NEAG February 2025 meeting

A decent crowd turned out for 4mm modeller John Elliott's presentation on his approach to modelling, painting and weathering. John's interest is in historical modelling of the collieries and private railway systems of Northumberland and Durham, with a little bit of Cumberland by way of the Brampton Railway. He brought along some examples of his exquisite industrial buildings by way of illustration.

I think it's fair to say that we all learnt something (and in my case, a lot) from John's presentation. For example, his basic technique for stonework is to use B&Q ready-mixed filler spread onto a foamboard or plasticard carcass. This is then scribed once dry, albeit dampening the surface again first with water using a paintbrush.

Part of John's P4 layout project is a brickworks, and the following photo is a typical Newcastle kiln:

This engine shed shows a larger expanse of stone wall. Interestingly, John tends not to put any glazing in his windows. He thinks that this is more realistic than having a transparent film of over-scale thickness, at least from normal viewing distances where windows invariably just look dark. Indeed we didn't notice the lack of glass in the engine shed windows until he pointed it out!

I got the impression John was rather fond of the following – a signal box converted to another use. Like all of his buildings, this is based on a real prototype.

An important aspect of John's talk was the painting process. Suffice to say that a mixture of different paints are used, including acrylics for primer and basic body colour, artists oils for (mainly) weathering, and watercolour pencils. The results speak for themselves.