Laser-cut plants are thin paper and card sheets with leaf shapes cut precisely to outline; once pressed out, shaped and assembled they give a plant with a profile that neither plastic nor resin can match. The choice covers water lilies, ivy, ferns, sedge, burdock, sunflowers, monstera, banana plants and complete jungle sets, mostly in scales from 1:56 to 1:24.
How the sheets are worked, painted and assembled is described below, along with how long one plant realistically takes.
A real leaf in 1:35 is thinner than a tenth of a millimetre. A casting cannot reach that thickness, because it would break on release from the mould, so every plastic leaf carries an edge the eye can see. Laser-cut paper has its thickness exactly where it should be, and it can be shaped as well. That is where the technique gets its strength: seen from the side, a single leaf looks like a leaf rather than a small plate. The drawback is labour - every piece has to be released, painted, bent and glued on its own.
The quickest route is to spray the whole sheet before the individual parts are broken out. Spray both faces, with the underside a shade lighter and greyer. The material is thin, so a heavy coat will cockle it; work with several very light passes.
A flat cut-out leaf looks like a paper sticker. Draw it over the edge of a pair of tweezers, fold it along its midrib and ripple the margins slightly. On larger leaves it helps to damp the paper lightly, shape it and let it dry - it then holds the shape by itself.
Glue with cyanoacrylate from the tip of a cocktail stick, working from the lower leaves upwards around a wire or printed stem. Remember that leaves do not grow in one plane: rotate each successive one by several tens of degrees. With jungle sets it pays to build two or three plants first and only then decide where on the scene they will go.
Reckon on an hour of work for a single plant. In return it is detail that stays visible on the scene and cannot be bought ready-made - the surrounding growth can then be caught up with quicker materials from scenic accessories.
