River Dock table – part 17

I put the first layer of texture medium over the water area last night, and am looking forward to seeing what happens to it as it dries out. Hopefully it will result in a shiny surface (reflections are always good on water terrain), and some kind of uneven ripples. I suspect I’ll need at least two coats just to reduce the very obvious brushstroke direction that you can see at the moment.

Here’s a version from a few hours later:

And some more of the buildings. I may have got a bit carried away adding to this last night – I decided that it would be best to do it all in one go, and lost track of time while working on it…

I’ve been using Spakfilla for the mortar – it’s a lightweight pre-mixed joint compound that’s very easy to work with, and much less mess than mixing your own. I’ve been working it into the bricks, then scraping off the excess and wiping the whole surface down with a damp cloth. I like the way it ages the bricks by staying in all the little rough patches of texture, but in daylight it turned out to be a bit too stark and white. Fortunately it takes washes just fine, so I’ve used a few shades of watered down brown paint to weather the finished surface a bit. You can see some more of the final effect in the third photo below.