I thought I'd post my humble tree project in case anyone might find it useful. I am making a winter version of a Lionel scenic plot for my Christmas tinplate layout. You can see this in the last photo. Still to come are hedges, walkways, fences, steps, snow.
Here are the basic steps to the trees.
1. They are made from chenille stems from the craft store (we used to know them as pipe cleaners) twisted around a bamboo skewer. This is the artistic part of the process: how many and what shape are the limbs. I did a couple before i did one I liked. You could embellish with stranded wire for smaller branches and more realism, but this is a repro Lionel layout, so I kept them simple.
2. They are then trimmed with wire cutters and the ends of the branches are tapered with a cigarette lighter. I didn't show this step, just the before and after.
3. I then made a slurry of Durham's Rock Hard water putty tinted with acrylic paint and liberally painted that on to disguise some of the twisty structure.
4. To simulate snow, I simply poked them through a cardboard box and dusted them from what is the top with gloss white spray paint. Then I did a judicious application of modge podge and sprinkled this with glitter while wet for some sparkle.
All in all, I am pretty happy with them.
