Trees for the river scene

[Tyson Rayles]

Gary that's looking real good and the foot path is a nice touch!

 

[Casey Feedwater]

Originally posted by Gary H Pfeil
Casey, That first photo is unbelievable. Is it really amodel? The angle, taken looking up thru the trees to the sky, is fantastic. Have you written about how you made them?

Gary, I may have posted the photos and an explanation sometime ago. I don't remember. It's an "age" thing going on...

Anyway, one of the things I do is mix tree varieties and "plant" them as closely together as I can. In the first photo, I have a mixture of "Super Trees" (from Scenic Express) and homemade trees from Sedum. You can clearly see one of my Sedum trees in the second photo.

I do something a little different with my Sedum trees. I drill holes in the trunk and add branches and limbs from other Sedum stalks. It really helps fill out the tree. I also soak the trees in a container of matte medium for a few minutes before adding the foliage. They soak up some of the matte medium which helps preserve them. (That's a trick I learned from Scenic Express.)

One other thing that I do is add lots of "undergrowth" to wooded areas. I have seen a lot of layouts where the "wooded areas" consisted of a few trees and lots of bare ground. They just don't look convincing to me. If you look at the photos I posted, you can see there is a lot of ground cover and brush under the trees.
(The underbrush where I live in the Ozarks is so thick and heavy in the summer that you can hardly walk through the woods. That's the impression I try to convey on my layout. )

 

[sumpter250]

Gary,
The sedum branches on the stripwood trunk is a good variation! It changes the look of the sedum trees. Casey's technique of adding additional branches to the sedum trees will produce yet another variation, and Val's yet another. With just those techniques, and some different colors you can do a whole forest!
BTW Casey, I agree with the undergrowth. I still have to get some new growth trees planted, then all the undergrowth.
Pete

 

[Gary Pfeil]

Thanks to all for your input and favorable comments. I've got more riverbank work to do (and more trees/ground cover) then I'll be pouring water. This is a funny hobby. I've done so much benchwork and tracklaying and so little scenery up to this point that I was excited to get this scene going. Now that I'm approaching that goal, I can't wait to finish it so I can lay the track down the street to connect the the Garfield branch to the river crossing. Sometimes I look around at how much is still to be done and think I must be crazy. But I'm having fun!

 

[Drew1125]

Hi Gary!
The trees look great to me!
I agree with what some of the others have said, about undergrowth being an important element of any wooded scene...but I also agree with Tyson...whatever you do, keep that footpath...that is so realistic to that type of scene.
That is such a fantastic looking layout!