For background I am new to the hobby and have kept a 10 gallon for about 6 months, and have been trying to get to the next step for a 50 gal. I wanted to create a cool feature out of foam for it, but feel a little out of my depth. The past couple of days I have built up the spray foam around some Styrofoam for proper curing and got some paint for it that I have used yet. I'm just wondering what advice you can give me going forward with the project. Any help is greatly appreciated!
Posted by Impossible_Reply1644
26 Comments
What specifically are you trying to improve, the texture?
Carve the rounded bits to create sharper lines and look more like rock. Then use a paint brush to feather highlights (taupe color) onto the whole thing. I’ll post my crawler course where I used this technique.
https://www.reddit.com/user/Odd_Bid2744/comments/1r7kx4l/crawler_course_in_progress/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
I just want to say that one time I spent days making a mini stone wall out of some sort of sedimentary stone I painstakingly broke into small rectangles and glued together with brown hot glue.
I had drawn it out and planned it, everything was perfect.
As soon as I flooded the tank the granular nature of the stone meant the top layer stuck to the glue but separated from the stone.
I like to think it’s just part of the hobby, good luck!
It looks like Castle Greyskull.
It looks like that Vatican Explosion of Spirituality sculpture
It looks like Nurgle’s teapot.
That honestly looks like a great base!
When I did something like this I took a knife to it after it had cured to create the straight edges and then silicone and sand, grit, sphagnum moss, peat to create the various textures.
Spray paints will eat into styrofoam, so you can also create a foam rough out and use a light coat of an aquarium safe spray paint (like Krylon Fusion) to create the rough surface.
Googly eyes? But seriously just shave all the bumps off with a knife for a more stone-like texture. Once it’s in the tank with plants it should be fairly realistic as a natural feature.
You have successfully created the temple of Angkor Wat. Great job.
It looks like that scene from the movie “300” when the Spartans block the road with a wall of corpses and ambush the Persians.
I’m going to go give that a watch today. Thanks!
That’s biollante
Kind of reminds me of Giger Aliens stuff. I’d lean into it
Add a xenomorph statue and youre good
this is a pretty cool start!
Based on my own aesthetics, I’d cut some of the swirls a bit to flatten it out a bit, use some spray adhesive and dust it with some fine light brown sand and then brushing on moss with some weeping moss for a viney look.
abadox
Giger would be proud.
Better if you layer it and make sure you are using pond Great Stuff. I’ll take a photo of the one my son made
Personally I wouldn’t use anything made of spray foam or painted in my tanks. They might say it’s safe but more often than not they’re wrong about that and I just keep it natural in my tanks.
Am I the only person who is questioning if this is even going to sink? Isn’t foam buoyant?! I also wouldn’t want to put that expandable foam into a tank, I don’t think it’ll be safe for the fish. They could eat it. Sorry for being a naysayer.
Looks like the walls in the first few alien movies
I’ve been doing Aqua-scapes and aquariums for 41 years and never used spray foam. Genuinely curious, can that leach any harmful chemicals into the water? I’ve made floating mops with cork and yarn for my fry to hide in, and after following all the cautions provided by other hobbyists (washing and soaking the yarn to remove dies etc), my first mop ended up toxic anyway.
HR Giger-esq. I dig it.
thats gotta be out of Dante’s Inferno
Stranger things theme
Usually you would make it thicker and then cut it down to the right thickness.
I just completed a couple inserts for my new 75 gal and used Free Form™ Habitat™ Black epoxy putty. It’s what they use at large commercial aquariums and zoos to create inserts and enclosure features.
https://www.smooth-on.com/products/free-form-habitat-black/
I’ve also used other stuff from Polygem. I thinks it’s 307 lite for underwater use. Pretty much works the same way. This will allow you to put as much detail as you want. They’re both aquarium safe once it’s cured. You can also paint it and then clear coat it after that. I didn’t paint my inserts. So was able to put them in once cured.
One other issue I had with my last projects was getting them to sink. So you may want to use rocks or something heavy to weigh it down. Unless you’re going to anchor it to the bottom with glue or something.
Hope this helps. And hope your project turns out the way you want.