Hi All
first post here been MR reader since age 14, 79 now! and still no layout, but I am working on that. I remember reading an article some time ago on improving and using paper cut out buildings I found two books and would like to use as background buildings. anybody remember this aritcle and issue
thanks
I’ll be interested in that info as well.
A friend put me on to this site.
Mel
Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951
My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/
Bakersfield, California
I’m beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.
Wecome to the forum!
I don’t recall or have the article, but there is a website that has all sorts of printed textures for paper model structures. There’s a guy in a local club here who builds almost exclusively with paper or cardstock. I have visited that club and have seen many of his structures - - very impressive! I can’t remember the name of the website, in fact I’ve used it to add some brickwork to a cardstock background structure some time ago. I’m sure someone on this forum will chime in and be of more help than I.
Time to get out of that arm chair and build a layout! 
2 matches for card buildings
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Shadow details for background buildings |
There was/is a book called “Railroad Model Craftsman Cutout Book” that had “20 HO scale full color buildings”.
Ed
I’m not familiar with the article to which you refer, but had quite a few cardstock structures, from a book, on my first layout…they may even have been from the same book which Ed mentions.
These were printed on not-very-heavy cardstock, and the builder (my dad) had to brace them with balsa or basswood strips. I was quite satisfied with their appearance, although todays’ modellers might not view them so kindly.
The ones in the links offered by previous responders certainly look more suitable for todays’ market.
On my current layout, I use some background structures printed on heavy paper, so they do require a more substantial backing. They’re from an outfit called Kingmill, and are photos of real structures. Some are simply an image of a single wall, while others are the main wall of a structure, with a short wall (10’ or 15’ HO) attached on each side. Once they’re cut out, the side walls are folded and the three, as a unit, are glued to the supporting structure, built by the modeller from their own materials.
I use .060" sheet styrene, which I buy in 4’x8’ sheets - quite useful, as some of the structures are fairly large. A friend also uses these structures, and places the single-wall versions on foamcore.
I was intending to show you a few examples but photobucket seems to be having some technical difficulties…perhaps later.
Wayne
There are a few sites with totally free buildings including (strangely enough) mine on http://xdford.freeasphost.net/stag21.html where I have a few buildings when you find the next page link down the bottom. Mine are a quasi mix of North American, British and Australian ideas.
Some UK type buildings are on http://www.wordsworthmodelrailway.co.uk and they are all free!
Some Illinois buildings can be found on https://www2.illinois.gov/dnrhistoric/Preserve/Pages/construct_mainstreet.aspx
while other free not necessarily so well detailed buildings can be found on
http://www.thortrains.net/ and http://www.thortrains.net/freecoms.html
Good luck with your building
Cheers from Australia
Trevor
Paper buildings were used on George Sebastian-Coleman’s $500 layout, which was published in two parts in January and February 2004. The part about the paper structures was in January’s installment.
Here are a couple examples of the Kingmill paper structures to which I referred in my earlier post…
The four above are flat, one-sided images on sheet styrene. This one is, too…
…but if viewed from the wrong angle, is not so effective…
This one is the lower two floors of what was originally a taller structure. It has side walls…
…so I added partial gable ends and a modelled roof using .060" sheet styrene. The roof was sheathed using Campbell’s corrugated aluminum siding…
Wayne
There was also a recent article or/and video by Paul Dolkos about attaching printed photos onto foam board walls to build structures.
Modelers in the UK enjoy lots of factory made card stock buildings that are quite elobarate looking and when done correctly, rival some of the plastic kits. Metcalf and SuperQuick are a couple of the brands. Definatly take some skill to build up properly. I have some really old MRR magazines that had cut out buildings on the back covers. Instead of messing up a nice vintage magzine. I scanned them into my computer, then printed them on heavy card stock paper on my ink jet printer. Eventually I wil laminate the card stock onto a backer board to make it more ridged and assemble the buildings. I think it gives the layout a nice “vintage” feel to it. Goes well with the late 1950’s and early 1960’s brass imports I use for motive power.
Mike the Aspie
Kingmill paper buildings are no longer made.
I like Clever and Scalescnes buildings. Another source s Scale Model Plans.
Papermau has a huge number of links to free downloads.Many European and Japanese, but often useable with no or little modification. Quality varies from crude to highly detailed. One downside is many of the links have obtrusive ads and other downloads. Also many of the sites are not in English. Google translate is useful figuring them out.
No updates on this subject thread? Possible lots of interesting links.
It caught my eye. Steve’s post about the $500 layout in the Jan 2004 edition was interesting.
Here’s an interesting layout with all paper and card stock buildings. We visit it every year ar Trainfest. John used a lot of models from Clever Models ( Mel’s link) and dveloped his own, which according to the article in the May 2013 inssue, John’s models can be bought at Clever Models.
The “new” archives search works great!
There is also an article on track planning, using pencil, paper, drawing tools, and templates.
My kind of track planning. [swg]
Mike.
In my opinion, Kosma’s layout is right up there with the Gorre and Daphetid as one of the greatest examples of modeling-with-a-heart, and this video captures some of the best of the details.
Not to drift the thread away from ‘enhancing’ paper buildings.
Dover Books at one time had an “HO scale” color kit of Wright’s Robie House that made up into a pretty good-looking model… but still, obviously an architectural model. What was needed to get this to look realistic is almost a first list of enhancement techniques that the OP is looking for. There are other MR articles and videos that would benefit him, not all of which are paper or ‘cardstock’ related: many articles describing building up 3D effects or surface finishes in styrene apply nearly equally to paper.
The importance of proper attention to windows is something that deserves particular attention. As with auto windshield modeling (on which we had a good thread a few months ago) there are some simple tricks in making up good windows and glass effects for paper as well as stock construction – I don’t know if there are MR articles on this but there should definitely be, as they especially relate to using photo images as a starting point for realistic building sides.
Dover had a whole series of “Cut-and-Assemble” HO buildings and towns. Most were either by A G Smith or Edmund Vincent Gillon. Somewhere I think I have the remains of my “Victorian Seaside Village” with two or three buildings removed and I recently picked up “Early American Seaport” at a resale shop. There was also a “Main Street” and “19th Century Mill town” set and a few stations that would have alot to offer model railroaders.
What I assume is the whole list is here: https://www.librarything.com/publisherseries/Dover+Cut+and+Assemble
They are mostly OOP and some are rediculously expensive, but some can still can often be found at retail or less.
A few are still in print and can be seen here:
http://doverpublications.ecomm-search.com/search?keywords="cut+and+assemble"&res_per_page=100
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I have several of these, and they look very good in photographs.
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Kind of like the Walther’s backdrops, they look like artistic impressions and are no where near “Photo-Realistic”.
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-Kevin
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Kevin, are you referring to the thin-profile buildings that Walthers makes aka, Background Buildings?
I had been considering some of those for my layout. Of course, Walthers always does a nice job showcasing a fully painted/weathered building for their catalog, and I thought the buildings looked quite nice. So are you not a fan of the final product? I’m not trying to be George Sellios here (I’m never going to be scratchbuilding things):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvbg_tL9JXM
…but I also don’t want to have something that looks childish. The Walther’s thin-profile buildings seemed like a good middle-point for me. Perhaps this is a question for another topic thread, but I’m curious to hear the thoughts of other members here.