How to make Wooden Beams out of FOAM

[@LivingAnachronism]

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[@fauxmarmorer9544]

Hello! EVA Foamsmith here. 4 years of foamwork under my belt. Do not get your foam from Michael's, its tempting for the price, I know. It cuts terribly, it heat seals poorly, it takes paint like a sponge. Invest in sks props' hd foam, it is night and day. When melting foam, use a respirator, or do it outside. To flatten it, leave it on the floor, or a table with weights where it bows for 1-2 days. When Sanding, use a dust mask or a respirator, it is nasty stuff. Sharpen your knife after every cut!(yes, that often), when cutting foam, take it in as long of a cut as possibly, not several small cuts. If it doesn't cut like a stick of butter, your knife is too dull, don't tear it! If you plan on using a Dremel, use a flex head attachment(It makes it much more wieldy). Heat seal with a heat gun before painting. And finally Seal with something before painting(plastidip works, but can be finicky, try at your own risk, if making wood, leave those brush strokes following the grain, it adds depth! That's all folks! Just trying to save others before they make my foolish mistakes 😁 I you desire more knowledge on Prop making, I recommend sks props, punished props, and ashen warrior props. They have excellent painting, technique, and construction tutorials!

[@Lorienhal]

Steven is amazing for making his produ ts! I definitely have made use of my 35% off coupon code from Blick Art supplies for being a patron of SKS and a member of Blick

[@Wintermute909]

Great summary! It looks super helpful! I'm a draftsman but I started just a little too late to use pencils and make foam models of the building we were designing.....but the first company I started at still had a room full of all their old foam tools and a quarter finished building model. I used to always sigh when I walked past that room.

[@motagrad2836]

For a more rigid surface and to make it look like stone gesso works as a base coat 🙂

[@markfergerson2145]

Remarkable. This same technique was used in the 1970s by home builders and remodelers to make fake ceiling beams. Nice to see it being used by us home gamers. As an aside, my 70 year old wife (I’m 72) just found and binge watched the entire Witcher series. We were both rather surprised that none of the descriptions we have both seen of the program mentioned any of the nudity. Not that we’re prudes or anything, it was just a passing surprise. She’s now slightly depressed that there isn’t any more.

[@Sawtooth44]

that final modpodge layer makes it look like you applied some wood polish to it, a very nice look

[@jaytucker7873]

Pro tip: mix black paint with your Modpodge 1 to 2 ratio. That way you can spot all the spots you missed with the Modpodge AND it base coats at the same time!

[@RomaniRai]

Just a fun idea for joining two bits of foam when they aren’t long enough, traditionally when two pieces of timber needed to be joined they would use a joint such as a scarf joint which you could easily emulate with the foam to give it even more depth of detail for the aesthetics!

[@AnachronisticArmory569]

AWESOME! great to see ya back!

[@Kargoneth]

@18:37 "Six of one, half a dozen of the other." is how I've always heard that phrase.

[@1HankDaTank1]

set looks awesome!! might do something like this in my basement

[@robertjensen1438]

I just got a wooden motorcycle. It has a wooden frame, wooden handle bars, wooden wheels, and a wooden seat. Guess what? It wooden start.

[@beowulfshaeffer8444]

Yes, set production 👏👏

[@pkerep1]

Greetings from Croatia !!! Question: Why didn't you just put a wooden beam and apply Wood Coating to make it darker and make the grain more noticeable? Why use foam?

[@ice4cow]

I was wondering the same thing. Seems like a lot of work to make it seem like wood. Why not just buy some wooden skirting boards that can be oiled, painted or done however you wish? At least here in Latvia we can buy one skirting board of 2.25 or so meter length for 3-5 bucks, yet work involved here doesn't seem worth saving such a small amount of money.

[@madcatlady]

after running extremely knotty pine floorboards all around the top of my room for my cats to use as a superhighway I wondered the same thing, they were $15 each downunder and the entire length of the room

[@travishancock9120]

Wait, did I hear you right? Welcome to Utah, Kramer! We are glad to have you here!

[@brymanxl]

Heyyyy! I just did something like this over and over to make a medieval tavern!

[@jerrylangford2991]

I did essentially this for the ceiling in my own Medieval-themed room. And foam-stone. You could try that next.

[@CreepyMF]

Really does look great and you couldn't tell it was painted foam.

[@madcatlady]

floorboards are pretty cheap and pinus radiata has lots of lovely knots

[@brightfaith8403]

That looks so nice what the heck

[@ericanderson4436]

If you don't have, or don't want the wood burner or dremmel. 1. Yes you do. 2. a box knife and heat gun (or hair dryer) works good. Just spend the $20 and get the wood burner.

[@neoaliphant]

I did somthing similar, most of our house has 200 year old exposed beams, but one room has modern joists and pine flooring because of a fire, so to make it blend in we made fake beams similar to this, they did well as conduits as hollow to hide the electrical cabling....

[@jimlarosee8899]

To everyone saying to just use real wood, offhand I can think of a few reasons. If it’s a rental, you aren’t supposed to make “permanent” alterations. The extra weight. Woodworking tools can be more expensive and possibly scary to use for a novice. I do temporary props for my photography so weight, portability and storage are issues.

[@BluestoneGargoyle]

Modge podge also has a matte version.

[@darrelljacobjr2120]

Just lightly drag a coarse wire brush down the length of the foam board, then stain with paint cut with water.

[@Kargoneth]

If you get a foam that shrinks with heat, you can slit the surface if the foam and use a heat gun to shrink the surface. This will turn the slits into grooves. Unfortunately, getting paint inside the grooves without filling the grooves would be quite difficult without a paint that is thinned out, which, depending on the thinner, may cause the foam to dissolve.

[@Kargoneth]

*surface of the

[@SiegfriedSTM]

Why not just use wood?

[@peinoftheakatsukiXx]

Weight and cost.

[@TheWampam]

While those grooves are very common on faux wood, I have never seen an actual piece of wood containing them.

[@noaccount2494]

I've seen old rustic wood that had the grooves. The wood was very very old and any protection it may have had had long worn away.

[@TheWampam]

​@@noaccount2494 The old wood I know, while it is sometimes warped or has horrible looking splits and a damaged surface, I never saw those grooves alon its length. Maybe it is a sort of (American) wood that makes those grooves when aging

[@jimlarosee8899]

@@TheWampamI’ve seen it on old untreated wood exposed to the elements, but it’s usually more subtle.

[@NicholasNappi]

Honestly i rather just carve a piece of wood and have a real wood beam. I don’t do larp so I don’t use foam like that but I do do reenactment and i do however like the look and personally i really rather have the real thing.

[@xxindigoAphrodithexx]

Where's the link to the original video

[@creaksmcgee6620]

Awesome! But would it be better to just use actual wood fake beams?

[@purpleboye_]

Tbh it might be easier and cheaper to use real wood

[@marcogenovesi8570]

for small details like he did, yes. If you want to do larger fake beams or something with a complex shape, foam is better

[@marcogenovesi8570]

also worth noting that the foam for these things is flame retardant and will either just char or snuff out the flame, so it's better for fire safety

[@FerdinandAugustinus-j6t]

l'll some day put foam arches into my house.

[@TristanWegner-mw3id]

I just worked a piece of wood for a week and threw it away because it lacked something don't surround urself with stuff like this go for real

[@gandalfilgrigio97]

maybe i missed the point but ins't it cheaper/quicker to use real wood? i like the look but working with foam seems much more complicated

[@thatfunkymonkey]

Dude, a piece of 1" x 4" x 8' pine is like $5. Rip it in half and nail it to the wall. The best part is it already looks like wood because...wait for it ...its wood 🤔

[@Myzelfa]

I don't want to sound critical, this is a genuine question: why not use real wood? Is it just that it's too heavy to attach safely to a wall without making holes?

[@cirquestar6618]

You are wasting time and materials. EVA foam is not needed, just cut 2" strips of you're pink foam, miter one edge and join at 90 degrees, then to the same detail steps. also mod dodge is just PVA glue that you are over paying for and command strips are just double sided carpet tape. I've worked 30 years in FX. EVA is great for costumes but kinda overkill for set dressing

[@monstremarguerite6121]

I need home renovation millennials to stay away from this video

[@Blondie42]

For shame that the Utah home builders 👷‍♂️ didn't make your house to medieval specifications. 😉

[@lifigrugru6396]

Realy sorry, but would not way easyer to take a right mass pine? you can draw on it white a scruedriver, easy to paint, cost not much.

[@Justin_Black]

First!

[@MatthewSwain]

Drybrush my guy.

[@vyr01]

You got your p.o. box set up yet?

[@Bornahorse]

Sorry, but the shots of you using the heat tool and some of the detail painting are blurry and shot from the wrong side, It is impossible to see what you're doing because your hand is in the way. For tutorials on making it's better to have more shots of you working with voiceover than just sitting talking about it. You have good ideas and good tips in the video but it needs condensing. Half an hour is a long video for one wood beam, even though the beam does look great when you're done. Not hating, just being honest.

[@noaccount2494]

For people asking why not use wood that is not always the best option. For someone with only a knife and a rotatory tool or woodburner it would be rather hard to cut the wood right them finish it and attach. Also if you are making a larp prop you often need to make them from foam for safety.

[@Kargoneth]

Foam dulls knives? Must be a very abrasive material.

[@Lorienhal]

EVA Foam has small bits of metal in it to help with the rigidity. The insulation foam is a high density fiberglass-like product. So both are definitely abrasive on knives

[@Kargoneth]

@@Lorienhal Very interesting and good to know. Thanks!