Craft Nerd Herd

Discussion in 'Make It So' started by Starcrossedsky, Feb 23, 2015.

  1. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    I am making a solar system for school!
    It includes painting and gluing and other fun stuff!
    I can elaborate if wanted. :D

    (I'm super excited since I love painting and like asaaasjajnian I did mars and venus last night and they look gREAT but they arent even the complicated ones. they are terrestrial planets, the others are going to be ordeals and a half. EEEE)
     
    • Like x 3
  2. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    That's so cool! Are you going to have an asteroid belt?
     
  3. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    I am going to try!

    Not sure how well I can carve dollar store styrofoam spheres into rocklike shapes, but I want to try.
    I need an asteroid belt since part of my research included asteroids, meteors, and meteoroids.
    Also one or two of the dwarf planets is by the asteroid belt, so..

    I'm so excited aahh
     
    • Like x 1
  4. Aviari

    Aviari PartyWolf Is In The House Tonight

    I recommend high-grit sandpaper wrapped around a finger for carving. Gives it a more organic look than knifing it.
     
    • Like x 1
  5. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    Hmm. I will consider that. :)
    Not sure if we have sandpaper, there w=might be some in the garage, but i'd have no idea what grit it would be.

    anyone have ideas for sticking cotton to the styrofoam balls?

    basically my plans are;
    gas giants - styrofoam ball, painted, dyed pulled apart cottonballs glued? on after.
    ice giants - styrofoam ball, saran wrap over top, painted
    terrestrial - styrofoam ball, painted
     
  6. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    How about cotton pasted to the styrofoam with PVA glue, then hair-sprayed to keep them fluffy and secure?
     
  7. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    I also want to keep the colour viewable, so that you can tell what planet it is, by other things than just size.
    I wonder if sticking them on while the paint is wet would be enough.. *shrug*
    The hairspray sounds like a good idea, thanks! :)

    edit: Is PVA glue just normal white school glue? (i am an idiot)
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2015
  8. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    I think so! It's what we always called it at school. You're not an idiot; it's almost certainly a Briticism.
     
  9. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    Okay well. Photo update
    [​IMG]
    Venus, Neptune, Mars, Mercury, earth that hasnt been painted. Eris, Haumea v, Pluto ^, Ceres

    Neptune (and the plastic wrap idea in general) looks like shit T_T
     
    • Like x 2
  10. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    Hm. What if instead of plastic wrap, you slap a load of clear-drying glue over it? It might give smoother texture and a more matte finish.

    (Or it might not work at all, but hey. Crafts.)
     
  11. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    That could work...The big thing is making a clear difference between ice giant, gas giant, and terrestrial.
    But while the ice giants technically are made of ice, they have big cloudy atmospheres, which show up nice and smooth. Just like the gas giants.
    urgh.
    If this was based entirely on making it look good, I would peel off the plastic wrap and paint it like a terrestrial planet.
    But it's not, and I can't. Aargh.

    But the other planets (and dwarf planets) look good?
     
  12. Alska

    Alska Well-Known Member

    If you're looking for a smooth texture, you could try using paper clay to cover them before painting?

    And yeah, the others look good! I really like the painting on the two brown ones c:
     
  13. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    Yeah, I think they're all really effective apart from Neptune, which is kind of letting the side down. I like Mercury particularly.

    Idea (bit crazy): what if you made a kind of separate atmosphere for the ice giants? I'm thinking, cover a bigger sphere (one you don't need) with plastic wrap as smoothly as you can and paint it with glue so it goes hard. Then cut it off. If you stick it together again, you should have a translucent sphere that's larger than your planet (that you can stick to the planet with some little paper columns, or something.) You can paint the surface of the planet and give the atmosphere a light colour wash as well.
    Might be too much work, might be too fragile.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2015
    • Like x 1
  14. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    I have not heard of paper clay? Sounds interesting though.

    That sounds like a cool idea, but unfortunately I am going to be displaying these in a science fair type thing at school with 2 other classes of people. :/ The frailness is a bit worrisome

    Thanks! :) If memory serves, I sponged a darker colour onto Mercury and Pluto, and it turned out quite well!
     
    • Like x 1
  15. Alska

    Alska Well-Known Member

    It's basically a lightweight air dry clay, kind of like super fine paper mache made into clay I guess?

    Oh, if you're looking for a way to make them look noticeably different, maybe you could add sparkles to the ice ones? Like the ice crystals reflecting?
     
    • Like x 1
  16. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    In that case, how about loosely crumpling up plastic wrap and gluing it on to make a layer about 1/2 inch thick, then covering it with a clean sheet of plastic wrap? I'm trying to think of a way you can show that there's a gaseous atmosphere. If you have any dye or watercolour, rather than poster paint, the translucency would probably help too.
     
  17. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    Urgh I feel bad for shooting down ideas so much

    The plastic wrap thing sounds super complicated, and sounds like once I give it neptune's dark blue colour, it might look the same as now
    I am a fan of the glitter, because its gonna be really hard to represent these fucking atmospheres anyway.
    Like, I'm not doing anything about the terrestrial atmospheres..
    But the atmosphere is so key in how neptune and uranus look that I cant just drop them.
    See?
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    AAAAAA space why >:|
     
  18. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    Don't feel bad, it's your project! I'm just throwing out ways I might try and represent it to see if any of them sound appealing/effective.
     
  19. EulersBidentity

    EulersBidentity e^i*[bi] + 1

    Another idea: could you cut segments out of the planets(/dwarf planets/etc) and paint them like that diagram above so you can see the layers?
     
  20. Imoyram

    Imoyram Well-Known Member

    Maybe I could like, paint then normally, but do the light bits on Neptune with cotton, and some wispy bits on uranus with cotton, instead of the gas giants that will be covered in cotton?
    idfk

    I am reasearching space this entire year, and will continue to add on to the project as I learn more things about it.
    And technically that isnt in my notes yet.
    I havent researched what the layers are in the planets.
    So I have to stick with things I've alreading written down.
    But I will get onto researching that for end of next term :P
     
    • Like x 1
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