Fly's Studio: Part 6 - Exterior Trim

In case you are just joining us, this series of articles chronicles my real-time adventures preparing and painting Old Glory's Fly's Studio from their OK Corral series of 25mm Western buildings. Because the entire process is an experiment, you'll get to see my successes and mistakes along the way. To see the entire series of articles, click on the Fly's Studio link.

Due to my schedule this week, this will be a short installment today. After painting the base color on the exterior walls and the floor, I drybrushed the trim using Americana Avocado Green. I want the side windows and trim to look like the owner gave them one coat of paint and then ignored them, while maintaining the paint on the false front. I will paint the sides of the shingles dark gray once I work on the roof. I chose the lighter, faded look of Avocado Green because the front trim will be a dark green against a light tan. The interior trim will be the same dark green with most likely buff walls.

Color-Coding Paint Bottles

I got this idea from someone online. I don't remember who, when, or where. I totally forgot about it until last week, when I sat down and took inventory of my paint collection. Shook each bottle, inspected it, and painted the bottle's cap. It has really helped me see the difference between colors, intensity, and sheen. Here is a quick shot of some of my craft paint collection. I also own a number of Vallejo, Reaper, and P3 paints. I did the same with those, but they're not shown here. Give this little trick a try. You won't regret it.

Fly's Studio: Part 5 - Exterior Wood

In case you are just joining us, this series of articles chronicles my real-time adventures preparing and painting Old Glory's Fly's Studio from their OK Corral series of 25mm Western buildings. Because the entire process is an experiment, you'll get to see my successes and mistakes along the way. To see the entire series of articles, click on the Fly's Studio link.

This installment details painting the base coat on the wooden exterior walls. I'm trying to make a building that looks uncared for on the sides but looks good from the street, just like many real boomtown buildings did.

Step 1: Drybrush Americana Burnt Umber
Using my soft cat's tongue brush, I gave all the exterior walls a heavy drybrushing of burnt umber, which is a dark brown color. Because I plan on painting the facade a buff color with deep green trim, I left it black. Remember to drybrush the wood behind the roof's facade, along the roof, and behind the roof.


At first, I ignored the doors and windows. I figured I would drybrush them with a green, so I really didn't need to bother painting them brown. After some thought, I realized I wanted some of the wood's aged brown to show through, so I quick drybrushed the trim burnt umber as well. I also drybrushed the wood on the porch roof sides but realized that I had wasted my time. Later, I will paint the wood the same color as the facade. Oh well. Live and learn.


Finally, I drybrushed the interior floor and porch burnt umber as well. In later installments, you will see my frustration painting the floor. Like I mention in the introduction, you will get to see my success as well as mistakes. Luckily, some mistakes work out for the better!


Final Thoughts
If you like, you can stop right here and have a nice looking building. All you would have to do is finish the roof, facade, interior walls, and doors. Of course, I didn't stop here. In Part 6, I'll show how I painted the trim a faded "vomit green" (my son's description) and gave the building a more weathered look, with individually worn boards.

Fly's Studio: Part 4 - Painting The Stones

In case you are just joining us, this series of articles chronicles my real-time adventures preparing and painting Old Glory's Fly's Studio from their OK Corral series of 25mm Western buildings. Because the entire process is an experiment, you'll get to see my successes and mistakes along the way. To see the entire series of articles, click on the Fly's Studio link.

In this installment, I paint the stone foundation.For me, painting buildings is one of the most relaxing parts of the hobby. My main process for painting these Western buildings will be drybrushing. I don't have to worry about being exact, the process is quick, and if I don't like something I just paint it black and start again. Repainting rarely happens.

Step 1: Primer Touch-Up
After the gesso dried a couple days, I came back today and touched up any areas the primer missed, hitting them with a dab of black craft paint. Here you can see the building wall, a nice solid black.


Step 2: Drybrush Americana Graphite
I began giving the stone foundation a heavy drybrush of Americana Graphite, making sure to get some in the massive spaces between the stones but leaving quite a bit of black for deep shadow. This is my base dark gray. Don't worry about getting paint on the wooden walls. It will happen, as the photos show. Because I easily can touch up the primed walls, I do the foundation first.


Step 3: Drybrush Americana Neutral Grey
Every step of drybrushing is lighter than the previous. Not just in color, but in application. Again, don't worry if some areas are darker or lighter than others. Mistakes are good at this point! The one photo shows the contrast between the Graphite and Neutral Grey.


Step 4: Drybrush Americana Slate Grey
Again, a ligher gray and a lighter touch. My camera setup isn't professional, so the subtleties might not show up as well as they do in person.


Step 5: Drybrush Americana Grey Sky
A very light drybrush of Slate Grey to pick out highlights.


Step 6: Drybrush Ceramcoat Antique White
The final drybrush is a very light and random drybrush of Antique White to pick out the top highlights of the rock. Never use pure white because it is too stark. Antique White has a buff tinge, dulling it.

Step 7: Touch Up Black
The final step is to touch up the wood with black. Because I will be handling the building during the painting process, I'll let the paint dry a while before I continue. Plus it gives me time to write this article.


Final Thoughts
At this stage, the stones look good but still a bit "clean." When I am done with the entire building, I will come back and muddy up the foundation and the bottoms of the walls slightly. That will tie it all together, making it look realistic. If I didn't stop to take photos and answer the phone several times, the whole process would have taken no more than thirty minutes. Not too bad for a Friday morning! Now to eat lunch. I'm not sure if I'll continue working on this today. I also have to finish my 15mm Peter Pig WWII guys. I'll keep you posted.

Do You Have The Latest "Ant Man"?

I'm not really quite sure what to say about this photo other than those guys sure look impressed with the selection of comics. My son, Jeremy (aka Rover Dill), built this scale comic shop several weeks ago. It occupied a corner of our enclosed patio until we had to dispose of it this week. We hated doing it but had no choice. Even though the store was making a good profit, selling mostly to pro-wrestlers and evil villains, it was starting to get "unwanted" customers of the small, crunchy kind.

For the floor, Jeremy used tiles from Home Depot. Eveything else is cardboard. He practically used my entire bottle of $5 Weldbond, which is the best white glue ever made, and an entire box of finishing nails. He snagged images of comic book covers off the Internet, shrank them using Paint Shop Pro, and printed them. It was pretty neat. He saved the "comics." Maybe someday he'll open up a new store in the better side of town.

Western Photos 3

During the late 1800's, not everything in the West was "to scale." Take a look at the buildings pictured here, and those I posted earlier. You will typically see buildings built with high doors and ceilings right next to buildings built on the cheap with lower doorways and lower ceilings--even a shack right next to a false front store. Of course, you don't see this as much on Hollywood backlots, giving the impression that 1880's Western towns were neatly designed and built. Far from it.