Making Ice and Snow

The last of the freezing winter effects to be presented is the icing effects on the ship hull and superstructure. As reference material I searched the web looking for photos that showed the real life appearance of the effects I was trying to recreate.

Icing (icicles) tend to accumulate on booms, railing, poles, masts , gun barrels…in a greater extent the closer to the water ( this is only my limited impression on what I saw on the studied photos that I found). So there I went. For this effect I used Liquitex™ acrylic gel and a fine point wet paint brush, and applied the gel to the selected elements of the ship models again in a time-consuming, stepwise manner.

With paint brush strokes, spread the gel in a vertically downward direction with a wet paint brush, trying to make an icicle appearing “smear”. Many applications of the gel in this way were required, randomly distributed throughout the above-mentioned parts of the ship model. The gel tends to dry fast once spread and then it can’t be spread anymore. You have to wait until is totally dry before applying a second round of material. The good news is that it would be ready for this second application once you return to the starting point of the application once you make a round, since only a small amount is applied. The following figures illustrate these steps. Figures 15 -18 during the early stages in the icicle making.

Figures 19-22 during the later stages in their making