making water look alike

[Highfiver]

anyone have any suggestions as to make some water effects without having to buy the very expensive stuff from Woodlands.

[OldTimer]

Water looks wet because it is highly reflective.  Since you can't look down into a body of water, what we need to model is the reflectivity and color.  Coat the bottom of your stream with a plaster slurry and let it set up fully.  Sand lightly and clean up the dust.  Paint the plaster an earthy color along the bank and feather that into a black or very dark green in the deepest parts.  Allow the paint to dry throughly.  Cover the paint with several coats of clear gloss varnish, making sure that each coat is completely dry before you add the next.  Not a real expensive process.  Hope this helps.
OldTimer

[Highfiver]

yes, that does help - Thank You.
Have you ever tried using white glue ??  This is supposed to dry clear.
Or what about Weldbond - I heard that might work.
Anyone ever use either of those

[Doneldon]

Hi5-

I don't think you will be at all happy with the results of white glue for water. It's best to get your color from paint on the bottom of your body of water, with black or VERY dark blue in the middle, and then one of the commercial  model water products for the water itself. You can even get a product called Water Effects which will allow you to add ripples or white water.

Remember to paint the bottom before you add the fake water; put plants, junk, sunken trees or old boats on the bottom before adding the water; and make absolutely certain that your pond is waterproof.  Instant water products have a habit of finding any potential leak in a riverbed, lake bottom or whatever. Also, pay special attention to things which stick up out of the water like piers or floating boats so that your water laps up on them realistically. This can require a little fine brush workwhen the water material is first poured. Follow the manufacturer's directions and you should wind up with an excellent result.

                                                                                            -- D

[Highfiver]

Thank you

[jward]

i am wondering about painting stream beds black. i know that's how they say to do it in that magazine, but black just doesn't look right to me. i live around several navagable rivers, and the water colours range from muddy brown to a deep olive green. polluted streams might be bright orange from mine drainage. but i have never seen black water....

bottom line, look around you and note what colours things actually are.

[OldTimer]

I drive past Deep Creek Lake, Md., often and it always looks very dark green to black to me.    I agree that large rivers, becuase of the amount of sediment they carry, often look muddy brown.  Use colors that look right to you.
OldTimer

[Doneldon]

OT-

you have a good point: water colors vary and we need to do what looks right to us.

I don't think we paint water bottoms black so the water looks black; rather, it makes the surface more reflective like real water. The only truly black, and I mean BLACK, water I ever saw was high in the mountains southwest of Yellowstone Park when my wife and I went there on a snowmobiling trip. We were up at about 10,000 feet in late Spring. The sun was incredible and everything was still wrapped in lots of snow, but the streams and creeks had thawed. That water was coal black and as shiny as could be. The contrast of the pitch black streams and brilliant white snow was really something. It was also so extreme that my camera couldn't really capture it.

But, bottom line, do whatever so it looks right to you and you'll be happier than if you do something "right" by someone else's standard.

                                                                                                                                 -- D

[ebtnut]

OK, here's what to consider about water.  As we all know, in it's natural state it is absolutely clear.  Theoretically, you can see way way down to the bottom.  Whatever color we ascribe to water in nature is first off a reflection of the surrounding color(s).  It is not often that we look at water from on high - mostly we see it from near horizontal, and the color is usually the sky color reflecting off the surface. 

Now, in the real world the stream bed or lake bottom is about the same color as the rocks/dirt around it.  Because light scattters as the depth increases, the perceived color gets darker as the water gets deeper.  Stuff that may be growing or accumulated on the bottom adds to this as well.  Again, this presumes the water itself is still clear. 

A lot of large water bodies have a lot of impurities (pollution, runoff, algae, etc.) in them that do in fact color the water.  If modeling that, then the water material should have some color in it, too.  I've seen quite effective large ponds modeled just with the feathered paint covered by a few coats of varnish or a layer of Envriotex.

[Barney R]

anyone have any suggestions as to make some water effects without having to buy the very expensive stuff from Woodlands.

Highfiver-
I don't have any suggestions to make water effects without the expensive stuff, but I can share my experience.
I asked questions on line as you have and I received great suggestions from others as to what they did. I also read several articles in railroad magazines. This combined with some trial and error allowed me to create Tommy's Pond on my layout. Around the upper edge, I used light tan paint and then blended in some brown, then in to some shades of green and finally blue and dark blue. I bought and used Magic Water to create the water and I am thrilled with how it came out.
I hope this helps in some way.
Barney

[ACY]

Barney are the Blue Goose and the NYC AHMs? At any rate I always like the looks of those stream-liners, like the 20th Century Limited. To say the least I am very envious of your locos.

[Barney R]

Acy- Yes they are Rivarossi/AHM and the thing that I like about them now is that I have converted them to DCC. I got active again about 5 years ago and started with DC. I have a backround in electronics and was drawn immediately to the Darkside (DCC). Once I converted my layout to DCC, I was conflicted with having beautiful DC locomotives that were sitting idle and considered selling them. I am glad that I decided to convert them instead of selling. I also converted a Heavy Pacific that is just incredible in it's low speed movement. They all work well, however the Heavy Pacific is as good or better than my new DCC equipped units. By the by they are all DCC and sound. Thank you for asking.

Barney

[railsider]

I built a small muddy  pond (cattle tank, in fact) by gouging a hole in the foam, cutting a piece of heavy-gauge plastic (a package, if I recall), painting the underside mud-brown, and setting it, shiny side up, in the hole. Paint and plaster around the edge completed the image.

[CNE Runner]

The September 2006 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman magazine had an article about making a pond out of a party balloon (I am not kidding). The results were quite good. Unfortunately I have scanned all my model railroad resource articles and cannot figure out how to attach it to this post (it is in PFD format). It is entirely possible that you can purchase a back issue and get the article.

Ray