Country Cottages Paint Work part two

First of all, I would like to start by thanking all the Referring Sites that have recently been pushing traffic my way, in the first 12 days of June I have managed to attain my highest monthly figure yet, and so early in the month. Special thanks goes to the following, your support is much appreciated:-
http://www.theangrylurker.blogspot.com/
http://www.figoblogotheque.blogspot.com/
http://www.kingsleypark64.blogspot.com/        
http://www.wargamesblogs.blogspot.com/

Previously I undercoated the cottage and painted the thatch, details of that can be found here.
The Wood Work  and The Thatch Work.

Since then I’ve had a week off work, holiday time in which I planned to get a lot done, but some sort of allergic reaction caused my hands to swell up for a few days, and you can’t brandish a knife or a paint brush like that. Anyway, between bouts of swellings I’ve managed to complete the paint work on one of the cottages.

The walls were first painted with the Americana Decoart Acrylic Butter, then over painted with white acrylic blending into the sides and corners so that the walls also had an aged look.

I also dry brushed with white on the wood work, before picking out the joints of the wood frame and beams with a watered down black acrylic, this added additional dirt worked into the cracks.

The chimney and stone work were painted black, followed by a grey mix painted over the undercoat, and then topped off with white detail.

The windows were painted black; I tend to keep these dark and neutral. They can always be dressed for special occasions with inserts if you need a lighted window look later.

The sawdust base was painted green but then additional red sand and green flocking was added with PVA glue over the top, some of the red sand was rubbed into the wood work of the step, again to give it that lived in and used look.

I added the small pieces of bush and a couple of pieces of cork to acts as rocks which I painted up with the same colour scheme as the chimney.

The final paint work was addressed to distress the thatch, here I used a mix of orange, butter, and burnt umber in varying proportions to give extra depth and age to the thatch.

The only main concern was not to over use the orange as this was too bold, where the orange came through too strongly I blended back with additional ‘butter’ to soften the effect.

All it needs now is a spray of purity seal and the job’s done.

Now to get back to work on the cottage where the chimney stack had to be cut away and rebuilt...

Country Cottages Fixing the Chimney

Today’s work was interrupted by showers, forcing me to dash in and out between bursts, but then the weather took a final turn and all hope of working outside was lost.

 One of the models that I discovered unfinished had a full external stone chimney built by using the DAS clay shaped into stone work and stuck around an additional layer of foam board. I started work putting the wooden beams around it then came to the conclusion that the chimney was too flat, the effect I had been after was for the chimney to be built out of the wall. Once the beams were on and the area between the beams plastered up the chimney would sink flat against it.

I had to take corrective measures, and the first rule of this is a very sharp knife. I cut around the chimney removing it completely from the model. Then stuck another piece of foam board inside the model, like a new backing plate and built out the gap between with more pieces. After that I reattached the chimney to the elevated section giving the chimney more thickness. 

This left a gap around the edge which I filled with more DAS stones to add to the chimney work. I think I might have got away with it.

Country Cottages, The Thatching

Ok where was I?  (Previously Country Cottages Fireworks and Fur)

Oh yes thatching my cottages and updating my materials used page – but then our dear friends at Bloggerton blew up their system and made a hash of the system restore – yes my page updates have not been restored. Suffice to say, modelling is a hobby, as an IT professional I’m not impressed. Ok moan over, let’s get on with something constructive.

The next stage is to glue on the chimney and the capping stones. The stone and the chimney work are made from modelling clay – I tend to use DAS or similar material for this. I make small stone shapes and glue them to the top of the model sealing the gap between the fur edges.

Then I basically build up the box chimney shape using small pebbles made from the modelling clay, glued on whilst still wet. 

On the cottages where the chimney is built up as an external wall the clay stones are made to fit and are build up over the exterior of the foam board.

One of the other models I have found half finished has a chimney wall like this. I’ll be working on that one next week.

You need to leave the clay work overnight to harden off before sanding down the building to get any unwanted marks off the wood, for example any wall filler that has smeared over the wood. Once the building has been cleaned up then the painting can begin.

The first stage is to give the whole building an undercoat, for buildings where I have thatch work I tend to go back to a white undercoat and spray quite liberally with white paint. (In this case I’m using Skull White from Games Workshop)

Once this is dry I spray the thatch again with a second blast of the skull white and this time whilst wet I lightly sprinkle with saw dust.

Once this has started to dry off, I then start to add colour, and here you do need to use quite a heavy amount of paint to ensure that the fur is matted together.

This time I’ve used two creamy brown shades from the Americana Decoart Acrylic paint collection, the shade names being Desert Sand and Butter.

This has given a very light and clean colour to the thatch – I will probably do a little dirtying down on my next session.

When painting this I use a large brush and apply very liberally as I have said, also ensuring that the paint is well worked into the edges and front of the fur to stiffen it up and to make it look as much like the ends of cut thatch as I can, pushing the brush into the exposed fur.

Next I gave the stone topping and chimney a black base coat to start the stone work painting.

Next week I’ll dirty up the thatch a bit, paint the stone work in grey shades and then start the on the wood work.