Painting Realistic Brick Walls

[Jim Kottkamp]

I am constructing a replica of the RGS Ridgway roundhouse in 1:20.3.  I obtained copies of the original blueprints years ago from the John Maxwell Collection (now available from the Colorado RR Museum Library).  The seven-stall roundhouse is huge – the back wall is right at 6 feet long!  This translates into an enormous amount of interior and exterior brick which needed to be painted.
 
After dreading hours and hours of brick painting I ended up with a quick and realistic-looking process.  First I air brushed all the brick areas with an "old concrete" color to simulate the mortar joints.  Then I cut up a T-shirt and put 3 layers of the cloth over my index finger.  Next I put a small puddle of paint on a section of Foamcore board, dabbed my cloth covered finger into the puddle, wiped the cloth on the Foamcore to be sure it would not run when applied, and simply wiped the paint onto the brick using various crisscross passes of the cloth.  This process produces different shades of color in a random pattern which ends up looking very realistic.  I was able to complete the interior and 2 exterior walls on 2 stalls in less than one hour.   Final finishing will need to be accomplished with an air brush to grime up the walls.
 
The first photo shows an example of the construction with black vacuum formed brick veneer sheets, individual stone castings at the base, and gray hand carved window arches above the windows.
 
Photo 2 is a test photo of the interior walls after wiping on the brick color.

Photo 3-4 are close-ups of the finished brick.

[finescalerr]

Simple and effective. The walls look surprisingly good. Are the darker areas a result of how strongly you applied the color or are they a slightly different shade you applied later? -- Russ

[Bill Gill]

...or might the dark bricks be in areas that got wiped over more than once, in different directions? Whatever the cause, very nice results.

[Mr Potato Head]

How long did it take to carve all of those bricks
Gil

[Ray Dunakin]

Excellent! Who makes the brick veneer sheets you're using? In these photos the bricks appear very crisp, unlike most brick veneers I've seen.

[Jim Kottkamp]

The darker areas are both second applications and the result of first strokes with a freshened applicator.  Although I planned on using more than one color, after the first application I just didn't think it was needed. 

I can not count the hours required to carve the bricks for the arches.  The horizontal lines were easy as I used an altered compass to carve them.  The horizontal bricks - well let's just say I've recovered from the effort.

My Scottish email friend Jim Blakeman who has since passed obtained the veneer so I don't have the name of the manufacturer.  I know they were done in the UK - only bricks available in 1:20.3 scale.  I'll do a bit of research and see what I can find.  BTW this structure is dedicated to Jim Blakeman who also made a full set of original roundhouse doors with windows.

[Marc988]

your brick-work looks great !

Can you tell us which color(s) you used for the bricks ?

[greenie]

This seems to spring to mind,  -----    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trompe-l'%C5%93il

Excellent results, well done.


regards  greenie 

[Jim Kottkamp]

The paint used was MicroLux Custom Blended Hobby Acrylics #29010 Roof Red.
No other colors were added, the variance in color comes from the amount of paint on the pad used to apply the paint.

[Hydrostat]

Jim,

very good results with the coloring. For sure some stains of dirt/algae at the mortar joints will add even more to its already very realistic appearance. I hope you don't mind my late criticism, but that's what finescalerr's shark tank is about: The (hand carved, if I got it right) brick arrows give it away for their variation in brick size. If there's no way to improve accuracy by hand maybe some lasered parts would be an option. However, I like following your progress on that project.

Cheers,
Volker

[Peter_T1958]

[quote However, I like following your progress on that project.
Volker[/quote]

Me too! A really interesting way for large areas to paint. Here - not to hijack, but just as an inspiration - this wonderful photo I came across lately.



Cheers, Peter