Reflecting pond advice

[Steve-the-Duck]

Folks,
I'm soon to start on the Doyusha kit of Kinkakuji, the Golden Pavilion in Kyoto.
The real thing stands on a reflecting pond, and the kit includes a terrible self-adhesive blue sheet for that. Short of some careful cutting of the base and actually mounting it on a small mirror, any advice on how to make a proper water effect surface? At the moment I'm thinking of gloss varnish over black.
I should say, without some surgery on the moulded base, I've no depth to work with. Also, the kit is only 1/200 scale

[Ian M]

Paint the pool the colour you want it. If you want more depth paint it lighter where you want it shallow and darker for the deeper parts. then a few good coats of varnish.
Have a look in the Diorama section and there are some great examples of water base diorama by a member called Spanner He has shown how to do it a few times and different ways.

[rtfoe]

You won't get the reflective pond effect with any of the methods of pouring of resin or varnish other than a mirror.
I am not sure what medium should be used to tint the mirror other than to put the dio in a box frame with a sky for the background and the colour of the water above.

I think I saw a box dio like this in Shizuoka with a sunset lighting. Hope you figure it out and find a method that works.

Cheers,
Richard

[KarlW]

Just going off my shakey memory....
Photographers use what they call gels to alter the colour from studio lights, basically it's a good quality cellophane, maybe one of these over a mirror? I'm thinking a colour neutral one that just blocks some light.
Also wondering if building up layers of Tamiya smoke would do what I'm thinking.

Also I've seen a water effect clear perspex, again over a mirror, though again I'm thinking a neutral filter to dull down the reflection, this could give a wind rippled effect.
And yes you can get neutral filter gel sheets.
This sort of thing

[spanner570]

You won't get the reflective pond effect with any of the methods of pouring of resin or varnish other than a mirror.
Cheers,
Richard

Yes you can, here's an image of my wrecked Abrams - reflected in ordinary household varnish. Simple and quick.


Moderators, As it wasn't asked for by Chris, please remove the image at your discretion, but I couldn't put into words what I wanted to convey...

Ron

[Steve-the-Duck]

Ron, that looks like just the effect I'm after - what did you use for the base coat/colour underneath the varnish?

[spanner570]

Ron, that looks like just the effect I'm after - what did you use for the base coat/colour underneath the varnish?

Thanks Chris, I'm only too glad to be of help.

Any paint will do, I used some left over brown shed paint. It won't apply to your build, but I also added a bit of dirt to the base before I coated it in the gloss varnish.

All you will need is your choice of colour, painted on to the required density. Just make sure there are no 'ripples' left on the surface before varnishing.

Cheers.
Ron

[Steve-the-Duck]

Ron
What varnish did you use? The ubiquitous Kleer, or whatever it's called these days, or any non-yellowing stuff?
Time to start practising...

[Tim Marlow]

Hi Ron
That blue colour is reflection of the actual sky isn’t it? I think Steve was looking to use that as a base colour....but I might be wrong

[spanner570]

Steve - Ordinary household gloss varnish - I bought mine from Wilco. Cheap, and water based too.

Tim - Yes, it is the reflected sky. I would still paint the base a dark colour. Then take any pictures outside with a boootiful blue sky shining down. This will result in the same effect as my puddle in my posted image.
Making sure there are no other reflected images, such as his face or camera strap! You'll never guess why I mention that.... :upside:

[stillp]

Kinkakuji is a really beautiful place. Looking forward to seeing your model.
Pete

[monica]

Yes you can, here's an image of my wrecked Abrams - reflected in ordinary household varnish. Simple and quick.
[ATTACH=CONFIG]n1130063[/ATTACH]

Moderators, As it wasn't asked for by Chris, please remove the image at your discretion, but I couldn't put into words what I wanted to convey...

Ron

that is just fantastic Ron,I did not know you could get that at alll to work in this scale,super well done to you sir, :smiling:

[monica]

this should be very interesting build Pete,will look forward to seeing it,

[rtfoe]

I stand corrected Ron...good reflection. :thumb2:

Cheers,
Richard

[Steve-the-Duck]

I'll be practising the reflection effects first... Though I might just put it in as part of the build blog