An Alien Poo-er Plant?

Most of my crafting is targeted primarily at D&D, in part because so many examples and tutorials are based around items created for a medieval-ish, fantasy-ish universe. But I’ve been trying to add a little scenery for my Mighty Protectors campaign as well.

In an upcoming session my players will find themselves aboard a reported-missing cargo ship which, it seems, is infested by hive-mind alien insectoids capable of assembling slimy, eerie organic machines far superior to our earthly technologies. One of the items they’ve built inside their captive vessel is a big power plant in the cargo hold, around which much of the action will be centered.

It’s been a while since our last MP session, and I wanted to build some props for this one. The power plant itself was an obvious choice, but I didn’t really see too many opportunities to re-use the piece so I didn’t want to dedicate too much time or money to it.

I also wanted it to be alien, abstract, asymmetrical, and at least a little bit disgusting. While I think I achieved these goals reasonably well given the limited resources that went into it, I can’t escape the fact that it ended up looking rather like a (possibly diseased) alien creature left behind a particularly unpleasant pile of metallic-blue fecal matter.

I’m also not necessarily saying that look is a bad thing.

Building the Poo Tower

The structural ingredients consisted of an empty whipped cream tub, a plastic cup, and an old can of small-gap-filler spray foam I had lying around. I started out by just circling the tub and cup with rings of spray foam, creating a layer and letting it dry a while, then adding another, slightly narrower layer, and leaving the tops uncovered. The foam wasn’t very consistent in how well it held its shape so in places the structure became saggy and/or lopsided… which was fine and fit the sort of look I was going for.

I deliberately left a few gaps on the top section and poked a few holes with a stick after it was dry, with an eye toward dropping some multi-colored tea lights inside where they could shine through the cracks.

The pieces were coated with some glossy blue metallic spray paint. When it was dry, I mixed a neon green craft paint with another bright green, then watered the mix down into a wash. I proceeded to dribble this all over the pieces, where it settled into the many natural nooks and crannies created by the spray foam and added a slimy, wet, glowing look.

Stacked together with flickering multi-color tea lights inside in a dimly lit room, the end result looks both creepy and hideous – pretty much exactly what I was trying for! (But also, sadly, very difficult to photograph with a six-year-old mobile phone.)

Lights-on pictures of it don’t do justice to its low-light eeriness, but this is the end product.