Another Nice Job

You are very talented in doing scenery.  Thanks for sharing with us.

Nice work!

I really like where this is going, good work.

If I may share what I did since I have a rail that is covered with soil, just like your example. 

I made a tool out of a scrap piece of .060" plastic sheet, a bit larger than my rails (1 1/2"), cut two small notches the width of my rail (so the "tool" ride on the rail head and doesn't move sideways) and cut it slightly above the ties and spike details (but lower the rail head ). I then dragged my fill material (in my case, very fine sand from Sea Isle City, NJ) along the rail section until I couldn't see the ties anymore.  Before gluing everything, I ran a couple cars to make sure it didn't interfere with operations. 

The result is quite nice, and much better than my first attempt with plaster.

Cheers,

Chris

Thank you guys

Appreciate those good words. I love doing scenery almost as much as running the trains.

Cardstock buildings

Are those cardstock buildings? Do you use them on your layout or are they just placeholders until you make the real ones? Love the scenery work BTW.

Photo laminations

idomagic, the side of the building is photo laminated printed on my printer at home. The side facing the track is sheet styrene and strip styrene made to look as much like the actual building as I could make it, given limitations in space.

One suggestion, if I may!

If I can make a suggestion...

It looks like the glue didn't set properly on the printed building. Maybe use some kind of roller to "press" the paper/photo tightly on the surface it is glued to? Or maybe it's the glue that has started to cure before the paper was applied, and thus, didn't bond properly? Not sure.

I was able to find a roller in a craft/art store but can't remember what it was for exactly. I haven't used it yet for this purpose specifically (I bought so I can flatten Epoxy putty to make tarps for another hobby) but will as soon as I can get a hold of buildings I want to actually reproduce in paper/photo on my layout.

By the way, I really like the rail side wall. It's pretty close to its real life counter part.

Keep it up,

Chris

May try spray glue next time

johnybgood18, good eye my friend. Yes the paper is starting to wrinkle a bit. I used extra strong Elmers glue but I guess it didn't try quite right. Lance suggest 3M Spray Glue so thats my next attempt this weekend. We'll see if that comes out any better.

Spray glue is great!

I've started using spray glue and it works great. Only problem is that you need to spray outside...  otherwise, you end with a sticky surface almost everywhere!

You may also try using photo paper. It's bit more expensive but is thicker that regular paper and comes in mat finish as well. My gloss paper doesn't react well with my mat finish, it dries as a powdery coat that I can remove with my finger! :-(

My next step is to print directly on mat photo paper.

Keep it up!

Chris