The look that I am trying to achieve here is a bleached, sun baked surface that may have seen some rain sometime in the past.The nail or screw holes were made with a sharp needle in a pattern that indicates some kind of framing structure beneath.I deliberately did not line them up in rows like rivets.I want it to look like it was done by a human hand not machines.After punching in the holes I came back with a sharp HB graphite pencil and twisted a little graphite into each hole to create a nail or screw head.The graphite works well as it has a slight shine to it like it was metal.I then took some very watery raw umber and with a bristle toothbrush I flicked on a spray of paint to look like crud ,mud or fly$1***$2etc...Then with a small round brush and some very watery burnt sienna I touched every nail head and the wood swelled back to level again and soaked up a little rust staining.Try to be subtle when using this technique.Now I will do a little shading with chalk pastels in all the nooks and crannys.I do all my old barnsiding the same way using birch coffee sticks or tongue depressors.Do not seal the wood prior to painting.This is a long tedious process but I think that it is worth the effort in the end.
Once Upon a time.........
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I am a man of few words but lots of pics
I quit drinking beer because the download was taking longer than the upload !
A lot of work to make what looks like an old chicken coop ! This section has yet to be treated with the burnt sienna rusty nail heads look.Although they are hardly noticeable they do add a lot to the finished product.When weathering try to treat each area as a artist would do when painting.Make it interesting for the eye and try not to line things up in rows and right angles etc....or use monotone colors. Treat each piece as an individual part of the whole and put your best effort into it no matter how insignificant it may seem at the time.Avoid trying to rush through the things you don't particularly like doing.
Here is a cool old wood study pic ! The paint looks like it was once a red color that has now faded to orange.The surface looks like it is beyond the cracked paint stage and only a little of the paint stain remains.In this damp environment and a little greenish moss has developed where the wood nears the earths surface.Not a worry in the desert.
OK now here is the finished product ! All it needs is a chicken in the window.This is what I love about wood , nothing can replace the real thing.Each piece is unique and different and has a character of its own.
Does this bench frame look about right to you guys? The width is only about 3 feet, with about 18 inches for the aisle .Were people really that much smaller in those days?
Courtesy of the Sharlot Museum.
Here is one of those circumstances in modeling where a compromise of some kind has to be made.The bench is to scale but the wall of the car is a little too thick which moves the bench seat a little too far into the aisle.(no conductor is that slim) Lucky for me that all the benches are not required to be side by sideas in a normal railway car.I can cheat a bit in the arrangement of the benches and it won't be noticeable.This is one of the difficulties you run into when scatchbuilding by eye alone.
I would say that Claudia's rear end is perfect but big Marshall Dillon out of Dodge city might have to pay for an extra seat.This is Economy class for sure.Like everything else about this station the bench legs need straightening.I grouped the seating arrangement around the wood stove which seems like a natural to me for those cold nights in the desert.
For picture taking purposes I am sure that Sergio widened this set and adjusted the rails to suit the scale.I am not sure exactly how he did it but the left wall seems to have been moved outward with the rail was still placed in the middle.
These little creamers from the coffee shop make excellent tin garbage pails or forms for building wooden ones.I first cut out the bottom disc and then glue on the side pieces,trim the top level and add a band around the top.I painted it burnt umber and then sanded most of it off. I spent way too much time making this but because a lot of the storyline revolves around the symbolism of water I felt it was worth it.However it looks a little large in this scale.I will live with it for a few days and see if I have to make another one and keep this one as a wood bucket.
I decided to give myself an early Christmas present this year and start working on my first locomotive as a movie prop.I have never built one before and am really excited about getting started.The station prop has very little creative stuff left to do except some of the finishing.Every year in Montreal the miniatures people have a show in April and I will wait to see if I can pick up some nice 1/24 scale Victorian furniture for the old stationmasters desk and chairs etc..My background is aviation so I am out of my area right now.I find this exciting but also a little intimidating.Just learning all the new terminology itself will be a challenge .If you see something that is obviously wrong or I am headed in the wrong direction please feel free to jump in at anytime with constructive criticism.Thanks ! Cheers. John. Should be fun !
OK, so step one will be the overall composition and in which direction the train will be heading . This will determine which side of the loco that I will build.I think that clockwise would probably be the best as that is the way most viewers would feel comfortable reading the storyline.Therefore I will be building mostly the R/H side as the prop facing inwards.