Terrain Workshop: Ground Cover part 1

I have been working on improving my terrain lately. Until now I have been using the quite basic painted sand method, which works quite well for basing miniatures.
After reading up a bit I wanted to try several different methods for ground cover. I have heard good things about both the filler+PVA+sand+paint and Papier-maché methods. I started by preparing five pieces of roughly cut 5x5cm plasticard.

Here we have the different testers. The first one is just plain old PVA with sand strewn on top. Number two is  a mix of polyfilla (filler), PVA, sand and raw umber acrylic paint. Numbers three to five are papier-maché: plain, with sand pressed in and the last one pre-mixed with sand and acrylic paint.

I then painted the first sample, and touched up some areas on the second one that had white plasticard showing through.

1. Sand + PVA

2. Polyfilla + Sand + PVA + Acrylic paint

Another view of #2

The last three samples where a bit of a surprise. I had heard that papier-maché could cause warping, but I never thought such a thin layer would cause so much warping. As you can see, all samples with papier-maché suffered from warping. The last one could even be removed from the plasticard in one piece. This could however prove useful if you'd want thin sheets of ground texture. I guess if using papier-maché you need to use thick material underneath, to prevent warping.

4. Papier-maché + Sand

5. Papier-maché + Sand + Acrylic Paint

Overall, before painting and scatter, I think I'd rank papier-maché as having the best texture followed by the Polyfilla+PVA+sand+paint mix.