Yes folks, it's your friendly neighbourhood pain in the artist here with some progress pics of the backscene that will be at the more urban end of my layout.

 Materials used:  [so far]

 2" wide flat brush made of Taklon [very soft]. Cheap from a newsagent
1" wide flat Taklon brushes
1/2" wide bristle brush

 Jo Sonja's background colours:
 Soft White
Island sand
Sky Blue
Harbour Blue

Jo Sonja's All Purpose Sealer

misting bottle with clean water

3mm MDF board 90x60cm

 I sealed the board with a mix of the all purpose sealer and sky blue. They call it sky blue, but it is a very grey blue, which suits me because I want to avoid anything too pretty here.

 The backscene has to have on it a continuation of the road on my layout. I could do without that complication really. I placed it at the end of the layout and marked where the road would go.

After studying many photos of industrial buildings in the US I began to draw them on with Harbour Blue, using the 1/2" bristle brush.


 

I can't see any pictures Mike :sad:

Chris they're uploading to photobucket right now

Gotta be 200 of 'em! At least.

 So I drew some buildings and the road,




 then carried it out to see how it might look.
 Well the road looked all wrong   The road on the layout crests at the rail crossing and i'd like to give the impression of it dipping slightly as it recedes onto the backscene.
 Made some adjustments with brown - the only paint I had out there, and too lazy to go inside for the blue

 Using my sky colour mixed with a dash of Harbour Blue I painted over the shapes of the most distant buildings to keep them very cool in colour so they recede.




New colour : Red Oxide

 This was mixed with the Island Sand [a very faintly creamy white] to make a gentle pink.
Using the 2" taklon brush I painted this pink over the lowest part of the sky, using the sharp-edged brush to cut around the buildings. Wherever the paint overlapped buildings I rubbed it across them with my finger to help soften them and their edges.



 As the pink petered out into the grey-blue above I used very long, rapid brushstrokes horizontally and diagonally to "lose" the join.
 I had to add more of the original sky colour as well to help with the blend and I made use of the misting spray too.
 After that I felt I'd like to see some more blue-grey right down low to maybe represent smog or low cloud or something :lol: so more of the sky blue was brushed over the lowest pink. A dash of Harbour blue was added to the mix and edges were feathered away with fingers and soft brushes, with more spraying of water.

Then it was out to the layout to see how it was looking.





 Not concerned with the colour of the ground and closer buildings just yet. More concerned about the shape of the road and the scale of things. Pretty happy so far. Hopefully I'll be able to marry the two together.

Will have to work at getting the road just right.

 Mike

Mike this is extremely interesting im looking forward to watching you progress through this

cheers Brian

Mike

Your timing for this project is spot on, as we will be thinking about our backscene soon. For me its the fact that you don't use the bright colours, that makes it so good.

Watching with a lot of interest

More progress.

New colours:
Arylamide yellow
Chestnut and Deep Plum [Jo Sonja's background colours]
Black

 Brushes
2 more flat taklon brushes about 1cm wide
1 very fine rigger brush size 0

 I started by painting the road a mix of black, harbour blue and red oxide plus island sand.
 Apart from its linear perspective making it narrower as it goes away, I can make it recede by having it progress from darker up close to lighter in the distance, with more blue added to the distant bit. I still might need to darken the front part. Or I could always lighten the road on the layout, which wouldn't be a bad thing.

 

 The pale building was done with those sharp taklon brushes, cutting around dark patches to make window shapes and framing them with the fine rigger brush. Light paint illuminates the roof edges and there's no definite light direction. Shadows under eaves are warmish because the sky can't influence the enclosed area.
 Ground cover is various mixes of chestnut, yellow, plum, and blue plus white here and there.
 Background buildings are under way with what amounts to geometric shapes of various greys. No deep darks and no strong colours for the distant area.

Snow patches are well and truly off-white - any old grubby whites that were lying around on the palette.

 Brick colours are based on red oxide with milky blues and some chestnut added for variety. Also some deep plum.

 On the layout:

when it started it reminded me of a certain oz we have over here he used to say
" can you guess what it is yet ?"
well yes i can, and it looks the start of something good,
nice how to Mike, thanks waiting for more.

:doublethumb:lol::lol::cool:

Glad you're enjoying it. I hope I'm covering everything fully. The buildings are done the same way as in a previous thread on here.
 I have plenty more buildings to do so I'll show one step by step if anyone wants me to.

 Mike

[user=8]MikeC[/user] wrote:

Glad you're enjoying it. I hope I'm covering everything fully. The buildings are done the same way as in a previous thread on here.
I have plenty more buildings to do so I'll show one step by step if anyone wants me to.

Mike

Yes Please :doublethumb

Mike C,
        Brilliant as ever,mate! If I were you,though,I'd use some of the darker grey from the road on the layout to "carry through" onto the road on your backscene,and fade it out into the distance;-):thumbs

Owen.
        You beat me to the draw with that Rolf Harris comment!!
I was thinking just the same as I panned down.It reminded me of those big boards he'd paint,usually while singing or telling some story.At the start,you'd be looking at it,thinking"what the bloody hell's this going to be??",and the picture suddenly appeared like magic.(Clever buggers these Aussies!!!)

"…I'd use some of the darker grey from the road on the layout to "carry through" onto the road on your backscene,and fade it out into the distance;-):thumbs " GJG

After having a good long look I think you're right! Thanks for that.
 
OK I'll do a building step by step next seesion.

Mike

….. and when you're done there's around 30 metres of backscene here I need doing …….

Looking very good there Mike.  It must help if you have half a clue how to draw and how to use those sort of materials.

It must help if you have half a clue how to draw

that i do agree with,my kids can i haven`t a clue…

:roll::roll::cool:

Oh my:exclam:thumbs:thumbs:thumbs

What can one say, just outstanding, lost for words

 :thud

Phill

Brilliant :exclam  Keep going . . .

Max,I think us South Aussies should band together & send Mike a bus ticket to come down here for a few days, staying at each house  for a couple of days while he does his magic stuff :exclam:exclam

Mike :doublethumb:doublethumb