I'll let the photos show some of the steps in building these wood models:
Monday, September 3, 2012
Company Town
I've installed the grouping of buildings that make up the "Company Town", just adjacent to the still unfinished coal tipple.
I'll let the photos show some of the steps in building these wood models:
I'll let the photos show some of the steps in building these wood models:
Trees
Trees and vegetation really begin to bring things to life!
Tree making 101: I start with Super Trees from Scenery Express. What you get in the "Value Cases" is a big "bush" of natural plant material that, when separated out, looks amazingly like scale trees. They claim it's from Denmark - what do I know about plants? I've read some people say it's a plant called Sedum, and you can grow your own in the back yard. Well, that's not happening. Anyway, they look good, except they tend to have a natural curve I need to get rid of.
I work in the kitchen for the first steps - another advantage of being single... here's a batch separated from the bush into individual trees - all shapes and sizes.
Then they go into a huge pot of water to boil for a minimum of 20 minutes. It smells kind of like kale when it's cooking...
Then outside, I've rigged up a clothesline under the deck to hang them upside down, with extra clothespins for weight. The boiling and hanging straightens the trees out.
When dry, I spray paint the lower stems with cheap light grey primer.
When the paint is dry, I dip the lower painted part into a mixture of alcohol and black India ink. I think the combination of the grey primer and the ink dip gives the "trunks" the right grey color, highlighted in a darker tone.
Here they're laid out for the ink to dry.
Next, holding the trunk in a gloved hand to mask it, I spray on 3M Super 77 hi-tack adhesive. It is ready to work with in seconds.
Now it gets fun. I use Noch Professional Leaf Flake in a variety of shades for the foliage. Some flake is poured into the Turbo Tree canister. Actually, I modified mine by transferring all the guts into a little larger container of Utz Pretzels. The Tubo Tree is a little pricey, and it looked like something I could probably make myself - but as someone in the manufacturing field, I appreciate the cost of innovation and engineering, so I bought one. It worked great, except I found a little larger container worked better, so now I have about a 2-year supply of pretzels.
I tried to get a video of this thing in action, but failed miserably... but it works really well, distributing the leaf flake evenly onto the tree sprayed with hi-tack. The trees are then placed upright into a scrap of foamboard with holes poked in it to allow the glue to dry.
Finally, I sprinkle on a random dusting of a fine highlight color - browns, yellows, reds - and give the trees a spray of cheap, unscented, super-duper hold hair spray to keep everything together.
Planting is easy into the foam scenery base - poke a hole with an awl, add a dab of hot glue, and plant. Smaller pieces of Super Tree material, with leaf flake added, are used as underbrush to fill in the gaps.
I keep count of the trees as I plant them - the current count is 132 trees!
Tree making 101: I start with Super Trees from Scenery Express. What you get in the "Value Cases" is a big "bush" of natural plant material that, when separated out, looks amazingly like scale trees. They claim it's from Denmark - what do I know about plants? I've read some people say it's a plant called Sedum, and you can grow your own in the back yard. Well, that's not happening. Anyway, they look good, except they tend to have a natural curve I need to get rid of.
I work in the kitchen for the first steps - another advantage of being single... here's a batch separated from the bush into individual trees - all shapes and sizes.
Then they go into a huge pot of water to boil for a minimum of 20 minutes. It smells kind of like kale when it's cooking...
Then outside, I've rigged up a clothesline under the deck to hang them upside down, with extra clothespins for weight. The boiling and hanging straightens the trees out.
When dry, I spray paint the lower stems with cheap light grey primer.
When the paint is dry, I dip the lower painted part into a mixture of alcohol and black India ink. I think the combination of the grey primer and the ink dip gives the "trunks" the right grey color, highlighted in a darker tone.
Here they're laid out for the ink to dry.
Next, holding the trunk in a gloved hand to mask it, I spray on 3M Super 77 hi-tack adhesive. It is ready to work with in seconds.
Now it gets fun. I use Noch Professional Leaf Flake in a variety of shades for the foliage. Some flake is poured into the Turbo Tree canister. Actually, I modified mine by transferring all the guts into a little larger container of Utz Pretzels. The Tubo Tree is a little pricey, and it looked like something I could probably make myself - but as someone in the manufacturing field, I appreciate the cost of innovation and engineering, so I bought one. It worked great, except I found a little larger container worked better, so now I have about a 2-year supply of pretzels.
I tried to get a video of this thing in action, but failed miserably... but it works really well, distributing the leaf flake evenly onto the tree sprayed with hi-tack. The trees are then placed upright into a scrap of foamboard with holes poked in it to allow the glue to dry.
Finally, I sprinkle on a random dusting of a fine highlight color - browns, yellows, reds - and give the trees a spray of cheap, unscented, super-duper hold hair spray to keep everything together.
Planting is easy into the foam scenery base - poke a hole with an awl, add a dab of hot glue, and plant. Smaller pieces of Super Tree material, with leaf flake added, are used as underbrush to fill in the gaps.
I keep count of the trees as I plant them - the current count is 132 trees!
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