Modeling grass?

[Anonymous]

What method / product should be used to model grass? The type of grass I mean is the nicely manicured kind you would see in the yard of a suburban home, not the kind that would be just growing wild in nature. Thanks for any help.

[selector]

You can purchase Woodland Scenics ground foam of different coarseness and colours. Sprinkle at least two colours in a given area, but three, at least lightly, plus some foam 'bushes' will do wonders. Spray liberally with a diluted solution of White Glue or Elmers Carpenter glue (about one part glue to two parts water, plus two drops of dish detergent for penetration of the foam).

Otherwise, purchase foam rubber, acrylic paints in various shades of natural green, and blend them up in an old blender. Let the ground and dyed foam dry, and then shake it on and glue as mentioned.

Experiment on a piece of cardboard to get the feel for it. Then have at it on your layout.

[jfugate]

Fine ground foam works good to model short uniformly cropped grass, as in a well manicured lawn.

Kevin, your scenery photo looks very interesting, although dense vegetation covered slopes don't occur naturally straight up and down as you show ... you need at least a 60 degree slope for it to look like what you see in nature.

The only uniformly straight up and down slopes you see typically are man made, as in a wall of some kind.

Just some things to think about ...

[Newyorkcentralfan]

A couple of bales wrapped in black plastic tucked into the platform of a Mexican road decorated ACF covered hopper?[:D]

Eric

[Anonymous]

Does anyone know what is being used for grass in the upper left hand corner of the cover shot of GMR 2005 on Ted York's layout?

It's in the front yard of a house.

That has to be the most realistic looking manicured grass I've seen.

[bogp40]

A fine manicured lawn would show best with WS T44 and T45 . Apply the brighter green grass and lightly add the burnt grass to obtain variation and the look you want.
Bob K.

[Anonymous]

Has anyone ever modeled rolled sod? That would be a great excuse for some flat land with perfect grass.

Some of Louis Sassi's yards are the best, weeds, small litter etc. In N scale it is really hard to get that weed scattered, varying height grass. Any good tips on achieving that realistic grass?

[howmus]

You may want to consider Woodland Scenics Static Grass Flock. It comes in several colors for different effects. You shake it on to ground that has wet glue applied to it and the grass will "stand up" giving a very realistic appearance of a lawn.

One of the colors is here: http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/785-634

This photo shows the finished result:

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jfugate


Kevin, your scenery photo looks very interesting, although dense vegetation covered slopes don't occur naturally straight up and down as you show ... you need at least a 60 degree slope for it to look like what you see in nature.

The only uniformly straight up and down slopes you see typically are man made, as in a wall of some kind.

Just some things to think about ...

Yeah, that is not the best view to see it from. When viewed from the "front", you can't tell that it is almost vertical. It forms the "illusion" of a tree covered mountain range, which is what I intended it to look like when I built it. After all, our hobby is pretty much all about illusions - making models look like the real thing! [;)] Thanks for the input, though! [:)]