During my initial reseach I visited a rocky beach in order to take pictures of rocks to get some idea of colour, texture and the types of seaweeds and shells present.
After having used alginate on the practice moulding and having advice from visiting industry proffessionals I considered using alginate to take impressions from shore rocks to save time in sculpting. However, I was concerned about contaminating or disturbing the shore environment. I have done some research into alginate to find out more about it, however in the end I decided to simply sculpt my rocks myself.