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Kenneth Childres  This building was pieced together over the course of a year and a half and was originally intended for another project, only later was it adapted to the Tigerville base. It was constructed of mostly Balsa Foam, Wood, Plaster and Styrene sheet Once the basic dimensions of the building were established the walls were pinned together to orient the building on the base. Again this base was for another project and was eventually discarded but we’ll get to that later. Balsa foam can be drawn on to mark out locations but be gentle and mark lightly.  After cutting out the door and window openings the walls were glued and clamped up. Again, only light pressure on the clamps is necessary to hold the walls together. Balsa foam is very strong structurally but is easy to bang up if careless.  The second floor has been added as well as some of the brick detail. Stonework can be carved in with about any tool. I used a sharpened bamboo skewer in this case.   The brick was painted off white first then the mother of all dry brushing sessions brings out the bricks.But that isn’t enough. Oil paints and acrylics both were used to apply random colors and tones to the bricks to really give it an authentic look. The great thing about balsa foam is that the grain of the foam is EXCELLENT for replicating the texture of brick walls… Notice all the pits and bumps. Most of those were already present in the foam surface. All I had to do was draw out the bricks (which is quite tedious but easy) and distress a few here and there. It was at this point that the building sat for about 6 months until the tiger project came along and gave it a new purpose. I sawed it off it’s oval base and mounted it to the square one for the Tiger I.   A sidewalk was formed around the building much the same way a real one is. The “stones” were glued into place then grouted with plaster. A curb was formed with Apoxy Sculpt.   copyright©2007 ausfwerks |