Bricks in N Scale ~ Saturday, September 19, 2020

For years I've heard of a technique for modelling brick walls where you first paint the walls the basic brick color, and then run thinned white or gray paint into the mortar lines. This was the first thing I tried. When you're applying the mortar paint, capillary action draws it into the grooves between the bricks, and it looks great. But I kept finding that as the paint dried, the effect disappeared. I guess as the water evaporates, the paint particles redistribute and instead of a thick paint line in the groove you end up with a very even and very thin coat over everything.

On Youtube, I found a demonstration of another technique: brush spackling pastte or joint compound (the gray stuff you patch holes in real-life walls with) over your model and wipe it off, just leaving the mortar lines filled. An interesting idea, but seems like it could go wrong and ruin a model. But I tried the same basic idea using thick white paint ($0.99-ish craft paint), and here's the results:

Click to see larger.

I'm pretty happy with this but I feel like the white lines "pop" a bit too much--next time I'll try the same idea but try either gray or a terra-cotta red mortar (like the 1905 building in my previous post).

I made a few changes to the kit as I assembled it. First, I cut out a section of the long walls to chop it down to my standard city lot size. The front "stoop" has been positioned to rest on the sidewalk instead of being even with the bottom of the walls. I also added some partial floors and interior walls in preparation for lighting (those giant holes in the ground of the layout are for running wires).