Scenery Update

Last time I talked about my process for creating the scenery around the yard.  Well, as I was looking at it while working on other things I decided I didn't really like it.  I couldn't tell why at the time so I just ignored it and kept going.  A few days later I was trying to level out the garden in my back yard when it hit me: it was all too flat!  The fine turf creates a great blend of colors when viewed from above, but when viewed from a sitting or lowered view it is rather bland. 

To break up the boring, I decided to begin adding other types of turf.  In this case, coarse turf in Medium and Light Green from Woodland Scenics.

These two bags contain a product that is similar to taking the fine foam an rolling several pieces into a ball.  It takes a little work to spread around but is definitely a great product for my needs!  I spread it out in a random pattern and then glued it down using the same methods from the previous post.  While the glue was still wet, I sprinkled on a little more the coarse and fine turfs to add more color and blend it all together.  Below are the results.

So why it is all still as flat as a board (get it?!) this creates a better visual that draws the eye away from the flat land and creates a sense of elevation changes.

I plan on enhancing this using grass/bush tufts of various forms from several makers before calling it complete.

And now for the prototype photo of the day!

Here we have BNSF 1244 and a sister, both 3GS21B locomotives, transfer some cars from the Pearland Yard to the South Yard in Houston, TX.  I love whole train shots so this was a lucky catch!   Plus it is always fun to hear the reefer compressor units running (all on the end of the train).  Now if only I could get rid of all of the weeds, signs, old posts, etc.