I started by coating the branches with Hobb E Tac and dusting them with WS fine grass. Next I used cheap hair spray and dusted with course grass several times. But the results look more like desert cactus.
What can be done to make it look more like a tree?
Comments appreciated
Bob
You might want to add some clumps of ground foam.
-George
I would get clump ground foam, glue big pieces together, and then attach. Then you could do what you just did.
I Googled “making HO trees” and came up with the following website: http://members.shaw.ca/twofootBill/shopSelkirkAspen.htm
Maybe you’ll get some hints here.
Bob, I forgotten the name of the stuff but it looks like green hair. Make clumps and stick on to the branches. I used it when i first got started, used wire and or twigs from the yard. Woodland sell the stuff, I use to buy it before I found Super Trees.
You could use some cotton balls, paint green and add ground foam. Then it would be a Cotton Wood! [%-)]
Out of super trees Bob?
Ken
I like to glue in coconut fibres, from hanging basket liner [painted beforehand] then use Heki or Woodland Scenics foliage mats.
hope this helps.
Mike
Just today I went and stole a bunch of sedum from my neighbors, they were happy to see it gone, I hear so many bad things about sedum from this forum, whether it’s the shape of the tree or what, but there is a negative feeling about sedum. Well. I got a box of sedum, a gallon of old water-based green paint,which I watered down a bit, I dipped the sedum in the paint, shook it of stuck it in a sheet of blue foam,with pre-punched holes, waited till it dried, then got some brown paint and painted the trunk and branches, (you don’t have to be very precise with the paint) a bit of brown on the foliage, and will add a bit of yellow on the leaves later. I now have 60 or 70 trees of varying sizes, breaking off smaller branches from the sedum give tall, medium, small sizes, the key is not to make them too tall, all this took 2-3 hours and cost nothing(but a good cigar) and I have a wad of great trees and they look terrific, can some forumers tell me what the negative side to using sedum is.
Ken is talking about Woodland Scenics green polyfiber. Pull off a small clump, tease it out until it’s ultra thin and airy Spray the tree with cheapo hairspray and and wrap bits of the fiber around the tree branches. Apply more hairspray and sprinkle on coarse ground foam or dyed sawdust. Secure with more spray. The trees in this picture were done by this method using armatures pruned from a bush in my front yard, and I think they’re pretty presentable (and a heck of a lot cheaper than Super Trees!)
Good luck and let us see your progress!
Jim
WS has green poly fiber, Micro Mark has brown or you can get some brown (dark) quilting batt from a craft shop. Pull it out until it is quite thin, then stretch it over your limbs. Then spray and add your foliage. Have fun,
For open armatures like your pic, a very little bit of microfiber pulled over the branches before the foam will make a big difference. The most common mistake is too much microfiber. For larger armatures and front row trees, superglue bits of super trees to the ends of the branches before the foam. Nock leaf matterial might look better than ground foam. Plants like Queen of the Praire, Bridal Wreath and Candy Tuft from Michaels do not need the Microfiber.
Welding wire armature, covered with silicone sealant, and WS foliage.
“Bottle brush” deciduous.
“Bottle brush” conifers.
Tatans - the negative side of using sedum to represent trees on the layout is that, used as they come from the field, they do not resemble any common North American deciduous tree. The tall, spindly, long branching, nature of the sedum twigs, with foliage that forms more-or-less just a canopy at the twig’s top, is very un tree-like outside of perhaps a few ornamental lawn trees. I personally regard their overall appearance as rather surrealistic.
When first employed on HO layouts, back in the 1930’s, sedum trees much better fit the bill as “representational trees” in the Art Deco appearance of most layouts of the day, as well as being commonly seen employed on often stylized professional architectural models. Today, however, with most of the better layouts being scenicked in a much more realistic fashion, when compared against products like Scenic Express’ SuperTrees, basic sedum trees look very artificial and toy-like.
CNJ831
Hey, Grampy, what’s the secret for making a bottle brush deciduous tree? Those are some pretty nice specimens you’ve shown there.
Jim
Grampys Trains - your trees belong to the best looking trees I have ever seen.
There is a guy in Germany who makes trees like you do, but he sells them around $80 - $ 100 a piece.
Thanks, Jim and Sir Madog. Jim, a how to can be found here.
http://s297.photobucket.com/albums/mm237/GrampysTrains/Bottle%20Br%20Conifers/
I use goldenrod. These are my attempts at white birch:
And others:
Terry
Terry,
I guess you have your own doubts about the looks of your trees and you are right with that. Your trees are a good start, but lack some “volume” to look like the real thing.Maybe it is also the choice of material you used for making the trees. I have always avoided using Mother Nature´s materials for exactly that reason -too few branches or wrong shape (Sedum).
Making natural looking trees is quite a difficult job and requires a lot of exercise, so don´t give up on it. I am sure that we will see excellent trees from you very soon.
Green hair?? Ken, you been playing those old Sid Vicious records again?
Hello they look like the trees I first made. To me the first one looks dead with some Ive or vine growing on it. The second one looks better. The third one would work with some shorter ones under it.To fill in some of the open space. Here are some of my trees they are not the best but I am trying. The first pic shows my dead tree to the left and one I tried to make from carpet pad.
These were made from goldenrod I think
This what they look like be for I painted them.
Hope this helps Frank