Finished the Last Two DPM Buildings

Boy, I love these DPM buildings but painting them is a tedious PITA. But as mentioned in an earlier post, that's the trade off  for easier assembly. Anyway, I knocked out the last two.


First, I took on the "Corner Turret Building." I started by spraying all four walls with Testors "Flat Light Aircraft Grey." Next I brushed everything but the trim Floquil "Boxcar Red." I did the roof in my usual Grimy Black.

I committed the pointy witch hat-looking roof for he turret since my Cornerstone "Merchants' Row" kit has a similar roof. I installed more of my folded construction paper drapes in the ground floor windows and hit it with a coat of weather wash. I can't really call it done until I get more Dulcote, but that step takes all of two seconds.

 

 The last in my bunch of buildings was the Corner Apothecary kit. I started by spraying the walls with some cheap Wal Mart spray paint. Next I brushed the windows and trim Foloquil "Roof Brown." The roof was "Grimy Black" yet again. Finally, I touched up all my my hand brushing oopses with some Floquil "Reefer White."

"Why white paint?" You may be wondering. Well, back in the March 2017 issue of Model Railroader, Lance Mindheim wrote an article suggesting painting buildings shade of white, being that this is a common color in real life. Mr. Mindheim is an extremely talented modeler whose layout looks phenomenal. 

That said, I have noticed there are some drawbacks to white paint. First and foremost, it's very unforgiving of mistakes. If you've ever painted a DPM building, I don't think I have to tel you it's only a matter of time until you're painting window trim and "oops!" the brush slips. 

When you're using two dark colors like Boxcar Red and Roof Brown, those mistakes aren't nearly as noticeable. But a dark color on white paint? Yeah, that sticks out like a sore thumb. So unless you have very steady hands, I suggest not painting DPM buildings white. 

Painting issues aside, I'm just not believing it. The buildings done in "Antique White" look alright, but not white white. But as I was driving today, I really looked at the buildings I was driving past, and most of them were white or tan. But for some reason the brick colored buildings on my layout just look more realistic to me than white. I guess I find a more impressionist approach better than trying to force reality into where it doesn't want to go. 

Where the white paint does work though is in the industrial areas. Both the Ice House and Bralick building are painted white and they look right to me. They also show of weathering quite nicely. This makes total sense since Mr. Mindheim primarily models industrial areas on his layouts. 

So yeah, I'm not bashing Lance Mindheim at all. Quite the opposite actually. His layout is a sight to behold and the level of realism he achieves is unparalleled. I'm just saying I tried one of his techniques and it didn't quite work out for me. But it goes back to the paot I wrote about there not being a right or wrong way to do this hobby.