Buff Medium Ballast Bag

Ocher rubble for dry and baking scenes

In the medium fraction a light ocher tone behaves quite differently than in the fine one. The grains cast small shadows of their own, so an area stops being uniform and gains relief even without further toning. That suits places where it is meant to be visible that somebody crushed or pushed the stone recently: quarry areas, the foot of a rock face or a road cleared through rubble.

Suitable scenes

• a quarry or a sand pit with heaps of crushed stone
• a dried-out bed in which only light pebbles are left
• an access road to a fortification laid with local material
• the edge of a field road in a dry landscape, where dust mixes with small rubble

Light grains react to the lighting of a scene more sensitively than dark ones, so check the result under the light the diorama is going to stand in. If an area comes across as too chalky, a very thin brown wash helps, which runs into the gaps and emphasizes the outline of the individual grains. Release the soaking with a dropper so that it saturates the layer right down to its lower edge; an under-saturated layer later comes loose in whole flakes.

For larger areas it is practical to alternate this fraction with a finer one of the same color. The transition then has no visible boundary and the surface looks sorted in the way stone settles in reality. The package holds 353 cm³.

Try the shade out on an offcut of the base beforehand, because once the binder has dried the color darkens somewhat. The difference is small, but with light materials you notice it the moment you compare a finished area with a dry sample.