Rainbows in the Lehigh Valley Gorge

[TMo]

So....  there in the deepness of the last photo, you see a lone plastic kit - I think it's a Model Power Belvidere Hotel kit that I put together probably 45 years ago.  I think I was a little heavy on Tester's model glue, especially on the corners.  The biggest problem is that the brick screams "PLASTIC!", but that's pretty easy fix.  

   

I think the key to brick walls is that they are in no way uniform.  They tend to mottle with dirt, sun bleaches bricks differently, water pulls dirt into crevices, etc.  Brick is also constructed with a wide variety of base materials and can intentionally be different brick to brick.  

First, I hit each and every brick and mortar line with an ivory arcylic.  It automatically deadens the plastic look and gives you mortar between your bricks.  It also gives the face of the brick some grip for the next layers of acrylic paint.

   

The next layers of paint are all done with a "dry" brush.  I simply grabbed a single color - in this case "Brick Red", grab a little bit of paint on the end of a soft brush, dab it until there's very little paint on it, and dab.

   

Once the bricks get finished, there's some other plastic parts that also need to be painted, and I'm going to add windows and floors.