Woodland Scenics' "The Scenery Kit"By Michael Benolkin |  |
Background
We learn to produce our diorama bases from trial and error. We look at some of the knock-out vignettes in the magazines and at model contests, but we usually don't get to hear how the builder replicated that base. The same goes for realistic scenery on our model railroad layouts. Even with the wide variety of materials available at our local hobby shops, we just don't really understand how to re-create nature in miniature.
Last month, we looked at two products from Woodland Scenics, a how-to video and corresponding instruction book. These two references are a great way to learn how to transform the various bags of raw materials into a scale piece of the world. One of the tools that the video uses to get you through scenery 'basic training' is Woodland's 'The Scenery Kit.' We decided to take a closer look at this.
The Kit
The Scenery Kit contains a wide variety of samples from Woodland's product line. These include glue and adhesives, green and earth-toned covering, lichen, trees, rocks and even a culvert.
The base for this kit is a provided by a precut wooden frame that builds into a size roughly 10" x 18". The frame is also pre-contoured to replicate a hillside with a road or trackbed running across it. The actual surface is plaster cloth applied over wadded newspaper. This creates a rigid (and lightweight) shell, upon which the various other materials are applied.
The resulting base will give you a complete end-to-end instruction on how to create scenery, whether it is for your HO layout, or for a stunning base for your 1/35 Tiger tank.
We'll be doing a follow-up article showing how this product goes together, how it can improve your diorama skills (and mine), and how this training tool can also be used to display your latest projects.
Conclusions
The Scenery Kit is an excellent tool to help the scenery novice to learn how to accomplish the intimidating task of re-creating nature. We'll be looking at how this all comes together next month!
My sincere thanks to Woodland Scenics for this review sample!
