In my previous post, I explained how I built the frames for the gate pillars, and the styrofoam cladding. In this post, I will continue with the construction of the pillars. They need to be coated with monster mud, and painted.
I did find liquid drywall compound, the stuff everybody else seems to be using, but I didn't buy it because it is much more expensive than powdered compound. The liquid compound costs 30 euro for a 5 kg tub, while a 5 kg bag of powdered coumpound (wich is enough for about 8 kg of prepared compound) costs only 8 euro!
Mudding it up!
So like I said, I started by coating all the styrofoam with monster mud. It was one hell of a task, and afterwards, my knees hurt like hell. I prepared a bit too much drywall compound at once. Even though it stays more or less liquid for a few hours, it already thickens quite a lot after thirty minutes and becomes impossible to work with. I had to throw some away, unfortunately.
In a single afternoon, I coated both pillars top to bottom. I had to squat and sit on my knees a lot, wich was very exhausting. The day after I didn't work on the pillars, not only because I was a bit tired of it but also because I had to make sure the mud had dried enough.
Painting
Two days later, the monster mud was dry enough and I could start painting. I started by painting the mortar between the bricks gray, followed by the base and the top. For the mortar I used a paint brush, but for the rest a roller. Works much, much faster!
Next, I painted the bricks. I mixed some red and brown paint to get the typical dark red brick color. I started by painting a few bricks all over the pillar first, before mixing up a fresh batch of paint. The idea behind this was that this way, all bricks would have a slightly different color. It didn't really work, though, all of them turned out the same color.
At this point the pillars were painted completely, but of course they looked way too dull. By using the magic of drybrushing, I made them look a bit less dull! First of all, the base and top got a layer of black drybrushing, like I did with the tombstones. The bricks all got a bit of pure red paint in the center, so this part looked a bit brighter than the edges.
What made the biggest difference, though, was the green drybrushing. I mixed green with a bit of brown and green and drybrushed it on the base and top, so it resembled moss. Next, I gave each brick some of this color in both upper corners. I was surprised at the result, because it made a gigantic difference!
Last but not least, I painted the protruding tube at the top black. In my next (and final) post, I will explain the arch that spans the gate, and some pictures of the gate at our haunt site.
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