I have no experience with scenery, yet, and recently saw a picture of a layout that was set in fall, and the colors made it simply gorgeous. I was wondering if it was any more dificult to model the fall season than summer, and if it could be accomplished by someone with no experience, like me… Thanks in advance. Josh
I hope so, I plan a fall section and that will be new to me. I do have a small set of Woodland Scenic fall trees that will help me with color. When you learn more, please share it with the rest of us.
You mean, like this?
This is an early fall display with trees at elevation turning, while those on the layout level are still green. That way, you get a bit of everything, even snow on Sentinel Mountain.
My Yuba River Sub is set in Sierra high country in October, which gives me a chance to model both evergreens and changing colors in oak, maple and poplar trees. Early and peak fall can make for some pretty spectacular modeling, and there are lots of commercially available trees in fall colors. WS also makes ‘flock’ in fall colors that can be added to tree armatures. Here’s a sampling:
Trains meeting in South Yuba Canyon–deciduous trees almost at high Fall colors.
Bullard’s Bar Bridge with mixture of deciduous and evergreen.
South Yuba Crossing with Poplars in fall colors.
Tom [:D]
Overall, autumn is probably the most difficult season to model, summer the easiest. A believable autumn scene representing the highly colorful Northeastern (particularly New England) foilage is really tough to do because of the multitude of tree species with their widely varying coloration. Most commercially modeled autumn trees are too pure and intense in color. Too much of a mixture of these strong, differing hues looks very unconvincing and toy-like. The best path to follow in this instance is to obtain good color photos or posters of suitable autumn hillside scenery and model directly from them.
Modeling areas such as the Rockies in autumn is generally much easier. Much of that region is typically dominated by growths of aspen which have a distinct but rather homogeneous yellow coloration. I’v seen very good results modeling such locations.
I’m not sure of just how the upper mid-west trees respond to the coming of autumn but I’d expected it is rather transitional between these two extremes, with less of a mixture of colors and perhaps more muted ones as well.
CNJ831
[bow] [bow] [bow]
Was thinking about this today, and thought I’d clarify a little. If you’re planning on modeling Fall colors, and you have any kind of elevation change in your layout, remember that the higher the elevation, the sooner the Fall colors will peak. For instance, I model the Northern Sierra Nevada, and my Yuba River Sub ranges in elevation from between 3,000 to almost 7,000 feet above sea level. At the higher elevations, the deciduous trees are going to change faster than they will at 3,000 feet, due to more extreme variances in temperature. On my layout, at 3,000 feet, the trees are just beginning to change, while at 4-6,000 feet, they are already in High Fall colors. What few deciduous trees I have between 6-7000 feet have pretty much already peaked and are on their way to shedding completely. By late October, high Sierra deciduous are either at peak or shedding, while lower Sierra trees don’t really hit their peak until about November. Just a hint, in case you decide to model the Fall. Modeling the Northeast or the Appalachians is a little tricky, modeling the Sierra Nevada or other Western mountain regions–which are largely evergreen-- is actually pretty straightforward. Hope this helps. But I’d definitely recommend modeling in at least early Fall, it makes for some very interesting color on the layout.
Tom. [:D]
PS: Aggro, stop with the [bow] already, you’re giving me a swelled head, LOL!
Tom