The Beck Bridge - A New Horizon

Whilst going through various options to develop the 'Beck Bridge' recently I realised that for photography purposes it was bothering me that there was a whacking great gap in the backgound of pictures. From some angles the black edging along the back was showing through, as demonstrated in this natural light shot of 'Flower of the Forest'. This was difficult for me to disguise in editing.

I pondered over this and realised that I could add in a scenic piece to represent the beck flowing away from the scene. After some trials an image that I had downloaded in my research phase was flipped horizontally and given a painted effect. It worked from normal viewing angles but when I muttered something about making the trees on the print out look right, a friend suggested to me that I might try to use the 'Decoupage' technique used by card makers to get a 3D effect. I liked this idea as it could fill the "black edge" at the back of the board effectively without too much bodgery required. As a trial I printed my intended backscene out three times on thin card and carefully layered them using mounting board between the layers.

Satisfied with this I created a two-layer decoupage, in theory a back layer could be added if a fixed backscene was added (or as an extra stand-alone layer). Rather than print onto card I printed onto matt photo paper and then glued this to the card, the result is a slightly more intense colour compared with the mock-up.

The line of cut varies from the mock-up as I took the bottom piece across the pipe, which does give a nice effect. The edges of the trees and bushes were cut as carefully and randomly as I could without driving myself crazy. Once cut the cut edges and the back of each piece was treated with Button Polish (shellac) for strength and durability. Between the layers is a piece of mounting board also treated with Button Polish, the top of which and the upper edges of each piece being painted with a green-grey acrylic to help hem blend in to the printed images. In front of the image new growth in the form of Sea Foam bushes and some Peco long grass hide the joins effectively.

From the back it looks like this, the back piece is some 1/32nd ply cut to shape, Button Polished and then painted with matt black as per the rest of the surround. I've tried to be as neat as possible but it won;t usually be seen!

Under the bridge now looks like this, extra Peco long grasses were added towards the back of the water to hide the join and disguise a bit of the black surround taht insisted on showing through.

A slightly different angle from the first picture but this does illustrate that the new backscene piece and greenery are doing their job. The greenery alone could have helped but the backscene really helps to add depth.

I'm really happy with how these changes have turned out, certainly some of my more negative thoughts about the diorama have now gone, it will have to be stored out of sight rather than on display but for photography purposes I am certainly a lot happier to use it. I may still opt to add a couple of items at the right hand end to better fill the end in but that can wait for another day!

Colin