when it's sprinkled from the hopper, it is pulled into a vertical orientation by the charge and lands upright into the glue where it stays. All very clever stuff. This little toy got me just over £70 including a small tub of base glue and a couple of sample bags of grass - a 2mm base grass and a 4mm layering grass to build it up. Also in the price were a couple more bags of grass you can see - there is quite a range depending on what sort of scenery and scale you are building. I was amazed at how little is actually used though and those 100g bags will last my lifetime!
So, onto the diorama then. Because I had not taken the static grass into account when I got as far as I did, it was necessary to remove the tree and tape a few areas off. I brushed the base glue on and set my base layer - 2 mm spring grass. Once that was dry, I applied a 4mm Wild Meadow layer on top. To get this stuck down, you need to spray the glue on. WWS sell aerosol cans of layering spray but were out of stock when I ordered plus I thought they were a bit pricey so I ordered some Matte Mod Podge, thinned some down and applied it with my pump spray bottle. Perfectly adequate. The results are there in the pictures and I'm most happy with them - particularly for a first attempt.
Of course there was quite a bit of cleaning up to do as it was impossible not to get glue - and therefore grass - on the fence without hours of precision masking first and I felt the effort was not worth while. I simply brushed the fence with water after the grass was applied and wiped off the grass with a soft dry brush and tweezers for the more stubborn bits. The Mod Podge (first time I've used it) held things fine and dried nicely.
Next will be to "mow" and attack the area under the tree to make it look more bare and patchy, put the tree back then set the sheep in place. They stand up beautifully in the grass to but a little dod of glue on their hooves will make sure they don't wander. After that, truck and figures can be set and I'll be ready to call it finished - not that I want to get too far ahead of myself and jinx things you understand.
As a postscript, very recently, and rather annoyingly, WWS was launched another product called the Pro Grass Detailer. This does away with the power box and is simply a wand which holds the circuitry and battery and comes with 2 hoppers - the Precision which I have and also a larger one which can hold more grass and cover a slightly larger area so it quicker to use. I would have paid a few quid extra for this had it been available at the time but not to worry, tis done now and I'm not planning on making any huge displays.