Just finished reading a scenicking article by David Pope in the June 04 MR. He recommends first painting with latex paint, letting it dry, and then using thinned white glue to secure the ground foam. Whereas I was planning to merely shake the ground foam into the wet paint. Anyone have opinions on this?
Incidently, having a vast supply of sawdust, I am trying that out. Just dyed a couple of coffee cans worth with Rit Dark Green dye. It does get dark, think Brunswick green. I’m going to try the next lighter shade, or maybe some thinned craft paint and get something a littler lighter green.
I prefer using glue instead of wet paint. Paint dries fairly quick and can leave some ground foam unsecured.
Craft paint works great for dying home made foam. Should work for sawdust too.
I don’t like flat, uniform ground surfaces. They look fine in a park or on a golf course, but most of my ground is supposed to be more wild, unkempt terrain.
First, I use Gypsolite to skim coat the surface. Gypsolite is naturally gritty, so even on a flat area like a foam sheet, the irregularity makes a big difference. Gypsolite is naturally a light gray, so I squirt in some dark brown craft paint until the mixture is a light tan. I spread this stuff around and let it dry, usually overnight.
I don’t like uniform tan-colored surfaces either, so I make up a thin green wash with craft paint and water. I apply this unevenly, in a camouflage pattern, using the base Gypsolite color. This dries pretty quickly, in a half-hour or less.
Then I paint on thinned white glue, about 1 part Elmer’s to 3 parts water. I use an old 1/2 inch paint brush, and do a few square inches at a time. Finally, I take pinches of turf in my fingers and apply them, generally putting brown turf over the tan Gypsolite, and green turf over the wash areas, but not being too fussy about either. Applying the turf bit-by-bit is a lot slower than just sprinkling it out of a jar, of course, but I get much better control.
My variation is as follows. Rather than straight paint, I mix the paint with premixed drywall sceme cement, and sawdust, with a little water and Lysol. I paint that on and put the WS colored grouynd foam on while wet. I vary the coursness of the sawdust to get different textures. For closeup scene, I will put some color variation on between the paint and the ground foam. Several colors of ground foam also helps a lot.
I sprinkle fine turf blend ground foam into the paint. Two reasons that I do this.
First, the paint is the same color as the dirt and hides the wood or foam color and the fine turf blend ground foam adds to covering the bare surface, and it is done in one step.
Secondly, I do this on all parts of the layout where track has been laid and working, as a precursor to doing the finished scenery at a later time. By having this first application done in a single step, the layout presents a better ‘look’ until the final scenery is completed.
That being said, I add ground texture in layers. Often I sprinkle or place the first layer directly onto the wet paint. Subsequent layers get the alcohol and diluted matte medium treatment so any loose stuff from a previous layer is now firmly attached with the new.
Like Mr. B. above, I too use structolite and various colors of tinting. Great stuff in many ways.
I have a related question please… When painting over flat/sheet cork for a yard, is latex interior paint generally what’s used? Will anything and everything stick to that painted surface using diluted white glue later? I’d also like the option of putting some hydrocal, plaster, etc. over some of the flat painted sheet cork to prevent the area from being totally pool table flat. Any problems with those materials sticking to the painted cork? Thanks.
Thanks Grampy. As always, I’m drooling over your beautiful work. So…what technique did you use? Did you paint laytex over the sheet cork? Any plaster materials? Thanks for any clarification. I can’t say it enough, I just LOVE your work!
Thanks Capt.: I used the sheet cork where the track was to go. Then I used my Sculptamold/Structolite mix to fill in around the cork. Then I painted everything with latex earth color thinned with water. The cork absorbed a lot of the paint, but it would be covered with ground cover, anyway. For the yard, I mixed dk and med green, earth, soil, and fine cinder ballast for the ground cover. I didn’t think that was quite dark and dirty enough, so I used a final coat of powdered black paint, the kind Joe Fugate uses, spread it dry with a brush, sprayed it with wet water, and blended it with the same brush. I really appreciate your kind words.
