I’ve sealed my river bottom with plaster and I’m ready for the next step. I haven’t found a definite consensus from older posts on whether I should first paint the bottom of my river or just mix the color into the Envirotex-Lite, any ideas?
My second question is if I decide to tint the Envirotex-Lite, I have some oil colors (old Bob Ross paints) way back when I tried oil painting. I mixed some prussian blue with sap green which gave me a nice dark color for my deep part of the river…will this mix w/ Envirotex-Lite? I know most people who have mixed tints use acrylics, just curious to see if this will work with oil paints. Thanks! Steve
I both painted the river bottom and tinted the Envirotex. The tinting was very light. I wanted the water to have some color, and I used more color in the early pours so that the bottom got more and more obscured the deeper the water was. Of course, this is fresh water in a relatively shallow pond or stream. For an ocean port, you might want the water to be far more opaque, and the bottom might not be visible at all.
Illusion! Illusion! Illusion! I have expounded on numerous occasions here on the forum that model railroading is, in essence, a practice of illusion: miles of geography in feet of space.
You might have a stream that is twenty feet wide–2 5/8" in HO-Scale; 1 1/2" in N-Scale–running ten feet deep–1 3/8" in HO-Scale; 3/4" in N-Scale; depending on just how much stream you are going to model that can be a healthy amount of Envirotex if you tried to model the total amount of water. Instead we create the illusion of that ten foot depth by creating a waterway very shallow, painting the bottom a dark color so that when our tinted Envirotex–multiple pours with each pour growing successively lighter–is poured we create the illusion of a deep waterway.
This is one of those projects where it isn’t an either/or…you can do both, as the other gentlemen have said. If you paint the bottom, and add either a clear or tinted layer or two of epoxy and it doesn’t look good, paint the top surface of epoxy a neutral tan or black and start over with a couple more layers. You would only begin to run out of depth by the time you got to about 7-10 thin pours, so flubbing the first three or four shouldn’t be a big concern for a properly prepared and realistic water course.
You could also do a quick mock-up and experiment to refine your eventual decision. Once you know what to do, apply it to the real place and enjoy the benefits.
By the way, I have discovered that adding a pinch of Plaster of Paris powder to the top or second-most layer does a great job of providing a more turbid look. Just a pinch, not a half-teaspoon or anything like that. It depends, of course, on the volume and thickness of the batch you mix. I have so far only mixed batches amounting to less than a cup in volume, but it you were going to pour a full 3/8" thick pour covering 40-50 square inches, you would want as much as a half teaspoon of the plaster. Again, you can always add another layer if the first is a bit thin or if it needs more turbidity or tinting, so be conservative, just as you would with washes and powders in a weathering job.
-Crandell
" R. T. POTEET:
Illusion! Illusion! Illusion! I have expounded on numerous occasions here on the forum that model railroading is, in essence, a practice of illusion:"
I think this pretty much sums up the hobby as a whole, we are attempting to make the unbelievable look believable, isn’t that what it’s all about? Applying this to your river bottom question it depends on several factors. First off what part of the country are you modeling? If lets say your modeling down south and crossing something that resembles the Mississippi or any other muddy tributary what would be the advantage of having multiple layers of Envirotex tinted or otherwise mud is mud and it would serve no point to go any more then cover the painted river bottom with just enough to create the illusion. But if your modeling lets say the Pacific North west or even part of Pa. and other area’s pf the country that are known for their pristine water ways then you want to see more depth and more detail. I paint the bottom of my water ways either a very dark blue or black and I like to have a river bottom of sorts and fine gravel or stones, rock and boulders etc. as much detail some times as the landscape has in some cases. So in those cases I generally don’t tint the Envirotex or just give it a few drops of acrylic paint to give it shade but not take away form it’s transparency. As far as using anything but acrylic paints with Envirotex YOU CAN NOT and here’s why, so avoid any heart aches before you do.
No, oil paint and other solvent based products may not be compatible and may negatively affect curing. We make both transparent dye and opaque pigments for our epoxy products; available from Blick Art Materials or Hobby Lobby crafts as well as through our distributor: Craft World @ 800-654-6114 or www.shopcraftworld.com . And ther
Last river I did, I painted the base and tinted the resin with small amounts of acrylic paint. It was poured in three layers of differing tints: brown then green then blue-green. I was happy with the results. After that, the bottom was easily visible at the edges only.
Had some issues with smoothing out the edges, but that’s another story.
Mike
In my own case a creek on my layout is only about knee high in depth so I used clear Magic Water and detailed the bottom with green ground foam (to look like what as kids we called “seaweed” that covered everything, including old tree trunks etc.) Given that shallow depth and narrowness of the creek I did not use the “illusion” technique of a darker center. I will however for a nearby pond because I want to capture the “illusion” of its greater depth without actually having a truly deeper bottom (there is plywood under that foam!). And my childhood memory is that I could see clear to the bottom in that creek but the pond was scummy and we could not see the bottom real well so I will tint that “water”
Dave Nelson
PS adding to the post. Interestingly, the Magic Waters materials include advice to use oil based enamels to tint their product.