Toning down foliage

[stebbycentral]

OK, so inspired by a lot of pictures of fall foliage posted to this website in the WPF thread, I decided to add some autumn color to my layout.  I picked up some pre-made fall trees (Woodland Scenics) and started to distribute them among the summer folliage on the layout.  OMG they are brightly colored.  It looks like a crayon box exploded on my forrest!  Any suggestions as to how to tone down the effect from those of you who have done this before?  I'm thinking watercolors in a neutral shade, but I'm not sure if that would be effective.

[wmshay06]

There are several problems with these trees that you can work on to fix:

trunk/branch color - should be a grey/brown color
add green foliage - except for about 2 weeks of peak color, green will dominate the color scheme.  Use some fine green WS foam for this.  Spray the tree with hair spray,etc and sprinkle the green foam on here and there
add a bit of yellowish (brunt grass works for this) foam highlights
add a bit of brown foam to the under side to give it some shadow effect

 You could also try some spray paint to the do the same - but it will be a bit harder to control.

As you can see a lot of work is required to fix these up.  My fall trees aren't WS for this very reason - but I have used the clump folliage in a pinch and still need to 'doctor' these areas a bit more. You can see what I mean in these two photos.  The WS clumps are on the left hand side of the bottom photo.

 

 

Hope this helps..

 

Charles

[loathar]

You could try adding some greenish ground cover to them. Most fall trees still have some green on them. Or airbrush some muted fall colors over them to tone down the brightness.
That's one of the reasons I don't like fall scenes. The trees stand out like a sore thumb. It takes real artistic talent to get the colors just right. I bet I've only seen a handful of fall layouts that I thought looked good.

[twhite]

My railroad is set in the Sierra Nevada in late October, and I'm replacing all of my WS fall trees with SuperTrees for the same reason you stated--clumpish and too bright.  The WS trees represent fall trees at 'peak' color, and it's seldom that all fall trees reach peak at the same time.  Here in the Sierra Nevada's, fall peaks at different elevations--the highest elevations first, then lower elevations.  And even then, certain types of deciduous trees do not 'peak' at the same time as others, so you might see a maple tree at full peak, with an elm standing next to it just starting to turn and poplar already bare. 

As several posters have recommended, I'd add a sprinkling of WS ground foam in green and paler grass shades to the trees--I use cheap hair spray to affix the foam.  You'll still have 'clump' trees, but the colors will be more realistic and muted.  Don't be afraid to leave a few at full 'peak' here and there, it gives good contrast.  But for the most part, a more muted approach is more realistic. 

Tom