Very nice your job!!!!!

regards

for those wondering where i am with the Red Rain project here is an update. been puttering with the painting of the building. it has all the colours roughed in and is ready for detail painting and weathering:





i painted each brick with a fine paintbrush rather than just drybrushing over them, made for a tighter look. basic oil washes have been applied and now i have to do the highlighting and overall weathering which will unify the building's appearance. not really rushing this portion as it is quite large and it simply takes time. the journey not goal mantra keeps me enjoying this phase.

looking forward to next weekend's Western Canadian Regional Model Show. hope to meet some of you in person at the show and keen to see your projects in the flesh. Red Rain will definitely be finished for the September show and hope to be able to bring it in. cheers for now, bd.

it's been a long time since your last post, i thought that you'd forgot about it.
anyway it looks fantastic, can't wait to see it with all the figures and tanks

Finally Bruce, I was waiting for updates.
That's outstanding indeed! If I didn't see the background I'd say that'S a a REAL RUINED BUILDING!

Why don't you try to produce some of those building as diorama accessories?

In my opinion it would be great

I was wondering about the bricks and figured that I would paint them individually myself for the same reason. That had to be quite time consuming, but it was well worth the effort from where I sit looking at a very tiny picture of this large structure.

just awesome. I am really inspired by this cork brick method. building looks truely stunning.

Question with the cork bricks.. could the sheets of cork be "dyed" or stained a brick red colour prior to cutting and installing ? have you seen anyone do any trials with cork and pre colouring ? painting each brick by hand is admirable attention to detail and commitment to quality! someone like me who always looks for the easy option probably wouldnt do that.

Was wondering where this project was at.. good to see an update.

thanks

Adam

Absolutely cracking!! These cork bricks look so realistic..!!!

Glad you are still at it! Thanks for "letting us watch".

Have you considered that the colour of the bricks would be different outside and inside (especially if previously covered by plaster)?
On the outside darker because of all the stains, and lighter (less red) on the inside because of the dust.
Just my 2p worth!

Cheers
Romain

Glad to see some progress, and some great progress!! I love the factory ruin, it looks very realistic!

Regards,

The building is looking great. You've done a really nice job with the painting so far. Its hard to beleive its made of cork!!

Bart

thank you everyone for all the kind comments. glad that this long overdue update was worth the wait. let me reply to your posts:

Stan, thanks my friend. i too am looking forward to getting the tank and figures in the scene but after finishing the building the next step is stocking the factory with goodies... my lathe and tons of accessories.

Mauro, making diorama accessories is a tricky business. i'd likely make them from plaster molds and then there's the problem of shipping them without breaking. i think i wouldn't have too big of a market as only madmen would want to paint something this gigantic LOL.

Jeremy, thanks buddy. i experimented with several methods and painting each brick with a brush just worked the best for me. but my next reply may have an alternate solution.

Adam, thanks for the kind words and great question. i have given this one some thought and here are my musings:

dyeing or some form of penetrating pre-colouring of the whole sheet may have some stumbling blocks. after the sheet is cut into strips and then into bricks the edges of the bricks also need some distressing. this means the pre-colouring would need to be absorbed fairly deeply into the cork.

the bricks get covered by the spackle during grouting step. this leaves a light film of whitish plaster over them which also fills in imperfections and makes the cork less "cork like."

the methods i have seen many modelers use is to airbrush the mortar colour and then drybrush the brick colour with a large flat brush. then pick out the random brick to brush paint a variation or tow of brick colour to add realism and break up the monotony. this method left me with brick that had mortar colouring showing through and very soft edges on each brick. i didn't like the look but heavy washes may have tightened the edges and looked okay.

some modelers skip dealing with the mortar colour and just airbrush the whole building brick. i tried this and then tried pin washes of the mortar colour over a gloss sealer but it looked messy and was tedious to clean up to a crisp appearance.

my alternate solution that i may suggest is this: glue all the bricks down like i usually do. airbrush the brick colour on and paint the odd brick an alternate colour. next seal the cork with gloss varnish or future floor sealer. then add acrylic paint to yellow the spackle so it is tinted/dyed off-white and apply it as usual. then wipe the bricks clean of the spackle with a damp clothe. the gloss coat should make a great surface for getting all the spackle off the bricks and the mortar is pre-coloured so you wouldn't have to paint it. viola.

though subtle in my pics, i painted about 60% of the bricks a variant colour. this meant i was looking at a lot of hand painting either way. but my above suggestion may be a route i explore for future projects.

Romain, thanks and you are correct to suggest that the interior should be finished differently than the exterior. my reference pics also show that the plaster many times leaves interior bricks encased in a half thickness of the plaster and that plaster dust is everywhere. i will be addressing this detail using Mig pigments during the weathering stage. thanks for confirming this point, cheers.

Vlad & Bart, thank you both for the great feedback. it is surprising the results the cork can achieve. it's a great medium to work with and allows for all kinds of architectural shapes and details.

thanks everyone for checking out the progress. i think my next project with be just a tad smaller as i can't imagine it getting much bigger. cheers for now, bd.

great work Bruce- you're setting the bar very high for the rest of us

Bruce: Sounds good, we won't stop learning as long as we keep trying new things out

Pat: Somehow I don't think that Bruce is even aware that there is a bar anymore

Bruce,

Great build!!! I have a question, though. I have recently scraped my builing I was trying to create with dry wall that has had the paper stripped off. Damn thing kept breaking. So, I am now trying the cork route.

Like you said earlier, grouting the bricks with plaster makes them look less like cork. Do you have any method for making the individual bricks in the rubble look not like cork?

I've posted this question a couple times in different forums but, have'nt had any responses, Thanks and love your work.



Jeremy,

I'll contavt you later. Got some sweet stuff brewing for your "What If" campaign.

Dan

thanks again for the nice comments guys.

regarding the individual bricks Dan, if they are cut cleanly with a sharp blade they shouldn't look cork-like once painted. if they do still have a cork appearance, you're one step ahead of me here as i haven't painted any individual bricks yet, i may suggest rubbing spackle on them then wipe it off with a clothe. this should fill in any pores that would otherwise be a problem. or you may just have to apply a good coat of primer on them before colouring them (if you do this just stick them down on the tacky side of a length of masking tape so they don't blow away when sprayed).

i was thinking that i may put spackle on some bricks just to give a few of them a different look as if mortar was still stuck on one side. i may stack a few bricks, spackle them and once dry break them back into separate pieces... if it doesn't get too time consuming. it's all just crazy good fun this wild hobby of diorama building.

hope this helps Dan and i look forward to your project as well as everyone elses. cheers, bd.

Thanks Bruce,

I'm ahead of myself too. I'm not even close to that point. Just something that popped in my head. Looking forwar to seeing more.

Dan

Bruce: The building looks stunning!! Thanks for the update.

Happy Modelling, -zon

Yo Bruce,

Whow, thats wort the waiting!! Stunning paintjob!! Very realistic depth in the wall.
It looks very red now...maybe thats your intention, I dont now. Hope you have a lot of contrast in the rest of the dio. Or maybe you could give the window frames an other color than the blue, for more contrast with the wall...but it will be ok knowing you

Great job!!

Greetz Nico

thanks Zon and Nico for the kind comments. i plan on toning down the bricks with the next bit of weathering. one thing to note is to paint the mortar a tad lighter as the washes do darken it down once weathered. the washes over a glossy finish do a good job of aging the look of the building without much effort.

the reference pics i have often show the window frames a dark blue, almost black colouring but they will pop more when i do the highlighting and detail painting. the weathering of the building is coming along well, i'm using oil paints to layer various tones for the concrete... and then it's time to rubble!

cheers, bd.

Bruce, this building is seriously good!
I'm really enjoying watching this come together.

Thanks for posting!

slowly but surely the building is getting weathered. still much more weathering to do but the colours are coming together further especially the concrete hues:




i had bought the Verlinden Workshop Set for the dio but was a bit disappointed. the small items have air bubbles that need fixing but the biggest item in the kit was the table... which is unusable.

though this pic is not the best by far it shows how much insane shrinkage this poor resin specimen of a table was fabricated and believed acceptable for the consumer. note the concave sides that i have already applied putty to in some sad attempt to salvage this large piece:



all that sweet resin wasted making this table
though i have seen this piece in other dioramas where it looked fine i may just have had the misfortune of getting one made the hour before a long weekend.

so............

...i decided to scratchbuild my own plus lots of other furnishings for the scene. all of these are quite simple to build from Evergreen Styrene of various profiles and plasticard. still have to make the drawers for the tables but making them myself allows me to have as many drawers open as i want:






a small setback turned into a fun little custom build project, one that was a nice break from all the painting i have been doing. as much as i like all the stages of modeling i have the most good times with scratchbuilding construction.

onward and so forth. cheers for now, bd.

Dang Bruce, that is some sweet looking furniture bud!

Just one thought on the shelves. I'm taking a guess that they are to be representations of thin steel shelving units? If so, they are extremely flimsy and easily misshapen. What normally happens is that they become warped or buckled if mishandled after they are assembled. I've used them for a long time until they stopped distributing them where I live and have plenty of experience with the damage that normally occurs with them, but unfortunately I don't have any photos to share with you.

I know we've talked about a lot of good stuff but I haven't had a chance to follow up with much in the way of my builds. I have roughly two weeks off so I'm hoping to do quite a bit of catch up and follow up on some of the stuff that we talked about such as building structures and painting white on figures.

Thanks again for sharing everything that you've been having fun with and take care 'til next time bud

Hi Bruce

As usual your scratch works are awesome

Although that, I have some doubts about the shelves design

You've depicted in a stunning way, some metal shelves that may look too modern in my very humble opinion. Are you shure that kind of metal shell was already produced in Russia during the WW2?...

The desk looks perfect

cheers

That type of shelving is a really old industrial/shop design and is pretty universal. I'm not saying that Russia had them, but it wouldn't surprise me at all.

It was just a doubt Jeremy

I really don't want to seem a nitpicker

I really love Bruce's jobs


cheers

Yo Bruce,

Thats very fine scratchwork you showing here...keep up the good work!

Greetz Nico