Shadowlands and Tellynott

[Rick]

Interesting looking trees and an interesting way of making them.
Looks good so far.

[PRR Modeler]

Very interesting how you do trees. The 1:1 trees look exotic and I guess they are!

[Jerry]

Nice way to make those tree trunks.
Looking forward to the next steps.

jerry

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi guys.

Thanks very much, Rick, Curt and Jerry.

I've taken a few more photographs so will try to walk you through the wire twisting stage.  This is a tried and true method covered in many books including Gordan Gravett's two books 'Modelling trees part 1 and 2'.  I'm new to these techniques, but have found that twisting up branches is a nice easy job to do while watching telly with the family of an evening.

Photo 1 - Start with an even number of thin florists wire.  I can't tell you the gauge, as I was given a big box of bundles of loose wire.  As the Kahikatea does not have a lot of girth near the canopy, I have lessened the amount of wires I start with as I've progressed.  For my latest trees I have been using 12 pieces for my top branch and 6 pieces for my lower branches.  Pictured is 6 pieces of florists wire, bent in half and the bottom section twisted together.  This, of course, now creates 12 wires.


Photo 2 - Here I have separated 4 wires from the 12.  These are split into 2 groups of 2.  each is twisted a few times, and then doubled over on itself, leaving a small tail.  This tail is twisted together to make another two branches.


Photo  3- The two pairs of two loops are separated.  Each loop is twisted a few times and then doubled over on itself, again leaving a small tail loop and two other loops.  These three loops are all twisted a few times to create smaller loops.


Photo 4 - Shows the four wires completed.  Rinse and repeate.


Photo 5 - Here the various branches have been inserted into holes drilled in the tree trunk.  I try to get a good tight fit and add some Aleenes tacky glue to the hole before inserting each branch.


Photo 6 - Here all the loops have been cut with side cutters and teased apart.  This is another good mindless job for doing in front of the goggle box.


More soon, cheers, Mark.

[deemery]

Actually, I was looking at the countertops instead of the trees...

dave

[Mark Dalrymple]

Continuing...

Photo 7 - Here is the paste I use to apply for bark texture.  This is applied with a flat brush.  I use a smaller brush when applying to the twisted wire branches.  It works very well and goes a long way.  It is also carvable.


Photo 8 - Here is another tree.


Photo 9 - A close up of the textured bark.  I may add another layer and more to the wire branches, although at this stage I'm not sure how much the flock will hide.  There is no such thing as a bad tree, just foreground and background trees!


Photo 10 - An idea of what they will look like en masse (and also how many thousand I will need to make!)  They are almost indestructible (I dropped a branch on the garage floor and my wife ran over it in her Mazda Demio.  I was still able to reshape the wire back to as good as new).  You can also construct anything - if you can dream it up, you can build it.  I would imagine as my skills progress I will be able to work from photographs and build a model tree to match.  I'm already doing this, but imagine I will improve.  There are also other techniques such as creating branches with thicker wire and wiring the smaller branches to the end of these.  In this way multi limbed trees can be constructed.  I'm keen to have a go at this to attempt a Kamahi tree.  This is as far as I have got so far, but I'll be sure to update as my journey progresses.


More soon, cheers, Mark.

[friscomike]

Howdy Mark, nice work on the trees and tutorial.  Have fun, mike

[PRR Modeler]

Great job and tutorial Mark.