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I’ve spent the last few weeks working on ways to make decent looking evergreens using scrub pads and bamboo skewers. There have been a number of articles outlining how to make trees using similar materials such as floor buffing pads, furnace filters etc., and the technique for each is virtually the same, but the product isn’t necessarily realistic. While a ‘green cone’ may remind us of a tree, it doesn’t mean it looks like one.

I’ve been fortunate enough to come across a few articles in the recent while outlining the importance of trying to capture the overall shape of a tree – too often we are content to put branches on a truck and declare the tree finished without actually referencing the ‘prototype’. With this in mind I set out to try to create a fairly reasonable facsimile of a black spruce.

(The black spruce is a tall, narrow evergreen tree common in Ontario. At the turn of the century they were typically planted in rows on farms to create wind-blocks, and are one of the tallest evergreen species found in southwestern Ontario. They are typified by their sparse drooping boughs and dark colour)

I came up with the following technique and managed to manufacture some fairly decent looking trees. Critically speaking, they are too dense and should be more airy, however I’m quite happy with their overall look, as well as their cost, less then 2 cent a piece!

I first started by separating a green kitchen scrub pad into 4-plys. Peeling the pad apart in easy the first time, but does take some additional care for the second pass.

I next cut out a long triangle from pad, roughly 1″ wide at the base, and then cut this into a series of successively smaller triangles.

I teased out the largest end of each triangle with my fingers to remove the visible corners, and then pushed each of the triangles onto the bamboo skewer, turning the skewer 90 degrees each time I added a triangle.

I coated all the boughs and the trunk with black spray paint and then liberally applied some sawdust. I stood the tree upright in a block of foam and adjusted the boughs as necessary. I let the tree dry for 15 minutes. (This is important as if you move to the next step before the tree has dried the weight of the paint/sawdust/foam will cause the boughs to sag too much and adhere to the trunk

I finished the tree by adding a second coat of black spray paint and then a dusting of green-grass fine ground foam. I over sprayed the entire tree with a bit more black paint to dull the colour a bit and then added one last sprinkle of ground foam ‘ from directly above the tree ‘ creating some highlights.

Once the tree was completely dry, I cut the trunk to the appropriate length using side cutters, and planted it using an awl.

I’ve spent the last few months trying to develop a technique for modeling fall trees that is effective, easy and cheap. The large maple tree I modeled for my Pete’s Pumpkins layout confirmed that I had finally settled on a process that was simple and effective, and I’ve started adding some hardwoods to the one corner of the Niagara Escarpment System. The key was in finding suitable dried floral stems that best represented the branch structure of the native deciduous trees. I found many samples that looked good for branches but lacked decent trunk structures, until I noticed a package of cocktail straws at the dollar store!

The process is as follows:

• Trim a number of stems from the original floral sprig and insert them into the cocktail straw creating the desired tree shape
• Carefully apply heat (in my case a candle) to the straw until it starts to melt, and then quickly roll it back-and-forth between your fingers to create a tight, wrinkled trunk
• Trim the tree to shape
• Apply a coat of thick acrylic tube paint to the base of the branches to smooth any rough areas and fill the holes at the top of the trunk
• Spray the entire tree with flat black/grey/brown paint
• Mist the head of the tree with light coats of yellow paint and immediately apply suitably coloured ground foam
• Add successive coats of hairspray and ground foam until the desired density and colour is achieved
• Overspray the tree with quick blasts of red oxide primer to add colour variation
• Touch-up with the trunk by dry-brushing highlights onto it

The set of trees seen in the following photo took two evenings to build at an average of about a half-hour per evening.

The autumn portion of the Niagara Escarpment System is divided from the rest of the layout by a small backdrop. As I intended to plant a shallow deciduous forest, I needed to ensure that the backdrop would add some depth to the scene, as the trees would likely be somewhat see-through, and would lack the density I wanted.

As this is a test-bed layout, I didn’t feel it was necessary to paint a highly realistic scene, or use a photograph to create depth, as all I needed to do was keep the viewer’s attention in the foreground; the best way to do this being to under-emphasize the background.

With a gray-blue sky already established, I first took some burnt umber and black and roughed in the tree line. While the paint was still wet, I immediately blended in some of the original sky colour to create a transitional area between the sky and the ground. Next, I added some vertical slashes again using the sky colour to suggest tree trunks, adding highlights randomly to the right side of the trunk. Once the dark coat of paint was somewhat dry, I dabbed on some deep orange paint that closely matched my ground foam, and established a rough, although fairly uniform tree line. I immediately added some lighter dabs of orange paint to suggest highlights, and finished with some very light yellow-orange paint to suggest the highlights on the tree tops. While this paint was still wet, I took a dry, 2″ brush and lightly stippled the entire area, blending the colours together, adding the odd dab of orange to help blend the colours together until I had a fairly uniform, and unspectacular, backdrop.

Although the backdrop is rather flat, it will allow the foreground trees to blend seamlessly with the background, and help give the scene some much needed depth. As well, the entire exercise had the added benefit of only having taken 10 minutes.

Although the Niagara Escarpment System is being sceniced to represent early winter, I wanted to try modeling an autumn scene. As such, I deliberately divided one small corner of the layout with the backdrop so that I could try my hand a modeling deciduous trees etc., without visually interfering with the rest of the layout.

As I envisioned the area densely wooded with maple trees, I needed to create the underbrush typical of a hardwood forest. As with the other areas on the layout, I first painted the scenery base a dark brown colour. Once the paint had thoroughly dried, I brushed on a full-strength coat of white glue and applied the honey-coloured static grass. Once the glue had completely dried, I began applying the underbrush.

First I sifted on some dirt to help establish the base. Next I spooned on some of the ground up sticks, as well as some of the course cigar pieces. I sifted on some of the finer cigar material, and finished with a small dusting of orange and red ground foam to represent fallen leaves, as well as some coarse green foam to represent varied leafy underbrush. Satisfied with the overall look, I misted the entire area with wet-water, and permanently affixed everything by applying a generous amount of 50/50 water and while glue with an eyedropper.

Having already applied the basic groundcover and the ballast, I started ‘paving’ some n scale roads. As I envisioned the town as being rustic, I wanted the scenery to reflect that, and chose to make a dirt road as opposed to asphalt.

I first started building up the shoulders around the crossing by shaping some sifted dirt with a palette knife. Once I was satisfied with the slope, I misted the dirt with wet water and applied diluted 50/50 water/white glue. I next brushed on a thin coat of white glue the tops of the roads, and then carefully sifted fine dirt over top of both the shoulders and the road tops. I again misted the dirt with the 50/50 in hopes of encouraging the glue to soak into all the dirt.

When I examined the results the next morning, I was disappointed to find that the dirt had not returned to its original light colour, but had dried much darker, and wet looking! Unlike ballast, dirt doesn’t dry to its original colour. Discouraged, I vacuumed up all the loose dirt, and applied a coat of light tan paint atop the road top and shoulders, and again sifted dirt over the paint. This time, I also used a roll of masking tape as a roller, and packed the dirt down by gently rolling the tape back and forth.

The next day, I vacuumed up all the loose dirt, and then proceeded to scrub the surface of the road with my finger to loosen any stray particles, as well smooth the surface. I vacuumed us the excess, and this time was pleased to find the road now closely matched the original colour of the dry dirt. As a precaution, I sprayed everything with a few light mists of Testor’s Dullcote. (I made sure they coats were light ‘ I didn’t want to darken the dirt again!

Once I had installed the majority of the cedar trees on the NES, I noticed that despite best efforts, the tapering braches at the base of the trees had create gaps that allowed me to see right through the bush. A drive to work revealed that real cedars have a great deal of underbrush growth that covers the base of the trees. I wasn’t interested in trying to duplicate the rich variety of plant life found in nature, but simply suggest that there were more then just trees, so I decided to focus on the large bushy dogwoods that typically line the edge of a cedar bush. I could have modeled hundreds of different species of plant, but what I was after was the suggestion, not a prototypical representation of the local fauna and flora.

I quick trip to our local fabric store revealed a huge selection of different fun furs, and two varieties that I selected for my n scale Niagara Escarpment System. The first was a form of ‘wolf-fur’, that had a mix of short and long light and dark hairs that closely resembled the grey thickets at the base of our local cedars. The second fur was a honey-coloured, very dense teddy-bear fur that was an almost identical colour match to the dead grass on the model railroad.

Installation was straightforward. First I dampened the area I wanted to plant the shrubs in with a bit of wet water. I clipped off a small clump of fun fur with some scissors, dipped the cut-end into the 50/50 water/white glue, and planted it on the layout. The wet water helped to ‘wick’ up the glue, so that the fur didn’t have a glob of clear glue at its base once everything had dried. Before the glue set, I tapped the centre of the bush with the sharp tip of my awl to help spread the fur fibers out in slight fan pattern

After letting the shrubs dry overnight, I measured them in the morning to find that they were about 10 feet tall ‘ a prototypical height in many cases, but too tall for my tastes, I pruned the fur with some scissors, and spread the clipping around the fixed shrubs. Happy with the results, I gave the entire area a quick blast of Testor’s Dullcote to help fix everything in place, as well as kill the shine of the fun-fur.

Southwestern Ontario is typified by its unique mix of deciduous and coniferous trees, especially its mix of cedars, pines, spruce, maples, oaks and birch trees. For my n scale NES model railroad, I wanted to create the look of low-lying cedar bush, so I needed to find an inexpensive and quick way to create cedars trees. After a few experiments, I found the following technique allowed me to make a great number of trees at minimal cost and with great speed.

The key to making these trees was finding natural plant specimens that closely suggested the shape of a cedar ‘ I found a suitable solution in an abundant roadside wetlands grass commonly referred to as Pampas Grass or Pampas Plume (Cortaderia selloana). The ends of this grass are made up of dozens of feathery plumes that closely resemble the conical shape of cedars.

I first removed a small plume from the plant, and loosely wound it around some fine wire; the individual plumes are far too flimsy without the added rigidity of the wire. Once I had prepared 5-10 plumes, I gave each tree a quick spray of flat brown spray paint, and immediately sifted on some fine green ground foam. I followed this with a few pumps of cheap hairspray, and then applied a second coat to ground foam to fill in any gaps/imperfections, as well as create greater density.

I let the trees dry for about 10 minutes, and then planted them in the foam scenery base. Using an awl, I punched a small hole in the Styrofoam, and using some tweezers, pushed the tree down into the hole. After I had planted a few trees, I used an eyedropper to soak the base of the trees with some 50/50 white/glue mixture. In an hour I was able to build and plant about 25 trees, which covered an area of about 16 square inches, at a cost of about $0.05 a tree.

Looking back, the texture of the trees is perhaps a bit coarse for the look of cedars, however en mass they do effectively suggest a cedar bush. Hence, I’m happy!

Having ‘planted’ the dead grass, I was left with the problem of how I should model dead leaves and underbrush. The simple solution would have been to go outside and get some dead leaves; however the foot of snow on top of them was discouraging. As an alternative, I purchased a couple of cheap cigars at the corner store, and ground them up in a coffee grinder. Once sifted, the pulverized cigar produced a wonderfully coloured dead-leaf matter! Following on the success of the ground cigars, I ground up some twigs from our gutters. (An ice dam leaked water into the kitchen, and I was forced to climb onto the roof with an axe to remedy the problem!) The twigs are actually part of the leaves from our walnut tree so they are less woody then actual twigs. Once pulverized by the coffee grinder, they produced a wonderful dark mulch of fine ‘branches’. Finally, I hacked at the ground outside until I managed to get a small scraping of dirt from the garden that I dried in the oven, and sifted.

The application of materials was quite straightforward. First, I applied a 50/50 wash of white glue and water to the upper parts of the hill and applied a second coat of static grass ‘ this improved the thickness/density of the previous application, and helped to add some variation in the colour. Next I sifted on some of the fine cigar leaves, and then sprinkled on some of the coarser material. Satisfied with the look thus far, I then spooned/sprinkled on some of the ground twigs. I made sure that each successive layer of groundcover receded back from the edge of the previous. With each of the layers of groundcover applied, I misted everything with wet water (water with a drop of detergent added) and drizzled on more of the 50/50 water/glue.

The next day when I looked over the results, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the cigars had actually dyed the glue mixture, and had leached down the hillside. The results added great colour variation to the grass, and helped blend the transition between the grass and the underbrush.

I repeated the steps for the areas surrounding the rock faces, but this time elected to add some of the sifted dirt and some small rocks, as well as some ground foam. Again, I was happy with the end results.

Having stared at the ‘Styrofoam-Central’ for several weeks, I was eager to begin adding some scenery, or at the very least hide the pink and beige contours of the layout’s hills! I started by applying a coat of deep brown craft paint to the hillsides. I’ve read many times that modellers prefer to use a light tan colour as their base coat, but as I was modeling early winter, it seemed only logical to use a mud colour. I waited for the paint to dry thoroughly, and then brushed on a coat of full strength white glue. While the glue was still wet, I applied a coat of Woodland Scenics static grass. Despite what I’ve read, I could not make he grass stand up like real grass no matter what I did! Apparently if you shake and squeeze the bottle of static grass when you apply it, it should in theory stand up strait in the glue, but in my case, it fell flat. I applied enough grass to cover the glue, but not so much that it was opaque. I wanted the dark brown paint colour to show through the grass in areas ‘ to help with the illusion that the normally green grass had matted down into the mud with the change in seasons. I waited for the glue to dry thoroughly before vacuuming up the excess with a shop vac.

With the majority of Styrofoam terrain established on the NES, I needed to add the rock-faces, as well as smooth out the contours of the landscape. For rocks, I used a Woodland Scenics rubber mold that I had purchased a few years ago. Rather then Hydrocal, I used standard plaster of paris for the rocks as again, it was what I had handy. Hydrocal is substantially stronger then regular plaster of paris, but as no one is going to be standing on these rocks, I wasn’t worried. Once the rock casts had completely dried in the molds, I removed them and cut them to fit into the contours of the foam scenery.

With the rocks ready for installation, I smoothed the landscape with a coat of tinted drywall mud. Typically, most people would generally skim-coat they landscape with plaster, but again, I had two pails of drywall compound handy from our ever-ongoing house renovations. As well, drywall mud needs at least 24 hours to dry, which allows for a much greater working time, and isn’t as messy as plaster.

I mixed in some cheap brown craft paint to cut the whiteness of the mud, as well as ensure that later when drilled, the dust created would be tinted and not stark white.

I applied coats of mud to the underside of the rocks, and pressed them into each of their respective locations, and then smoothed around them with a small trowel. In about 20 minutes, I had completely coated the layout with drywall mud ‘ what a difference!

I wanted to the layout to have a somewhat finished look, as well as have some added durability (as it would likely get moved around), so I installed the fascia. I purchased 1/8″ masonite hardboard and ripped them into manageable strips. I temporarily fastened each strip of masonite to the side of the layout using wood screws. I traced the contour of the terrain onto each board, removed the screws, and cut along each line using a jigsaw. I also cut to access holes in two of the fascia pieces so that in the case of derailment, I would be able to reach inside the layout.

I reattached the masonite strips to the side of the layout, making certain that I lined up the screws with their original holes, and ensuring I applied a generous coat of PL300 adhesive to the Styrofoam, and wood glue to the base of the frame and tightened the screws. As a finishing touch I added corner bead to the outside edges of the layout ‘ again adding some additional durability, as well as hiding any imperfections in the cuts.

Later, I will remove the screws once the glue has dried.

As the Niagara Escarpment System model railroad is a test bed for modeling techniques I haven’t tried (which is all of them as this is my first railroad..), I decided that I would like to build a simple town. After browsing through a number of publications, as well as the Walther’s website, I found that most manufacturers didn’t offer buildings that were appropriate for the era and region I’m modeling. Southwestern Ontario is dotted with a number of architectural styles, such as Canadian Gothic, as well as a number of war-time style homes, and basic two-story dwellings. As such, I decided that it would be a good time to scratch-build the small town.

In order to get a better sense of how a town might look, I built a simple architectural model of what a standard house in the Niagara region might look like. Having built a number of ‘real’ homes, it was a simple process to create a roughly proportioned, scale structure that was a decent facsimile of local buildings. I visited the Tichy Train Group website and downloaded some images of their frame windows, and then inserted them into my drawing. Satisfied with the result I was able to print out the drawings on regular bond paper, and with a pair of scissors and a little tape, fashioned 6 scale houses. (You are welcome to download the drawing here housetemplate.pdf)

With my small community in hand, I began arranging the houses on the hill of the west-side of the NES until I had designed a community that was pleasing. I traced the basic footprint of each of the houses, and then began creating streets. Using leftover cork roadbed, I carved away at the foam terrain, and glued down the cork until I had a fairly level set of streets. I replaced the houses, and made additional rough adjustments to the hillsides until things looked right. Satisfied with the overall look, I ordered the windows and Doors from the Tichy Train Group ‘ I hope I eventually find the time to put them to good use!

From the beginning of this project, I have always promised myself that I would strive to find the easiest/simplest way to do something – and keep mess-making to a minimum! Hence, when I started building the scenic contours on my n scale Niagara Escarpment System (NES) model railroad, there was no way I would use any sort of lattice-webbing-plaster-soaked-paper-towel technique. Rather, I decided to create the landforms using the ever-popular technique of stacked extruded Styrofoam sheets. Typically arranged in a wedding cake fashion, the Styrofoam techniques allows you to build landforms quickly, carve contours, and sand imperfections, all the while offering incredible structural stability.

In my case, I needed to create some rolling hills, as well as some rock bluffs in an attempt to capture some of the geographic essence of Niagara Escarpment region. Depending in whether or not the landforms were being stacked atop the hidden tracks or not, I either built the hills as solid masses of Styrofoam, or used small blocks to created elevated areas with open cavities beneath (for inevitable later access).

I opted to use the half-inch think pink foam for all of the construction, and I found many benefits to having selected this thickness of the other available sizes. Firstly, cutting the foam is a snap ‘ literally. You simply need to score the foam about ½ inch deep with a sharp knife and bend it along the cut and it will snap clean. Likewise, after hearing about all of the dust crated from slashing away at the foam with an old steak knife of rasp, I bought a package of utility knives; the ones that have the thin blades that you can extend about 3 inches. These knives easily cut through the foam cleanly. I was able to shave the majority of landforms smooth just using the knife. (Buy a pack of blades ‘ they do tend to dull quickly.)

I used PL300 adhesive to join the foam, and I shoved in 1 inch finishing nails to keep things in place while it dried. As I worked, I installed the backdrop/view block, fastening it in place with hot glue and wood scraps. I didn’t make the backdrop overly high, as I envision this model railroad being shoved behind the furnace etc. for storage, so the shorter the overall height, the better. After two casual evening of work, I had all of the terrain roughed in.