pictures

DId you take the pictures?  Did you need to adjust perspective on them?  Did you add the lines with gimp or are they part of the photo?

Pictures

Have you tried a texture photo paper such as canvas (Canon) ?

Dale Tripp

SNNT.org

daletripp.org

Textured photo paper

I'd like to try textured paper, but I haven't been able to find any locally.  Placing an order on the web is on my "to-do" list in the next week.

Liking it!

I like the idea of using printed road surfaces, especially for white / yellow lines, and road markings.  I believe that if done correctly it would work for foreground presentation.  Once I get my new railroad going I will have to do some experimentation.  Thanks for the idea!

Printed highway colors

While there's a bit of a learning curve, Photoshop or Gimp make it possible to get exactly the color you'd like for a printed road surface.  Indeed, if you have a Mac, you may find that iPhoto's tools will work quite nicely and require absolutely no technical knowledge.

Just Did That A Few Weeks Ago

How interesting, I stumbled on the same idea a few weeks ago. I pretty much did the same as you, I used photoshop.

I glued mine to .060 foam board I bought at Walmart as the base so the road was raised. Using the Transform tool you can even curve the road if needed.

Other material sources

If you don't have access to a cherry pick / bucket truck for overhead perspective, you might want to check out CGITextures which has an extensive selection of high resolution pictures of roads (asphalt,  dirt, concrete etc).

There is also Scalescenes (the card stock people), however their T034US is less flexible as the files are protected PDF.

Happy Holidays and all the Best for the New Years

Technology vs. paint-sniffing

Great results here!  I am wanting to try similar techniques for stucco, brick, etc - basically printing the paper downloads onto decal film.

But I do feel guilty, I feel I'm cheating myself out of an entire branch of the hobby - ie. painting and weathering techniques, the final and most obvious presentation of my model to the viewer.  By printing something photographed from nature, rather than painted myself, I just cant look at it and say with the same pride "I made that".

We now have backdrops delivered to us, all manner of textures, and although we can end up with really great results I cant help thinking we are shooting ourselves in the foot sometimes, as it removes the need to front up and learn a technique.  I guess it depends what you are after as an individual - I know I will never throw away my paints and powders.  But using the computer is just a new technique I guess?  I recall using photoshop techniques to manipulate model photos caused some discord a few years ago, maybe still is, and this is just a logic extension of that.  Please feel free to disagree with me.