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AVRR-PA
Fireman
USA
4597 Posts |
 Posted - 10/23/2010 : 06:27:29 AM
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Hi, Vagel --
It's really coming along! I'm looking forward to seeing it on Wednesday.
Don |
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Harsco
Fireman
USA
1101 Posts |
Posted - 10/23/2010 : 08:48:10 AM
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| Outstanding backdrop! I'm a HUGE fan of "Fall in PA"...the colors are always eye-popping....great job capturing that... |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
720 Posts |
Posted - 10/23/2010 : 1:43:48 PM
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Thanks for the compliments, guys. When you decide to tackle fall foliage you always have to worry about doing too little or too much. I'm glad this technique has worked out the way it has, but, MAN, does it take time!? It's better than modeling threes, though! |
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Harsco
Fireman
USA
1101 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2010 : 06:34:02 AM
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Vagel...you hit the nail on the head: possibly "overdoing" the colors. Personally, I think 50 to 60% of the tree population has to be green or a variation of green; the Pennsylvania hillsides I see (except for possibly a few days at "peak") always have more green in them than we perceive.
I've futzed with this for awhile now and tried spritzing an India ink/alcohol wash onto the vivid red, yellow and orange foliage to tone them down a little...it seems to work fairly well. Another idea I'm toying with is starting with a light green tree, then airbrushing yellow and/or red and/or orange onto the top surfaces in an attempt to replicate the turning process... |
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AVRR-PA
Fireman
USA
4597 Posts |
Posted - 10/24/2010 : 8:42:14 PM
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I've been working on a roll-around cabinet for Vagel that will fit under the layout and store all the rolling stock. There will be 11 drawers. Here are 10 of them. (They're clamped to the bench to make sure they stay flat while I'm working on them.)
The next step - and it will take a few days - is to glue in all the dividers. Garth came up with a good system - a pair of "combs" that locate the dividers and also serve as clamping cauls to press them firmly against the drawer bottoms. I'll glue in the dividers with West Systems marine epoxy, which will help keep the drawers flat.
Given epoxy curing time, I can do at most two drawers per day; one per day is more likely since I can't always find as much shop time as I'd like.
Once all 11 drawers are done, I'll wrap a plywood case around them. We're probably looking at three more weeks before it's finished.
Don
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
720 Posts |
Posted - 10/26/2010 : 10:39:06 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Harsco
Personally, I think 50 to 60% of the tree population has to be green or a variation of green; the Pennsylvania hillsides I see (except for possibly a few days at "peak") always have more green in them than we perceive.
I've futzed with this for awhile now and tried spritzing an India ink/alcohol wash onto the vivid red, yellow and orange foliage to tone them down a little...it seems to work fairly well. Another idea I'm toying with is starting with a light green tree, then airbrushing yellow and/or red and/or orange onto the top surfaces in an attempt to replicate the turning process...
Always with the 'futzing'![:-mischievous]
I totally agree with your proportions ... in fact I've been observing the same mountainsides for 20+ years now and truly believe that "average" peak -- a function of annual precipitation levels, first frost, mean temperatures during late-Sep/early-Oct, presence/duration of 'Indian Summer', and arrival of late-Oct cold front w/ rain and high winds (which is happening as I write this) -- contains at least 30% light-to-medium green in the overall coloration proportion. This year, by the way, the peak in South-Central PA was especially long and especially rich in fall colors and straddled last weekend. I was privileged this year to have had occasion to be in the same areas on back to back weekends, and the Tuscarora, Sidling Hill, Broad Top Mountain, and Wrays Hill ridges were just magnificent in early morning sun as late as yesterday.
I will add, though, that the color intensity was very subdued unless one was seeing it in low morning or low afternoon sun (or through brown-tinted sun glasses). So, Rick, your toning down formula for WS puff balls is well received ... other techniques I've had success with is a dusting of Floquil "Weathering" from the spray can held about two feet away or just letting layout dust do the job. After a while, though, the dust gets too heavy, but you can re-invigorate the colors with an over-spray of 91% alcohol.
Vagel |
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Orionvp17
Fireman
USA
2806 Posts |
Posted - 10/26/2010 : 11:25:29 PM
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Vagel et al,
I've had pretty good luck toning down garish autumn foliage with a rattle can of "rusty metal primer." This is an oxide red, and if applied as a dusting it kills the garish look.
You might try spray painting the trees with yellow first (the really cheap stuff from the Enormous Company That Shall Remain Nameless), then mist on various green, orange and red combinations to get the desired effect. Several folks with far more talent than I use this technique to get excellent results.
To my eye, at least, the so-called "spring" foliage colors also work well on autumn trees, as around here the departure of the chlorophyll causes a light green to precede the spectacular autumn color.
Good luck!
Pete
in Michigan |
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jbvb
Fireman
USA
1856 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2010 : 07:36:27 AM
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| A sugarbush (all sugar maple) that's being actively tended and underlaid by a single soil type will sometimes go all at once. I don't know if that's appropriate for your bit of Pennsylvania. |
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Neil M
Fireman
Australia
2173 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2010 : 08:14:57 AM
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| I would also suggest trying using light green foam and then dabbing it with yellow and orange paint. A lot of the trees around here are getting golden from the edges inwards. The leaves further down the trees are still green but out at the periphery they are turning, giving quite a muted effect overall |
Built a waterfront HO layout in Ireland http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=22161 but now making a start in On30 in Australia |
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clif
Engine Wiper
USA
210 Posts |
Posted - 10/28/2010 : 12:13:53 AM
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| I noticed the same effect here in Kentucky. Trees with green leaves on the inside and yellow, orange and red leaves on the outside. Mostly hardwoods like maples. |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
720 Posts |
Posted - 10/28/2010 : 5:51:11 PM
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Hi, All. Over the past few days I've extended the painted mountainside around behind the blast furnace site. Here are a couple pictures of progress. I'm going for the blighted landscape look behind the blast furnace; all that Sulfur Dioxide from the beehive coke ovens (off scene) is not friendly to plant life. This is a furnace that would've been idle between 1929 and say, 1936, giving time for scrub trees and undergrowth to repopulate the mountainside, only to be stunted by when the coke ovens started up again. Wifey saw it for the first time last night and gets it ... of course, she's been living with an Environmental Historian; maybe I'll need to post interpretive signage around this layout![:-graduate] I need to go back and sponge-in a more subtle transition zone, though.
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Frederic Testard
Engineer
France
16441 Posts |
Posted - 10/28/2010 : 6:00:48 PM
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Nice progress, Vagel, these forested mountains look very good.
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Frederic Testard |
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AVRR-PA
Fireman
USA
4597 Posts |
Posted - 10/28/2010 : 9:45:55 PM
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Interpretive signs would be good. 
And don't forget the "Clean Coal My ***!" billboards.
Seriously, it looks really good.
Good news on Drawer #1 - with Garth's help, I was able to remove and salvage the dividers so they can be switched to the new spacing.
Don |
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MarkF
Engineer
USA
9270 Posts |
Posted - 10/28/2010 : 11:02:27 PM
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| The backdrop looks great Vagel! Just sponge painting? And a nice hint of the fall colors. Well done! |
Mark
See my homepage at http://home.comcast.net/~prrndiv/
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
720 Posts |
Posted - 10/29/2010 : 01:32:29 AM
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Thanks for the encouraging responses. Mark, to answer your question, yes, only sponges. I did cheat a bit on this section by using a brush to paint in the basic dark brown under story color, although the time I saved wound up being wasted since I ended up going back over it with a sponge later anyway. I adapted a technique that I discovered on the Backdrops thread on this particular Railroad Construction forum:
http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=3884
Go to the link above and scroll to p. 3 ... look for the first of a series of posts from 2004 by Dry Fork, a guy named Rick Chase from Richmond, VA, and follow him through the next two or three pages ... he apparently dropped from the forum after only 66 posts; what a shame!?
Chase's tutorial on how to paint fall hillsides with sea sponges and acrylic tube paints and the DVD on speedy hand-carved rocks by Doug Fascale ... courtesy of Don's heads-up, are among the top five "Road to Damascus" moments in my model railroading career!
Don, by "clean coal my (xyz)," do you mean to say it ain't so, Joe? ... as in the following photo taken in Shamokin, PA (just a few miles west of Sa-mokin' Centralia) two weeks ago? ...
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New Home for the Blacklog & Shade Gap Eastern
