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Wet Feet

the idea

After reading some accounts of what is supposed to be Russia at the end of the summer, dusty, hot, sticky, I wanted to build those weather conditions. I also read recently an account of the Stalingrad battle by a Russian author, and that book began with striking reports of what a retreating soldier must look like, weary, dusty, lost and nervous. So I wanted to do just that, picturing two weary soldiers tramping in southern Russia or Ukraine, September 1941 being afraid by something and ready to dump a grenade at the first real menace.

And then I found the idea, the two guys would be near a river standing on the top of a wreck looking at something imprecise inside the river which could well look like their fears.

Composition

The second most important step after finding a good idea is composition. Trying to find a good balance between the different parts, creating a great hotspot and generally speaking just spreading all the different elements so that the whole makes sense!

There’s no other way than to pick a piece of paper and draw a plan. I think doing a perspective drawing of your diorama is a rather bad idea because you will be putting all your efforts into glamorizing this one particular view while the good thing with building dioramas is that you may be able to turn it around and see it from all sides. People will always ask and try to see your diorama from the most unsettling point of view. So I personally stick to side by side and “from above” plans. Of course, I try to avoid symmetry while searching for a real balance between different elements, I also try to avoid pointless details etc. the plans show pretty much the triangle like shapes I wanted to create.

Furthermore I tried to create interaction between the two figures, they have their faces close to each other, and this reinforces the feeling of interrogation and latent menace of the whole scene.

The plane

Well I tend not to trust science fiction much as I really think the human already invented the strangest shapes imaginable. So I wanted to have something made of metal that would kind of point to the sky in order to create this diorama’s much needed balance. I also needed another bit of metal so that the two soldiers could stand on something. So I decided a plane would do, but I needed some flat section so that the two guys could actually stand on something. I also needed something that was actually POINTING up to the sky and could look weird. So after extensive researches I found out about the Tupolev TB3, a giant four engine bomber, one of the first all-aluminium planes, famous for its Zveno variant which was designed to carry smaller planes. It was obsolete by 1941 but was used nonetheless with terrific results for those who were flying on it. I found some good scale plans on the internet and some detail photographs as well as numerous built reviews of the ICM 1/72 model. Finally I found some interesting facts, like for instance the ridiculous thickness of the aluminium employed for the structure and also the fact that the crew complained that the paint was actually peeling away while the plane was in flight. Moreover the tail section actually looked like some Apollo shuttle landing gear. I had my weird bits. So I used some thick aluminium foil I had bought in a craft shop. I carved the lines with a pencil and added some details with plasticard and miliput. I must say the fact that ICM put out this plane as 1/72 model helped me a lot because of the number of reviews that eventually spawned on the net complete with great detail pictures.

I covered the bits of aluminium I wanted to keep with some masking liquid and sprayed the whole thing with some various shades of dusty green –nothing too bright as the plane is supposed to have been in the water for a few weeks at least. Finally, I used some Humbrol Matt Cote mixed with some paint pigments and dirt in order to treat the aluminium and the paint in a similar dull fashion.