Sunday, February 28, 2016

Touching Up a Painted Backdrop

I made a 20 minute-long video showing a technique for touching up a painted backdrop.This technique is a bit unique in that I use matte medium to blend progressively darker layers of color together on the backdrop itself. It can be a bit messy, but mistakes become your friend with this technique. I'm pretty pleased with the results!

Friday, February 26, 2016

A Couple of Update Videos

Here are a couple of update videos detailing what I've accomplished over the past year and my plans moving forward. The first video is one I recorded back in January of 2015 where I show off the progress I've made on my cement factory.  These are really the very first plastic kits I've successfully assembled in my lifetime and I am pleased at how they are turning out!



The second video I recorded last night and details a few simple projects I'd like to accomplish quickly to add a layer of fit and finish to the layout and encourage myself as I work towards that ever elusive goal of "completion". (Of course we all know that no model railroad is ever complete!)


Monday, February 22, 2016

What the heck happened here!?

Let me take a moment and quote myself from January of last year:
"It's a brand new year and a chance for a renewed focus on model railroading! 2015 will be the year of the railroad.  I plan on getting a lot of work done on the railroad this year and I plan to update this blog quite often with all of my latest efforts.
 That didn't happen. I had good intentions, but like a squirrel with ADD, I found myself distracted by all the pretty, shiny objects around me. I started and quit a webcomic. (That didn't work out.) Then summer came and The Witcher 3 got released and I put about 300 hours into that game. (My girlfriend did not appreciate that one.) Finally I discovered RC multi-rotors and airplanes in the fall. (That one got expensive quick.) The entire time my layout sat lonely in the basement with no one to give it the love it deserves. Something should be done about that.
Yesterday I turned the layout on  and surprisingly everything runs fairly well.  A good cleaning would be helpful for sure.  I think my next steps are going to be getting stay-alive capacitors installed in my locos and continuing work on the scenery. I hope to have some new stuff to show on a timely and regular basis. With that, I'll leave you with the immortal words of Bart Simpson:
"I can't promise I'll try... but I'll try to try."