New Article: Creating trees and foliage

[SavaTheAggie]

Hey all,

A new article has been added to our How-To section. Feel free to check it out.

Feedback on any article is always appreciated.

--Anthony

[dookie]

Great article, I've always had trouble creating foliage so hopefully I can put this to good use if I ever start on a custom castle project. I plan to upgrade a BFF to use baseplates but I'm not so sure how, but based on the pictures in your article, I'm sure that the use of greens will definitely help improve the appearence of almost any lego MOC (depends on theme )

[Jojo]

Hi Anthony!


Thanks for the nice Article!

Personally I like trees built with foliage parts (FP) the best, if only for their more realistic look.

In fact there are some more cons that speak against foliage trees. Mainly their instability is a big con. It's almost impossible to touch a foliage tree without having half of the FPs falling down or having the trunk broken. If you attache more than just one FP to a twig (which is recommended because just one FP looks a bit poor) you can't secure every part with plates, the branches would become ridiculous thick in this case.
So to transport such trees (to shows and events) is a real adventure and you should allow extra time for reattaching the FPs when you have arrived. :-)

The brick trees look good, too, if they come in a bunch. Though I'd prefer them to make the background to give the impression of a larger forest. Of course a big pro is the availabity of a wide colour range, as shown in your fall gallery.


Bye
Jojo

[Bruce N H]

Hey Anthony,

I just saw a very nice tree on Brickshelf from Nathan Wells:
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?i=530940
that would be a good addition to your article. The same gallery has some climbing vines including both foliage pieces and brown plates:
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?i=530931
While I'm at it, Amado C. Pinlac (AC Pin) uses the seaweed piece to make nice climbing vines in this diorama:
http://acpinlego.homestead.com/ArrivalAtVarykino.html

Bruce

[fcarcanague]

Very nice How-To on foliage and trees. I finaly made use of all the foliage parts I've been collecting. There are now 2 trees on the side of my Mountain Shrine.

http://www.carcanague.com/100203mtn/ for the whole folder.
Let me know if the trees look alright.

Fred

[forester3291]

Thanks Sava. I have been struggleling on How to make great foliage. You nailed it man.


And great trees fcarcanague. I like the old gnarled look.

[Brickboy]

Wow! thanks for the ideas!
Alan

[SavaTheAggie]

Sigh... I ressurrect this thread because... I have turned to the dark side.

Yes, in my article I was rather down on trees built with the official 'leaf' piece, preferring to go with Brick-Built trees. In fact, I've had more than one online discussion where I preached the Brick-Built tree gospel, so to speak.

And yet now, I have done a total 180. Now I build with the leaf parts, building huge trees and using techniques that make them even more stable than brick-built trees. I've even come up with a conifer tree design that I've yet to share.

Low, I hang my head.

--Tony

P.S. Someday I'm going to need to update that article.

[ZIGGY!]

Cool, now if only I could buy those leaf parts, I barely have enough for one thick layer .Anywho it's funny (because)` I was just about to post a topic. What can I use those seaweed peices for, I know there is a willow tree but 1:I don't know how to make it, 2: I have very few, do you have any ideas?

[BreadMan]

Glad to see you've come around Tony. They just look so much better!

[Mirage]

Very nice article, I've always wanted to build large amounts of foliage but seem to be lacking those ever so pretty green leaves. This however will make sure the ones that i do are getting the most for their money.