Techniques for buildings
First Houses and modified kit buildings
The original plan was to use cardboard kits, but it soon became obvious that all the buildings would look the same and quite unrealistic, even with a certain amount of ‘personalisation’
However, making one’s own cardboard buildings was not feasible – I couldn’t cut accurately enough for perfectly square windows and doorways. We had a basic 3D printer, which I used to make the front walls of the miners’ cottages, plus windows, doors and chimneys. Painting them different colours and textures gave a good start.
More buildings
I began to really enjoy learning to design buildings for the printer and got a better printer, so as time went on I added textures, and more detail. Initially roofs were made from cardboard with printed tiles, and some of these remain, but later buildings have printed roof slates. The original cardboard chimneys from the kits were very fragile so they were soon replaced with printed ones. Similarly, by printing my own details I could have different doors and window styles.
Each round of building saw an improvement in the techniques, from adding gutters and drainpipes and creating texture with paint.
I couldn’t paint brickwork on the flat walls of the houses so started with putting on printed brick or painting them as though rendered. To my mind he printed bricks didn’t really look very good, so I started experimenting with making brick textures on the walls. The chapel was the first.
I also started printing the roof texture, so the whole of the building was printed and painted or weathered.
