DIY Practical Effects

In this text you will learn how to create practical effects yourself.

DIY (n.) short for “do it yourself”; doing something or creating something yourself rather than paying someone else to do it or purchasing a product someone else made.

Practical Effects (n.) short for “practical special effects”; a type of special effects (SFX) created physically (without the use of computer generated imagery (CGI) or other post-product effects).

Who Creates Practical Effects

Traditionally practical effects were (and even still are) used for movies, for TV shows, for TV commercials, and for photography.

Nowadays (whether acknowledged or not) practical effects are (also) created by:

• aquarium hardscapes,
• articulated comic book art (ACBA) artists,
• diorama creators,
• paludarium hardscapes,
• kit bashers,
• scratch builders,
• tabletop gaming terrain builders,
• terrarium hardscapes,
• toy photographers,
• vivarium hardscapes.

What this means for you is that, if you are interested in learning how to create practical effects yourself, then there can be people in each of those communities that you can learn from.

Index

• Materials
  • Cheese Cloth
  • Concrete
  • Methyl Ethyl Ketone (MEK)
  • Pewter
  • Polyethylene
    • High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE)
  • Polystyrene
    • Extruded Polystyrene (XPS)
    • Polystyrene Sheets
  • Resin
  • Steel
    • Steel Sheet Metal
• Products
  • Armatures
  • Dioramas
  • Stands
• Techniques
  • Casting
    • Injection Molding
    • Lost Foam Casting
    • Lost Wax Casting
  • Coloring Resin
  • HDPE Recycling
  • Painting
    • Airbrush Painting
    • Dry Brushing
  • Weathering
• Tools
  • Airbrush
  • Airbrush Cleaner
  • Mold Box
    • Don Wood Tapered Mold Box