Detailing Seeley Creek

With the Seeley Creek bridge nearing completion, I now need to focus on completing the stream bed beneath were the structure will ultimately be placed.  The stream bed started out as a flat piece of Masonite and now it's time to make it look like flowing water.  The first step is to paint the bottom so that it will look like a stream.  For this I used acrylic paint and started with lighter shades of tan and gray near the shoreline and gradually added darker color until it became pure black near the center of the creek.  Ultimately, I'll simulate flowing water by coating the painted stream bed with acrylic gloss matte medium.  That's still a ways off as I have to line the banks with rocks and finish adding the ground texture on the adjoining slopes.

Here's a photo of the painted stream bed.  The lighter lines flowing into the dark area represent a bit of turbidity form water flowing around rocks and across the shallower parts of the stream.  Also in this view you can see both abutments of the truss bridge.  The abutments are made from mat board and 1/32" plywood covering the wood risers that are part of the original benchwork.

The stream bank needs more rocks...a lot more!  Much of the geology in this area is made up of glacial till.  Huge rocks that were moved thousands of years ago during the ice age and deposited  along stream beds or areas there were eventually  eroded by streams.

This photo shows the completed rock lined stream bed.  The rocks simply came from my backyard. I tried to select stones that were flat on one side and glued them randomly to the painted Masonite. I used smaller stones and fine beach sand behind the larger stones as a transition to the embankments on the bridge approaches. Once all the stones are secure, I'll brush on the gloss acrylic medium to represent the water.

I can't take credit for the process.  It goes way back to the early 1980's and Dave Frary's book - Easy to Build Model Railroad Scenery published by Kalmbach in 1982.  I've used this method on many occasions and the results are quite spectacular.  I personally prefer it to pouring resin to represent water, especially moving water.  We should be able to see the results in my next post.

One more shot of Seeley Creek looking back toward Southport yard. You can see Kendall tower sitting on it's foundation on the approach embankment to the bridge.  Next steps include extending the photo backdrop and planting lots of trees on the far hillside.