Woodie said:
Oh.... yes please. A recipe for casurinas and some gum trees would be real good.
I am just hopless at trees. :cry:
As regards gum trees. I use twisted copper wire to make the branch structures. I've seen it explained in a couple of places but I could give a more detailed description if desired.{ since I wrote an extended post, I decided to do so further down}
I then melt solder into them and clean off the flux. this makes a much stronger structure. I then coat the branches with one of a number of gap-filling acrylics.
I use something called "No more gaps."
I can add tube acrylic paint to it and texture materials which make the tree more knobbly. while eucalypt trunks range in colour, one really useful shade I discovered was transparent red oxide. this gave me a fine representation of the resin flows and stains that typify the old gum tree. An old tooth brush does a good job of scratching bark texture into the gap filler,
I then find a suitable, fairly heavy twig, carve off the bark and drill holes in appropriate places. I'll often glue in a thin bit of twig with a broken end to represent a wind broken branch. Once the branches are attached to the trunk, I use "No-more gaps" to blend and refine the joinery. The aim is to stop the twig from looking like a twig.
I found my Dremel motor tool handy for hollowing the trunk to give the impression of age and fire damage.
One trick I discovered in an English book. Go to a theatre shop and get a plait of theatrical hair. tease a small amount into a light, transparent ball.
Spray one of your fixed branches with a suitable glue and drape the fake hair onto the branches. Spray this hair with glue and dust on one of the Woodland Scenic's range of non-greens. I used "Burnt Grass" and I think the other was "Dry earth". the point was that they produced a subdued, olive green with a dry quality, rather than the brilliant greens usually associated with the temperate North. The fake hair has sufficient colour to suggest twigs and small branches and gives a wonderfully light and open sense to the branch structure. Since it comes in a range of browns and greys, this adds more variation possibilities than the foliage net you usually buy.
I generally cut the head off a long woodscrew and superglue it to the base of the trunk, thread outwards, so I can screw the tree into the baseboard and turn it a bit while I judge it's suitability. I don't like having such useful things permanently fixed.
There used to be a railway called "Beyond Bulliac" who put an excellent article in the Australian Model Railway Magazine a few years back. They made excellent trees and I used many of their ideas. They may still be floating about.
When I'm up to speed with the technology I'll put a photo of my grand old red gum in.
Ok! the wire. That yellow and green striped copper wire has seven strands under the insulation. I get it at seventy cents or so per metre, so it's cheap and does lots of branches. strip it, twist about 150 mm or so as the main branch. divide the strands so that you have four in one group, three in another and twist into two branches. subdivide again until you reach the end, one strand.
You can also loop single strands at varous points and cut the loops giving forked branches. Once it's all soldered nothing moves.
I don't know whether you twisted paper clips to destruction at school. I did, and I noticed the similarity- once metal fatigue set in and the metal formed those tight little twists- to those wildly twisted branches. twist up the single ends and leave some exposed without foliage. Those twisty, dead branches are another eucalypt trade mark. a light iron grey, drybrushed lighter grey really brings up the grain you get with the twisting.
That's all I can think of at present. I'll see what I can do to get some photos onto the thread. Good health! jonno.:thumb:
FRED
Drill holes in what and where? Can I assume you mean the copper and solder "trunk"? And then slot the "twigs" into those holes?