Palm trees scratch built

This is my third attempt at trying to make some palm trees. My two previous attempts using material and the second bits from plastic plants having failed. With this attempt I used 4mm round dowel and cardboard.

A finished palm tree.

Making the palms...

The round 4mm wooded dowel is fixed to its base and some masking tape  wrapped around the top. Note  - when fixing the dowel to the base I mad sure they were on an angle and not straight.

I quickly drew four X's on the cardboard to help as guides.

Very roughly I cutout the palm fronds.

A hole punch was used to clip out a 4mm hole in the centre of each set of fronds.

One of the larger fronds is glued on.

Then the second frond is added slightly offset.

Four layers of fronds are added with the smallest on top. Once the glue was dry I shaped (bent) the fronds.

The next step is the painting to disguise the cardboard...

First the fronds were painted a base green.

A muted green was applied in strips to give the impression of the frond's leaves. See palm on the right of photo.

The strips were added to with a darker green. See palm on left.

While the painted fronds were drying I painted the trunk a dark brown.

With a light brown/tan paint and a small brush I quickly did flicks of paint up the truck.

Using a light green and a small brush the frond leaves are added in detail.

The bases were finished with sand and stones.

The finished palms on the tabletop.

The next item for scratch building will be a train as they were key to supplying the frontline troops in the WW1 Palestine campaign.