To continue our scratch built newsstand project, we’ll focus on painting and weathering and prepare the model for final details.  If you haven’t already, be sure to read Scratch Build a Newsstand: Part 1.

Materials Needed (For Part 2)

• Rubbing alcohol
• Fine sea salt
• Bristled brush or tooth brush
• Dullcote or other clear sealer
• Tan paint (Krylon Khaki Camoflauge spray paint used)
• Green paint (Polyscale Coach Green paint used)
• Brown paint (Polyscale Roof Brown paint used)
• Weathering powder

Painting and Weathering

The intent for the finish was to create a well-weathered old newsstand, but generally still have it appear to be in good shape.

Base Coat and Sea Salt Application

First, I painted the entire stand with Krylon Khaki Camoflauge spray paint. Just a quick overall coat. This paint color will show through slightly in some places when the stand is completed. The color will be very subtle, so it’s fine to use what you have on hand — tan, light gray or other light paint.

The next step is to apply sea salt for weathering. That’s right, sea salt. I’ve seen very few N scale modelers apply this technique and it’s more commonly used in aircraft modeling in much larger scales. The salt acts as a paint mask, allowing you to apply the final paint color then remove the salt to reveal your base coat. This creates convincing paint chips because unlike table salt, sea salt is irregularly shaped. The key in N scale is to use Fine Sea Salt rather than the standard size. I used Morton’s Fine Sea Salt for my project.

To apply the sea salt, wet the surface of the model with rubbing alcohol — make sure your paint is completely dry first. You want to apply enough that the salt sticks when the alcohol evaporates, but not so much that the salt dissolves.

I used a brush to apply the alcohol, and the same wet brush to dip into the salt and then apply it to the surface. You don’t want to apply much. Only where you’d like paint chips to appear. You can easily move the salt around by adding a bit more alcohol or remove it by just brushing it off with a dry brush.

Final Paint Color and Sea Salt Removal

Once the sea salt is firmly dried to the surface, I airbrushed the final color of the stand over the base color and salt. In my case, I used Polyscale Coach Green. Airbrushing or some form of spray paint is best since brush painting would dislodge the salt. Brush painting is possible if you’re careful.

Once the green coat was completely dry, I used a small nail brush to scrub the salt from the surface revealing paint chips.

Note: The following two steps will hide much of the paint chip effect you are creating with the sea salt, making it much more subtle. If you’d like the paint chips to be more prominent on your newsstand, complete the next two steps before removing the salt.

Weathering Powder

Next, I applied a light dusting of brown weathering power and a heavy dusting of black weathering powder using a medium, stiff brush. I applied an even heavier coat of black to the roof for additional dirt and aging. At this point, the newsstand should appear much darker than you intend it to be. The dry brushing step below will lighten it back up. Unfortunately, I thought I took photos of this step, but apparently I did not.

To seal the powder to the surface before the next step, I applied a coat of Dullcote and allowed that to dry.

Interior Detail

The magazine rack and side shelf were both painted Polyscale Roof Brown with a small brush.

Dry Brushing

Using the same Coach Green paint color, I dry brushed the outside surfaces of the model. Dry brushing is a technique in which you dip your brush into the paint and then remove the majority of paint by dragging the brush across a paper towel. The mostly “dry brush” is used to very lightly brush over the model leaving traces of paint behind.

In this case, the dry brushing will create a textured effect in the original (before weathering powder) color. The will leave the darker, powder-altered color in all of the nooks and crannies of the newsstand. Be sure to dry brush all of the raised .010″ x .030″ bracing as it will make this detail stand out and be more dimensional, creating a greater sense of detail than is really there.

I also dry brushed a light gray color in select locations to represent additional weathering and grime. This should be done very sparingly. I noticed that dry brushing the front edges of the sidewalls with the gray color helped give them a bit more definition. In places where too much gray paint was applied, I dry brushed more Coach Green over it until I was happy with the results.

To Be Continued…

In Part 3, we’ll complete my version of the newsstand by added printed magazines, posters, an awning and a bench covered in newspapers.