The Playset Addict's Diorama Drape
The Diorama Drape is a synthetic piece of material that looks like a field of grass. It enables you to quickly shape and reshape your play or display area to recreate the natural feel of, well, nature. If you use Styrofoam insulation as your underlayers, you can add trees like you see above. You can add rocks and bushes and roads and rivers and ponds and...well, your imagination and creativity are the only limitations.
Here is a large, four foot by 8 foot drape in it's raw state,
Stage 2: I've stuck stuff underneath the drape to get the contours I want for the set-up I have in mind. If you're not going to poke through the drape with the bases of trees, any old thing will do, though you want it to be solid to support the weight of your figures. (I added the sky backdrop just to help your imagination!)
Here it is with the trees and rocks and figures and explosions.
The beauty of this whole system is it's versatility and ease of use and storage. I intend to make some of these for sale. I haven't figured out a set price yet. I expect it to be between half and a third of the cost per square foot of the grass mats that so many collectors are enjoying. Larger drapes should be less per square foot than small ones.
If you would like more information as it becomes available, e-mail me at playsetaddict@charter.net. Put "Drape" in the subject line. Thanks.
Joe Baker
And of course, some shots of the fun I had with this set-up!
This shot shows what can be done if you want to customize part of the drape. Here I added tread marks in the grass and some shell craters.
The first Accessory I devised was a movable road that could be put where you wanted and would be able to adjust to the contours of 'land'.
In the weeks since, I've made hedgerows, rock formations, building footprints, rivers, bushes, and a pond.
Well, that should give you some ideas of the possibilities. If this fires up your imagination, let me know!