Gentlemen:
I am now going on year 4 of my layout construction; it has been my dream since childhood to build my own winter layout, and I am hoping to finish it before my 5-yr-old daughter loses interest! Between making the trestles, the bridge sections, planning the grades (I had to cut a section below the platform to make it work; too bad my feat of engineering inside the mountains gets covered), and just putting it all together, this has been quite an undertaking. I would guess that there aren't too many 4' x 8' layouts with more track sections shoehorned into them than this one. Fortunately for me, I didn't know just how involved and time-consuming this would be or I never would have attempted it.
I am now about half-way done with the Rigid Wrap™ plaster sheets, which I should finish within the next week or so depending on my free time. While I do have some earth tone colors for rocks, the layout will be predominantly white, and I will powder the tracks and all less-than-ideal areas with the sprinkle-on fake snow stuff. I do have @70 evergreen trees, and I have various frozen waterfalls and lakes planned. Both structures are lighted, with the small cabin being wired with a flickering "fireplace" imitation.
My question for those of you with experience: what is the most efficient, least-messy medium to apply over the plaster sheets to sort of smooth out the bumps and rough edges? Joint compound? Plaster of Paris? There will be more snow than is likely realistic, and while I don't want to compromise all of the hard work I've put into this, I am looking forward to having it completed and being able to finally clean up the mess created in the little air-conditioned storage room behind the garage.
All tips and advice humbly welcomed!
Thank you for reading through this...
Matt the woodland scenics snow video was very informative..
