Great work with those Tamiya figures Ron. Your scene is almost there.


I just finished the build part, now to get to painting. I still need to add beams, supports and scraps to the burned farm too.







1/48 Hobby Boss and Tamiya

Thanks, Greg.
You did great too. I just think that the roof doesn't look good. The reed should be placed in 1 direction, running from top to bottom.

I hope you huys are not getting sick 'n tired with me and my updates....

Because here's another one....

May I present to you...... La petite derrière de la StuG!

After the figurepainting I wanted/needed some more building.
What did I do to this StuG rearend... let's see...
- I hollowed out the exhausts
- Sanded down the exhaustplate and fenders
- filled numerous holes and sinkmarks
- made pieces of track with plastic single links
- build an inletgrille
- made a stowagerack
- made 2 bolted together angleprofiles, complete with bolts
- added tracktensioners and towinghookpins
- added a lot of plastic bolts
- added edges to the mudguards
- added a stowagebox and liftingeye to the enginedeck
- and, as a Grande Finale, added 2 towingcables to the deck, too.

Anyway. See for yourself!











For these pictures I had to hijack my wife's photobucket-account.... Mine's been a bit busy lately, as you might have noticed...

It'll be interesting to see how you'll suspend the stug to the dio.

Greg, Ron, good to see your progress.

Ron, idea with Stug's derrière (are you threating me Sir? ) is great - it will give real feeling of fully loaded train abandoned on the station. It's a pity that some of your pictures are not visible at the moment - photobucket does this from time to time...

Here is where I am at the moment. I've almost finished building the Panther tank, I've made a hole in the turret (this is where the death and destruction got inside the tank) and started to make some experiments with paints...




A.

Thanks Andrzej.
You have yourself a great destroyed Panther, there!
I like the idea of cutting of a piece of the vehicle!!

I managed to get my StuG on it's feet and stand without me holding it!!
They grow up so fast....

No wait... that's a different thread all together.....

Anyway... my StuG is standing. I used the transport securingblocks as "feet". I also dressed it up in it's basic colours. Now for some weathering!!









Here a shot of my workingcorner; 2 dio's nearing their final stages!
Yeehah!!


Finally......

I may not be able to complete the dio My last paycheck came in, then went away. I have a WWII reenactment event coming up so my parents gave me some maoney back they owed me so i can go. But unfortunately I am down to the last dollars and can't find anything cheap enough to base the model just simply. The models are all painted and just need sealed on a warm enough day. Any suggestions on sealing and basing for a dio?

Wooo Hoooo. Just thought I would share some news with the group. My little vignette I built was entered in a local contest along with a few of my other builds that were recently completed. To my surprize it was awarded "Best Diorama/Vignette" to the tune of a $15 gift card to the shop that was hosting the event. Coupled with the awards from my other entries and a best of award in for a build in another category, I made $50 today. I placed all of it towards my Airfix 1/24 Mossy though, so no new kits came home with me. Just 99 more payments and that bad boy is mine!! lol... Okay about $120 more and its mine. This is the vignette I am talking about. Thanks for looking, and letting me ramble "Q"

Hi Jacob. Sorry about the finances. Been there, done that. For a cheap base, you can use an old picture frame, with some styrofoam cut to fit and glued in. You can even cut up pieces if you can't find one large enough. Just cut them and add like a jigsaw puzzle until the opening in the frame is convered. Cover the foam with some spakling and white glue, sprinkle on some soil, shake off the excess, Add more gue and soil if needed, add some paint to it and then add your models and your about there. Hope this helps. "Q"

Well done Matthew on a well deserved win. Is the priest a stock figure or a conversion?

Thanks I got a lot of styrofoam around, I didn't think it would look right, but I will give it a try. Now I just got to find a picture frame.

Thanks for the kudos Pat.
It is a stock white metal figure from Belgo Models I believe. The casting on it was exceptional. I have a few more figures from their line and they are equally as nice. Thanks again, "Q"

Hi Jason, Glad to be of some help. If you cannot locate a picture from, no worries. You can simply paint the styrofoam a nice dark brown or even black perhaps. Just ensure you use an acrylic paint or you will have a horrible mess on your hands as enamels will turn the styrofoam into goo right before your eyes......trust me, I speak from experience. Once it is painted, continue on with the glue, soil treatment. Good luck. "Q"

Thanks, BTW my names Jacob. So I paint the foam with acrylics, but what do i use for like soil and the ground work?

Hey, all,

Now that my Mighty Wheels 09 entry has been posted I can get back to that Cologne Panther. The Jeep and figs are ready, the Panther is half-"burned", and the materials for the base are to hand. Another week or two will crack it... I'll post more in-progress shots this week.

Tom

Sorry about that Jacob. Fingers got going faster than I realized. Once the foam is painted with the acrylics you can use whatever paint you like. Just ensure the foam is completely covered by the acrylic paint. I typically paint my foam bases black using an acrylic craft paint as it is really inexpensive. Once dry I coat it with a heavy dose of Elmers white glue, then add the soil. Once all that has dried, I load my airbrush up with whatever colors I think I need to shoot, and start laying those in. Sometimes they are enamels, acrylics or even lacquers. Depends on what I am looking for. If you don't have an airbrush you can still paint the groundwork using rattle cans, but the control will be a bit more difficult. Colors I use are typically tans, and browns. Good luck with your base. Hope this helps. "Q"
**Edit, I reread your post... as far as what to use for the soil itself....regular ole' dirt. Just sift it through a screen or even just through your hands to get rid of the really big stuff, and use what is left. Roots from saplings make excellent trees. For bushes I use stuff found in the floral department of my local Hobby Lobby. Dried flowers work well. That is what I used on my vignette above.

I love that shot right there

"Charge that fascist machine gun nest private!"

"But I don't want to comrade sergeant....."

Its alright Its kinda frozen here in WV so getting dirt is kinda hard, especially with the snow and all. I have chunks of foam that are just big enough to trim and use. I also have two big bottles of black paint that I can brush on, let it dry, and then base coat it with some white glue. That should protect it from and brown paint I spray on, right? I don't have the money for an airbrush, or the room really. My room is like 9' x 11' and I have a bed and two book shelves I have crammed my desk into. I just have to find some stuff to sprinkle for the ground, then I have a bit of dark green lichen and static grass. I plan on spray SUPER THIN layer of dark green onto the grass since it is kinda bright. Thanks for the advice. I am working on my third ever Tank, Academy's Tiger I Mid w/ Interior. I am changing it up though to make an early war. Maybe I could incorporate that into a dio some day?

Understand about the the frozen dirt. If you have coffee you can use that as dirt. Grind it up really fine using a rolling pin or likewise, sprinkle on, then paint. "Q"

@ Matthew, congratulations on your award! It sure is well deserved!

@ Ron, - cutting pieces of vehicles is a great idea when you need to show a vehicle without building diorama 20cm bigger than planned (or in my case using 3 liters of Valejo water…). Thanks to cutting it I will have to make just about 1-2cm deep layer of “water” to achieve the effect of partially submerged vehicle. Water will be murky and troubled so mixing it with Valejo brown green should do the job.

@ All - I’ve almost finished my Humvee for Mighty Wheels 2009 (it will be done today) so I can finally start working on diorama base for this one. I want to keep it as small as possible but due to the Panther’s size and four figures I want to put on it I’m afraid that it will be quite big anyway...

A.

Can I use a coffee grinder?? Or would that be to fine?

Andrzej -

Apologies. It seems ages ago that I 'put in' with the Campaign and a seemingly endless number of other distractions to excuse the lack of participation. The extension will likely save me as I was afraid I wouldn't be able to complete on time. I've got several projects going and finall y getting to dedicate some time to getting them done. Anyway, I've managed to get my Tamiya PzKpfw III 'L' pretty much done with some additional damage details and weathering yet to go. Next is to focus on getting the figures done and diorama base completed. Hoping this will be acceptable. There is most definitely a great amount of support and incredible, outstandingly done entries here.



Hey Matt - How's things in the 'Springs'? Congrats on the outstanding and more than deserved success. Been watching your quality projects for a while now and always look forward to seeing the next masterpiece.

Blade48mrd

Congrats Matthew! That is some good work.

Jacob. I second Matt´s advice. Here is a pic I just posted of a dio base I just started. In the summer I like to collect things like old picture frames from yard sales, but usually you can also find them at thrift stores and bargain bins in Craft stores.

Someday this will be a beautiful dio:



Ron- weeks ago before my camara semi-died (it takes days to recharge) and work set in, I promised you pics of my own Rail-Dio in progress. This is a long term project, but one that would actually fit the scope of this campaign nicely.









The project is massive in scope. These are the kits that I still have yet to even start for the scene.



maybe a two to three year project?

thanks for looking once again.

Billy

Thanks. I got the dio done, I am thinking of painting the sides of the base dark brown or black. But I got it all done! I am going to have my mom help me take pics of it, she used to do it for a living. Can't wait to show you guys!

Ok, I haven't been here for a while... It's great to see that you all are moving forward with your projects... thanks to extension we still have 1,5 month to finish our stuff...

I started preparing base for my diorama - I will post some pictures as soon as it is ready.

Oh, I've won 1st place in "Armament" category with my Leopold rail gun, 1st place "Jet Plane" category with F-15 and 2nd place in "Figures" category with Teutonic Footman during local modeling show

Hey,all,

I've been a bit quite of late, mainly because of a major injury last week that put me in hospital. I'll recover, but it has halted my modelling efforts for a while. These shots are of my Panther, which I hope to get back to soon. (Sadly my hopes of attending Trucks & Tracks this month are scuppered, but for those in the UK I'll have the finished model at the MAFVA Nationals in June...)

The hull, painted but not yet "burned":






And the turret, already "burned":








The crude zimm is just about visible after dry brushing, just as it is on the real thing...

Tom