Scalescenes.com Low Relief Warehouse

We've built several N-gauge Metcalfe kits but now that we have decided to model a modern diesel-era scene we don't have much use for a period country station or goods shed (shame, I was rather pleased with the finished results but my wife thinks they looks great on the mantelpiece).

We like card modelling and have scratchbuilt other non-railway models such as space rockets, satellites and famous landmarks. After a little Googling we discovered Scalescenes.com. Whilst not strictly scratchbuilding in its purest form the flexibility of the kits and wide range of extra textures and accessories make creating unique models very easy.

As a tester/taster we downloaded the free Low Relief Warehouse R002b in TX07 Aged Brown Brick and hastily printed it out on cheap copier paper using the office colour laser printer. Construction was very straight forward as the instructions are very well presented (the owner of Scalescenes.com is a graphic designer by trade) and clearly a lot of thought and experimentation has gone into the design. There were some very good tips, such as using a glue-stick for large flat areas and then rollering to remove air bubbles.

What we like most about these kits though is the careful use of real photographic textures. They have been applied with care such that there is no discernible pattern repeat.

So here is the result of two short evenings of work with scalpel, ruler, cutting mat and Roket Card Glue:

The only problem we had was cracking of the printed surface when wrapped back on itself around thin edges. The solution we found was to use liberal amounts of PVA to soften the paper for a few minutes before fixing in place, much like the effect paste has on wallpaper.

Peter & Seth