Over the last week or so I've made a bit of progress shaping the ridge on the left side. There was lots of wood filler applied and grinding done to work in the shapes. Still lots to go. Once some parts were sort of done - like down in the lower left - I painted on some gesso to unify the colour so I could get a better sense of the shape. Then I thought I better unbag the right side and give some thought to shaping and balancing the entire layout as a unified whole. So, I think the next step will be to start filling in the major landmarks over the entire piece to make sure it balances out.
* I haven't forgotten the layout just yet :-)
It's going to change drastically when you cover over the right side mountains/tunnels. But I'm imagining a coved backdrop across the backside and the full right side, giving those mountains more distance and maybe the far corner hilltop some underscale housetops. Nothing out of step with the original EVRR, but enough to justify the number of tunnels and bridges (without looking contrived) and still drawing your eye into the pretty lake up front. Keep finding online photos for inspiration and this will look like the prototype ELM based his 60s layout upon!
ReplyDeleteYes, it will be a dramatic change. I'm thinking no matter what I do on that side it still might look a bit like wack-a-mole, but lots of '50s and '60s layouts were like that. But, the things you've expressed are reason I wanted to at least get enough landmarks in place to see how the whole thing will shape up and get going on making it seem a unified whole.
DeleteI think the whack-a-mole thing results from not having enough foliage around. It almost becomes an ant hill! Don't be afraid to use taller trees that nearly cover the short hide-and-seek tracks on the right. And if it looks too bad, just cover them completely and give yourself layout-side access panels. I think that the conversion to N scale makes your eye take in much more than on an HO layout, so the number of tunnels within your vision increases. It needs balance, in any case.
ReplyDeleteThanks! I'm on the look out for economical trees. I don't intend on replicating the ones ELM used, but using whatever commercial ones I can find.
DeleteThere’s great commercial trees for sale these days and I love the fine flake foliage. But that can get expensive. I still recommend using dried weeds for clustered forest groves. For larger tree armatures, I have had success with twisted picture frame wire armigers touched up with liquid steel. I like the woodland scenics foliage, Stretched and pull down into the tree from above, as you were had stays at scale eye level. Make sure to put in plenty of ground cover under the trees as well. I think the ground bushes are usually darker than the leaves in the grass. Of course, vary it as you go. I don’t know if you have tried the electro static grass; that looks promising. As far as pine trees, I like the bottlebrush trees and the bumpy chenille trees. I know these are mostly old school things, but in the spirit of ELM, they look wonderful.
ReplyDeleteI also used fake four instead of static grass for my larger weeds. Cut into a regular small shapes and surrounded the edges with ground foam, it looks quite good.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the tree tips! So far all I've got are 12 'pines' I bought resale at George's at Christmas. They're not too bad looking, but they're not foreground trees.
DeleteFake fur! Yeah, I remember articles that recommended that. I gotta find some so I can keep things in period :-)
Sorry for the misspellings. I tried dictating my response on my Apple product and I missed the completely gargled parts! LOL I was trying to say "twisted picture wire tree armatures".... I swear it was correct when I dictated it. I think once you add the punctuation, they rewrite everything for you! And then I said to pull the fine foliage netting through the treetops, looking at scale eye level. Boy, that message got fouled up, too. Sorry. I use things like dental picks or sharpened straight wires to poke the foliage throughout the standing dried-weed tree armatures. Oh, and don't forget to put a lot of broken twigs on the forest floor as well. If you work from scale eye level, you can achieve some very awesome see-though forests. Too often, people don't start adding foliage until much higher on the tree.
ReplyDeleteNo worries! Thanks for clarification!
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