OLD & WEATHERED WOOD VOL 2

Wood that stood outdoors for years

A board left to the rain and the sun loses its original warm color within a few seasons. Ultraviolet light breaks down the surface fibers, washes the resin out of them and leaves a silvery gray skin, under which the wood shows through only where it has splintered away. That is exactly the state the six shades of this second volume can mix.

How the palette is put together

Four of the six colors are grays of different cast: the light Rock Grey, the medium Pale Grey, the warmer Warm Grey and the gray-brown Grimy Grey, which forms the transition between gray and the brown of the wood. They are joined by the medium brown British Khaki as a base for less weathered areas and the dark Burnt Umber, which is drawn into the joints between boards, into cracks and into the shadows of the growth rings. The differences between the individual grays are deliberately small, because convincing old wood rests on fine blotches, not on contrast.

Where it proves itself

Ammunition crates, pallets, fences around farmsteads, piers, the plank floors of barns, the cargo beds of trucks and the hulls of wrecked river boats. It works just as well on a display model as in the groundwork of a diorama, where there is usually the most wood.

Working in layers

It pays to lay down a medium tone over the whole area, to drag a lighter gray along the grain with a dry brush once it has dried, and finally to add the dark lines here and there. Using at least three of the shades on a single surface is worth it, so that no two boards look the same. The last step is usually a weak filter, which pulls several different boards together into one surface without erasing the differences between them. Without it a crate looks like a puzzle made of random pieces.