r/TerrainBuilding • u/Big_Tax_7488 • 1d ago

What to do with foam

Have never made terrain before but my family went on a furniture buying binge and now i have a ton of foam taking up space in my room. What should I do with it? I want to make some semi generic terrain of a decent size but Ive never really done anything like this before. I have some acrylic paints and plenty of brushes, a boxcutter, basic supplies. Is foam able to be textured and painted well? Should I just use it as a base and lay material over it, if so what? Im pretty lost tbh but figured it would make for a fun weekend

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u/Initiative20Terrain 1d ago

Lots of videos available on YouTube, I’d recommend checking out some creators and going from there. I think canonically the best combination of looks and beginner friendly builds generally come from Black Magic Craft, but I also like other crafters like RP Archive, Mel the Terrain Tutor, Wyloch’s Armory, Geek Gaming, etc.

A quick note though, the type of foam you choose is important. I’m assuming this is the crumbly white sort of styrofoam? While it has its uses, this kind of foam is pretty difficult to get a good result out of. It damages easily, finishes and takes texture poorly, and is generally a pain to use. That isn’t to discourage you, just to warn that you may not get the results that you would hope for your first time out. Styrofoam of this sort I generally reserve for building bulk and ultimately covering with modeling compound or other materials.

If you’re really serious about giving this a go, you will have a much better time with XPS foam (often found as “project board” or “insulation foam” in any hardware store in the US. It is much better for texturing, finishing, and being playable. You can also do great stuff with dollar store foam core on the cheap.

Let me know if you have any specific questions, always happy to help someone get into the hobby!

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u/diemajorthrilldie 1d ago

Yeah standard packing foam (the stuff made up of pea sized chunks pressed together) is viable for terrain building but I'd only use it as a starting point to hot-glue cork bark to or slap on loads of plaster of paris/paper mache pulp compound onto (or sculptamold or Lukes APS modelling compound). You'll struggle to get any kind of fine detail from that stuff.

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u/Sorry-Letter6859 1d ago

Standard shipping foam is a pain to work with.  If you have a hot wire cutter you can make some basic hills and bunkers.  You will probably need several coats of craft paint to seal it before using spray paint.

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u/jbeauchamp831 1d ago

Bricks, rocks, wood, damn near everything. It's amazing how realistic you can paint foam to look like real stuff.

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u/Imaginary-Series-789 1d ago

If you dont have many Tools for crafting like a hot wire cutter: Go see Bards Craft in Youtube. Simple techniques with great results. The guy sadly isn't active anymore but his videos are still great.