Normandy village part 7

I have been working hard on the latest base in between the Olympics. If it wasn't for the radio commentary I wouldn't have got anything done for 2 weeks!

Progress has been steady but I would have hoped to have got a bit further than I have by now. The timber framed building has seen its roof take shape. Here is a photo of the original building.

The roof is a bit complicated with the dormers so I knew it would be a challenge. Normally I would use resin sheets of tiles to make the roofs but the detail was so delicate on this roof that I decided to make the roof structure from card, so it was easy to cut to the exact shape I wanted and then tile it with individual tiles made from plasticard.

I started by making the basic shape of the roof and then once dry adding the details.

The process of doing the roof was just to do one thing after another and don't get put off by each stage. It was going to come good and would be worth the effort.

The last step before tiling was to add the small roofs on the dormers. I now needed some painting to do so started on the building itself. A base coat of yellow ochre all over, washed with raw umber and then two heavy dry brushes of buff for the plaster. All the wood was then painted black followed by a dry brush of black grey.

The last thing I have done on this building was the tiling. It took hours but was worth it. Seeing the painted version will be on the next post.

I cut thin plasticard into small rectangles and then use super glue to stick them on to the card. Start at the bottom and work up to the top row by row.

While I was working on this building I began work on the row of houses that would back up onto it. I had about 15" length to fill so I went with 4 narrow houses with various roof styles and number of floors. I designed them, cut them out, added laser cut windows and glued them together into one row.

I wanted to have a couple of them painted quite brightly so went with a yellow and sky blue. I thought these would add a little contrast to the rest of the subdued pallet. Once I had rendered them with plaster the paint job looked like this

You will notice from this photo that I have also been working on the town hall. I have painted it with a base coat of yellow ochre, a wash of raw umber and then dry brushed with a cream, and then a buff and finally a very light white dry brush.
The roof has also been built and again I have decided to tile it with individual tiles. The roof has a hollow top ready for an AA gun which you can see from this photo taken before I had started painting it.

The board is now looking pretty full

I have got further than this but I realise I haven't taken any photos for a couple of days so will do another post, part 8 in a couple of days with a final one next week (or maybe the week after) when it is finished.