A partially completed 4-way corridor intersection. Floor is black foamcore, 9 inches x 9 inches. The grid texture on the floor is a piece of 7 mesh plastic canvas normally used for needlepoint projects and found in any craft or sewing store, or the craft section of Wal-Mart. I glued the plastic to the foamcore with 3M Super 77 spray adhesive which did not melt the exposed edges of the foamcore and did not warp the base as it dried.

Four of the 8 wall pieces are in place in this picture. The walls are more sections of black foamcore 2 inches high, joining to make corridors 3" long and 3" wide, meeting at a 3" x 3" open space in the middle of this floor section. I added most of the wall detail pieces while the wall sections were laying flat, then glued the walls to the floor with white glue.

This part of the ship will be painted white with grey floors. Some halls and bays will have more exposed pipes and machinery and will be painted in darker metallic colors.

Overhead view of complete corridor intersection, unpainted:

I originally planned to cut the corridor floors in a + shape, but basing the intersections on simple squares made construction easier and may help make the starship layout look more solid.

Figure-level view of the walls:

The details on the walls of some of the corridor pieces are partly inspired by pictures of Leia's ship interior from the beginning of the original Star Wars Episode IV. The rows of square panels are mostly made from surplus button covers originally designed for the keypad of some electronic device. There also is one panel on each wall cut from the same plastic canvas as the floor, perhaps representing some sort of duct cover.

Instead of curving the bottom of the walls like the original movie set, I simply added a strip of 'poly strapping' -- the plastic strips used to help keep large boxes closed in shipping, embossed with a diamond grid pattern. I covered the exposed foam along the top edges and the vertical end of one of the walls with pieces of patterned plastic cut from used tie wraps (cable ties).

Wall details:

I always use an unpainted miniature to test terrain pieces during construction.

These unfinished pieces happen to look like some of the Death Star control rooms -- black walls with grey and a few splashes of color.

Corner area:

Details on this side of the wall include some of the plastic bits that are used to hold the security wires found inside so many toy packages these days. A piece of plastic model sprue runs up the inside corner like a pipe or conduit, strengthening the connections between the walls and floor.

In my plan for a table-sized starship layout these corner spaces are inaccessible. But I'm detailing this side of the walls too because an alternative layout might use this space as part of a hall or room. Also the outside of the walls might be more visible to onlookers, and I want all visible surfaces to look finished.

I'm using minimal flat details on some room walls so I can place separate models of equipment against the walls to customize the layout.

I considered covering all the exposed outside edges of the foamcore with strips of plastic or cardstock, but decided against this in part because it would change the dimensions of the finished pieces. I'm using only black foamcore for the main structural pieces. The black tends to cut more neatly than the white and looks reasonably good when left bare or covered with a light coating of white glue.

Fitting different sections together (Update August 31, 2004):

Here are two corridor sections fitted together, a 9"x9" four-way intersection and a simple straight 6" piece. The floors fit together pretty well no matter how I turn them, and there is only a small gap visible at the tops of the walls where they meet. I think it looks good considering that I cut out all these pieces by hand with an ordinary straight razor blade. I test fit all the new pieces next to a finished piece then trim the walls as needed to make sure they match up correctly before glueing them to the floor.

Painting the Base Coat (Update September 18, 2004):

After experimenting with the paint, I sprayed a grey primer over my first efforts then sprayed a gloss white onto the walls. I painted a medium grey onto the floor with a brush, then painted the square mesh pieces on the walls black and drybrushed them with a hint of gunmetal.

I am considering simply sealing this piece and calling it finished. Most of the 3-D relief on the walls casts its own shadows, so painting blue-grey shadows under all the details may be redundant. Other sections of grimy metallic walls could receive different paint treatments.

Several problems have appeared. The foamcoare floor has warped due to applying several layers of paint on top. It took a lot of grey paint to get into all the little holes in the floor grid. I'll try painting the bottom of the base to see if that warps it back the other way. I might experiment with spraypainting walls and floors separately before assembling them, just for this section of the ship that has such a high contrast between the two colors.

There are lots of tiny bumps on the walls remaining from my first attempts to brush on a thick gloss white paint. It looks fine until you lean in close, then the walls look fuzzy.

Because the floor is a textured soft plastic, it is possible that the grey paint will not survive more than a few games with figures based on metal washers. I already have many corridor floor pieces partly assembled, but I may switch to a different floor texture for the larger rooms.

Two plastic Rebel troopers from WOTC for scale.

Back to my Terrain page.