Rocks

Lynton station was built into the hillside way above Lynmouth and in creating the station and yard area a great deal of rock must have been excavated leaving exposed rock and shale.Looking at old photographs I can see  evidence of the rock being just below soil level which is further evidence of the difficulties the contractor faced when building the line. The photograph below of Exe taken to the south of the engine shed is one example showing the level of exposed rock or shale.

Examining photographs shows that this shale and rock was quite visible and exposed right along the west side of the station and that towards the goods yard there was quite a high rock face. Early photographs of the station show that quite a lot of lose rock was still visible at the base of the excavation areas which, over the years, gradually  filled in with soil and became overgrown.

To model this I applied quite a thick layer of Polyfilla over the mod roc plaster bandage land formation and whilst still wet and of a mouldable nature I scribed in an impression of this rock and shale.  

When dry the  " rock " was then painted using very dilute acrylics using a technique called Leopard Spotting. First areas were highlighted with raw umber and then a very dilute wash of black all over. Small rocks were made by breaking up larger pieces of Polyfilla salvaged from the layouts initial rock formations and painted in the same way. This method was repeated all the way along the hillside base. Certain areas will then be grassed over using the basket liner and static grass using old photographs as reference. But here in the photographs is the area around the engine shed.