Diorama assistance

[MoarCrossovers]

Currently in the progress of planning a diorama. I have an idea of what I want to make and how to make it, but am lost on the crucial part of the diorama: scenery. Most importantly, vegetation.

I'm not quite sure on where to go on creating flora for the layout, as paleoflora is hardly a common business in the modelling world. If anyone knows any techniques or tutorials for creating things such as cycads, ferns and other plants, please help me out.

[Lanthanotus]

Currently in the progress of planning a diorama. I have an idea of what I want to make and how to make it, but am lost on the crucial part of the diorama: scenery. Most importantly, vegetation.

I'm not quite sure on where to go on creating flora for the layout, as paleoflora is hardly a common business in the modelling world. If anyone knows any techniques or tutorials for creating things such as cycads, ferns and other plants, please help me out.

Hi there.... I use several methods for building dioramas, the most simple way is having a printed backdrop combined with some mass produced plants - Safari's are discontinued but still avialable here and there, CollectA offers a small but nice variety aswell in different sizes, best have a look at the blog, several are reviewed there. Also, a lot of model train palnts can come in handy.

My selfmade palnts are often made from Tyvek and Sculpey or from several natural materials combined with Tyvek, wire, glue and paint (click and clack).

Forum member irimali posted a nice description, unfortunately the photos felt prey to the big Photobucket purge (click).

Hope this helps.

[Lone Trike]

I know the problem! The diorama plants, which are commercially available, are hardly what you´d expect to find in a mesozioc landscape.
I was actually thinking about making my own diorama plants as well. I found a very inspiring youtube channel about that stuff. It´s called Boulder Creek Railroad by Luke Towan
Hope this helps you!

[Ramose]

I too know the dilemma.  I've been finding though that there are more out there than I realized.  For instance scenic express (http://www.sceneryexpress.com/) sells a cycad (its under their palm tree section) as well as ferns.  I have purchased a ton of ferns from them over the years.  I recently made a cycad myself by cannibalizing a cheap palm tree model (https://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/show/Item/RMWC-PT/page/1) and then making a new base out of clay.  I was pretty happy with the results.  I've also recently learned how to make wire trees and am planning on making a Araucaria (monkey puzzle)

[Ramose]

Here's a photo of the cycad I made as part of a diorama.
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[Lone Trike]

@Ramose The diorama looks awesome! Do you sculpt the dinos yourself? Looking pretty good! What scale do you work with?
I was actually considering cutting the leaves myself. But I guess it would be a pretty time-consuming task

[Ramose]

@Ramose The diorama looks awesome! Do you sculpt the dinos yourself? Looking pretty good! What scale do you work with?
I was actually considering cutting the leaves myself. But I guess it would be a pretty time-consuming task

I work in 1:72 scale mostly at the moment.  I want to work on larger scale but alas at the moment I'm in an apartment which does not allow much room for larger things.  What types of leaves do you want to make?  I've found that a lot of things are obtainable by cannibalizing other models.

[MoarCrossovers]

For interest's sake, does anyone know of any dinosaur nest or egg models available?

[Lanthanotus]

Rebor offers two kind of nests, sauropod and theropod nests, then there's the Carnegie Maiasaurus with nest... however, a nest and eggs is very easy to be made by yourself with a bit of epoxy sculpt or oven hardening/air dring modelling mass.

[PhilSauria]

Getting back to Cycads and such; I have cannibalized and modified cheap plants from places like Ali Express. A bag of assorted plastic palm trees for can be had for not much at all and cut down into base adornments and the like. Don't think they'd pass scrutiny if a paleo botanist looked too closely but they provide a primeval vibe.

[amargasaurus cazaui]

For interest's sake, does anyone know of any dinosaur nest or egg models available?

Kayakasaurus here in our forum offers some of the best nests available in terms of what we think we know based on evidence. The rebor nests and even those that accompany the beasts of the  mesooic line are not particularly close to the fossil evidence, where we do have any

[Ramose]

For interest's sake, does anyone know of any dinosaur nest or egg models available?

I hate to say it but I've always thought about using white tic-tacs to stand in for eggs in a diorama.

[sepp]

For interest's sake, does anyone know of any dinosaur nest or egg models available?

I hate to say it but I've always thought about using white tic-tacs to stand in for eggs in a diorama.

that's so clever!!

[MoarCrossovers]

Would filler be a good material to base a diorama with?

[Lanthanotus]

I am unsure what general material "filler" is, but I build bases for my small dioramas (for Kaiyodo Dinotales and the likes) with Super Sculptey, for medium and large dioramas I use cement/mortar/plaster as a cheap and easy to build ground material, sometimes sculpted onto a base of cardboard or styrofoam to save on weight and material.

[MoarCrossovers]

I don't know what kind of filler it is, it just says all purpose filler on the tub. I do have some plaster cloth and modelling clay. I'm just looking for a non-porous material to cover the base of the diorama so that the resin won't leak through when pouring.

[Federreptil]

Maybe too late, but here some advices:
If you need ferns, you can choose some material of 1/72 railway modelling. I found there some small ferns in an US-Shop - made of plastic and very detailed. Also there are offers for small printed cut-out paper plants.
The very cheap palms sets e.g. at ebay for architecture models in 1:144 are very effective, if you cut the trunks. Most of them need a new duff painting to loose their plastic attitude.
If you have here mixed the sets from different sellers, you will get a very different green. You can see this in my dioramas on the forum.
You will find laser-cut plant models for the military diorama section in 1:35 or 1:24. Here are palms, herbs and fern leafs for some scratch building. Some similar plants with paper leafs you will find in the old Tamiya kits.
The CollectA plants are fine for the standard dinosaur models in 1:40 to 1:35. Unfortunately the thickness of the leafs are not perfect for photos.
For the needle trees you can use the railway models of bigger trees in the scale 1:22,5. These are all purposes if you don`t like to build to much and want faster results.
If you want a fantastic scenery, look in this section to the dioramas of Irimali. You will also find a very precise instruction, how to build this awesome filthy look.