I have been sifting through many posts about making your own trees. I found an article by someone I think by the name of Arggos that talked about natural fiber air filters and bamboo skewers. My question is, why not use real twigs and small branches for the trunks/branches? Is there a reason not to do that?
A question on foliage… Does anyone know what the Woodland Scenics clump foliage is made out of? This looks like such a simple material that is painted. I saw a post about Polyfiber I think, or Polyfoam. Not sure if that is the same thing. I really like the look of these premade trees, but they are expensive, and I think it would be more fun to make my own bushes trees, weeds, etc.
I will keep searching the forum like a good forum person should do, but I wanted to ask about these two things here. If you want to toss in anything else from your great expertice, let me know
Okay, Vulcan, I’ll take a shot at answering your questions.
#1: No reason to NOT use real twigs and branches for your trees, as long as they are reasonably in scale. A 1/4" twig in N scale would make a huge tree trunk! Some modelers have had trouble with twigs drying out after a while and becoming brittle. Painting sometimes helps and soaking the twigs in glycerin will also help keep them from drying out.
#2: No idea what the clump foliage is made out of. I think it is dyed rather than painted. Polyfiber is a spin-woven product that looks similar to inexpensive furnace air filters. In use, Polyfiber is cut into small pieces and the material is pulled apart to make a fine “netting” to place on the branches of your trees. Foliage material is then glued to the polyfiber to simulate leaves. IIRC, polyFOAM is a foliage material that can be used on polyfiber.
Get yourself some raw materials and have a go at making some trees. The more you make, the better you’ll get at making them, so keep practicing. Any “duds” can still be used in the background behind the better trees. After all, in model railroading, sometimes you CAN’T see the trees for the forest! LOL
Aggro’s trees make great Christmas tree type trees. I know of nothing better for HO scale.
Some Asilbe flowers make great Christmas tree types for N or small HO.
I use Queen of the Praire, for Poplar and birch,
I use Tumble weeds for maple and Oak.
I use Caspia stuck in tapered dowels for large pine and fir.
I have used a lot of other stuff as well.
WS gound foam is made from the material you would stuff a pillow with, ground up and dyed. There have been some who have learned to make it, but the cost of equipment uses up the savings for me.
Poly fiber comes from Micheals for me. It can be spray painted.
For stabelizing natural weeds, I use a 1lb cut of shelac
For painting, I use the cheapest acrylic spray cans from Menards.
I’ve been making trees for years…using twigs and local weeds for the trunks and branches; I’ve used Woodland Scenics, and finally I found the best kit for making trees. I was at a large train show and saw a modular layout where a guy had the most natural looking trees I’d ever seen. He pointed me to www.scenicexpress.com.
Click on “super trees” and consider buying the 1/4 bushel of tree material. I just made about 25-30 larger trees for HO scale and about 3 dozen smaller trees/bushes from the bag, so it is economical even at $25.00 for the bag. The thing is they make the BEST trees.
Click on “leaf and foliage” and you’ll see the actual leaf material they offer. I’ve tried several and like their EX802B for making lighter-leafed trees like white birch. To make the birch, I spray the trunks/branches with flat white paint. After they’ve dried, I follow instructions, dipping them into diluted matte medium (buy the concentrated matte medium they sell and dilute it yourself with water…it’s a lot cheaper). Then I sprinkle on the leaves.
To make darker leafed trees, I like their EX806B. I spray the trunks/branches with Krylon grey primer which is a flat paint.
I’ve also used the Noch products they sell for leaves, item numbers NH07142 light green and NH07144 the medium green. The Noch stuff looks like little pieces of paper cut to look like leaves. The key to trees is to vary them and by using all the products I’ve mentioned, you get a good variety of trees.
You will find that the bag of trees provides all different sizes and that adds variety also.
When I first made super trees, I used to hang them upside down from a string like the instructions say but that’s more work than necessary. After I’ve dipped them in diluted matte medium and sprinkled on the leaves, I just lay them on my wife’s cookie sheets that have been co
I do use natural twigs and branches but they must have a very complex branch structure. Sage and the blooms from the crepte myrtle bush work very well. All I do is spray paint the branches light gray and follow up with a hint of black paint, let them dry, and then hot glue woodland scenics clump foilage to the branch tops.
The woodland scenic material is actually foam rubber ground to a pulp. If you are into scratch building, when the missus isn’t looking, grap the blender, put some foilage colored acrylic paint in it and throw in some chunks of foam rubber from an old couch cushion and then give it all a whirl to chop the foam into minature pieces. The only thing is that, it’s pretty hard on the blender and will wear it out sooner than it would have if you were just using it to make carrot juice or pina coladas or stuff like that.
I have a way to make pine trees that works pretty well. Take a piece of wire, bend it in half, and clamp the bent end in a vise at the v in the bend. Now take some hemp rope, cut it into pieces from 1 to 3 " long, unravel the rope until they are all single strands, and then slide them between the two pieces of wire. Chuck the other end of the wire into an electric drill and wind the wire with the drill until all the fibers are wound up tightly among the two wires. Take a pair of scissors and trim the rope to resemble the shape of a pine tree, spray paint them green, and plant them on the layout…chuck
Sedum, or Autumn Joy also makes good trees, you can use floral wire and tie up several small pieces together to make larger oaks and maples. Goldenrod is plentiful around here, now that frost has killed it, it makes a nice tree, the only problem is the tops lean over, so you have to soak them in matte medium and hang upside down with a couple clothes pins to get them straight. You can also but those inexpensive little brooms from craft stores and do the same as Chuck does with rope. Also, go to dollar stores, there’s plenty of those bottle brush Christmas trees on sale, they can be cut in half, twisted and trimmed up some, repainted and covered with ground foam.Sometimes you’ll get four or five for a buck. I use blueberry bushes for armatures and the thicker ones I’ve drilled the center and used as a trunk for furnace filter/skewer or bottle brush trees.
