I am making a model of the street outside my apartment building in South Boston. The view is (corrected for parallax):
I thought I would start with the most challenging part, which is to make the road markings. As you know, these are sprayed paint but applied very wet and have a distinct thickness and applied as a band about 12" (30cm) wide with a distict ridged surface.
After lots of experimenting, I found that I could mask out a shape on thick mylar, apply the paint (Golden liquid acrylics) and smooth it out with a squeegee (The squeegee is used to apply a clear film to a cellphone). The thickness of the masking tape is about right for a scale paint-film thickness, and roughness of the the tape causes the squeegee to move unevenly and give the top of the paint a ridged appearance. I removed the tape as quickly as possible to allow the paint to flow a little and have a rounded edge.
It took most of the day to get this far, but luckily there was a blizzard going on outside, so I had nothing else to do!
I think it gives the correct apprarance of a painted traffic arrow. Now I have to let it dry for a week of so and then I can peel it off the mylar and stick it onto the base. Then I can weather it with a q-tip and solvent to get a good worn effect.
Since my bottle of Skull White from CItadel has dried up, I am looking for a nice replacement acrylic to give a cracked paint line…
This is the base in preparation. I used cherry plywood and cherry edging. I am branching out from my usual dark Walnut stain and I like how it matches my new desk! There is also a cherry spacer to give it a floating look, rather than sitting flush with the display surface.
I have always enjoyed your diaramas. I’m loking forward to this one, too.
Lee
Another interesting project N. the base woodwork looks good. Looking forward to future progress reports.
Carl
I. also, always enjoy your work. Seeing everyday sights from a fresh technical perspective. Look forward to seeing what follows.
Yes, that looks like the road arrows I’ve seen before. Looking forward (maybe pun intended) to watching this biuld progress
I made a Boston street grate out of extruded rod, sheet styrene and injection moulded letters. It took a lot of scalpel nibbling and then filing with a triangular file to get the shapes right but it looks good test fitted in place.
And the easy part was buying some 1/24 manhole covers from Dave at Vectorworks. I used one OOB and the other I made a new rim to have a slightly misfitting cover
[img]
A quick update. One line was painted directly onto the surface and attacked immediately with masking tape and a scalpel to weather it. The other thicker stripe was painted out onto mylar and then peeled off and glued onto the base. This is yet to be weathered, but I like the thickness of the paint on the road. And lastltly an overall with the arrow not stuck down. I am just working out its final location.
All the pieces are glued into place. I used Elmers (PVA) to glue the arrow down as well as the BWSC plate, and superglue for the manhole covers. I filled the space between the studs on the BWSC plate with a sifted dirt and Elmer’s glue to give a sense of trapped crud. I am very happy with all the different textures on this little scene.
Now to start the weathering…
I finally finished this one. It will be winging its way to Portugal shortly.
I had fun applying the oil drips to the road surface… I applied paint to a piece of dental floss and then stretched it taut and applied “drips” in a straight line to simulate oil leaking from a moving car. I found that I could use a fresh No.11 blade and carve in the cracks to the white paint and it looked pretty good, provided I followed the detailed reference pics I had. The weathering was very routine stuff.
Here is an overall:
And some details
All I can say is WOW! That is awesome man! I can’t wait to see more!
Eagle90
Congratulations NK on another fabulous work of art.
Carl
Excellent work!
Why is it on its way to Portugal?
Lee
Consistently amazing work. Well done!
Thanks Eagle, Carl Lee and Krzysztof. Eagle check out my fotki account to see more of my builds. A link is in the signature.
Lee: I am sending it to a friend in Lisbon who is an artist. A couple of years ago he gave my wife and I a painting and I wanted to make something for him as I know he likes street markings. He visited a couple of months ago and saw this in progress and loved it. So I know its going to a good home.
I tend to give builds away when they are finished as I have limited storage in my apartment. It makes my friends happy and allows me to keep on building without creating clutter at home.
That is very generous of you, I don’t think I could let them go.
Is it just me, or do manhole covers remind anyone else of Hydrox cookies?
That is pretty funny. Just dont get hungry and try to eat a manhole cover…too much iron for your diet
I’ve never seen them as cookies until now [:D]
Thanks Jim. Much appreciated.