Wow Adam, that wiring is a mess. It seems like you could just wad up a bunch of wire, throw it on and glue it down!! LOL.

The pole looks good and the "bend" is very realistically done. Congrats on that!

Happy Modelling, -zon

the market produce.

I had the most fun modelling tonight in a long time.

The fruit/ vegetable vendor carts above have had me worried for a while that my produce is too European or niche market stuff. And I sort of knew for a while I had to deal with it and tonight I took it by the horns and gave it a good shake.

So using this pic ( again) as reference, I started making some fruit.

I went to the local craft supplies store (spotlight) and bought up some stuff. hey sell jewelry making supplies there and I got some beads and some sculpy putty.

the beads are great in that they look like apples , and the china beads are real tiny and will add to the shop interior and the rubble in the main buillding. the little chromed beads look like the bottoms of ornate oil lamps and will add them to the rubble also.

Using the sculpy i wanted to make oranges. lots of them. i decided to mix green and orange together and see if i could creat and orange that didnt need to be painted. Sculpy is almost exactly like plasticine - very maleable and behaves the same way. The differece is you bake it in the oven and it sets hard. It has almost a permanent worklife until heat treated so doesnt set quick like epoxy - meaning when u mix colours you can save them for later on to make more of the same...

Anyways green and orange - two snakes about 70 % orange, 30% green.


start blending them together





It was looking to green, I dont mind green oranges as the best ones are always green on outside (Valencia's.. yumm). But needed ot be convincing.
So blended n more orange

And do it all again, roll and fold...


The effect i am looking for is to be able to see green and orange n the same piece of fruit at the same time - a very challenging thing to paint en mass.

cut into small fruit size pieces ( about 2 - 3 mm )

roll each piece indivdually to try get as round a ball as possible

repeat above step many many times...

And if lucky it should look like this... my lightis terrible so the colour is washed slightly. In sunlight they are much "brighter"

and when you have alot of them...

using the above materials I made some beans and bannanas as seen in the reference picture.




So thats a very quick look at some trials tonight.

I also added the spines to the spine board for those interested. And rust treated the power pole, and painted the carts.




I also added epoxy water to the water drum for the builders.


thats it for tonight folks..

As always any comments are welcome.

Adamskii

You, sir, are a madman! And I mean that in the best possible sense. I can only imagine how long it took to make the oranges, let alone the bananas and beans. Wow. When it was just the street and the buildings I thought this was an amazing project, but I really do think (apologies for the effusiveness) that this is really a new masterpiece. No BS.
Again, I am going to suggest that you think about seriously making this into some sort of written document, even if you just let someone else do all the hard work and you just sit back and collect the checks.
Adam, one other thought and I know this is not something you wish to do, but I am sure there must be someone out there (mousehouse?) that could take that spine board and make that into a cast for any one wishing to make an Australian LAV. With all of the effort you put into that and with the problems you had I think it would make a worthwhile addition to the accessories in the hobby, IMHO.
Thanks for all the updates this is really fun to watch it all come together. Cheers.

Dear Adam, your oranges look like real, even if they are a bit green. Strolling during our missions on various markets, we became aware that a. if one person sells oranges, the whole sales force sells oranges and b. they are not the 'export quality', thus matt and unequal in size and color ( but of superb taste!). What about the youngster selling cell phone cards? ( just kidding: I know you can do it!)
Your dio is getting better every time you handle it. Think about the book, please!!!

hey guys,

just a quick one - kid selling phone cards is a posibility... watch this space eh,,

I too think oranges need to be "oranger"... so might do the lot again.

spine board is barely passable quality wise - its innacurate. I have since making it received a line drawing of the real thing and wow its not the same thing I made... Also, its quite "sloppy" as in the craftmanship is poor. A think a better one could be made and then cast as a master , but not this one. However I would like to try and do it right.

cheers guys.

Also I should add I abandoned the bead apples - I will go buy some red sculpy insted and use same technique- gives better variation in size and shape.

Adam

Interesting. One of my favorite types of shops to monitor while there. So much so that IO [plan something similar in my dio. This is a typical Nokia cell phone "Office" sign.

This thread continues to blow my mind.

Keep up the insanely good work

Hey Adam,

For about a year or so I've been using the small beads.I have a young daughter and people were always giving her these bead kits and I thought they could work well for friut and vegetables and they do to a point,but I have never been real happy with them.To start,filling the holes is a major pain.The putty looks perfect.I did use Play Dough a few years back for bananas and hanging meat.Having a young one around doe's have it's advantages for dio builders.I discovered that if the dough was left out in the air it hardened, rock hard.
Still incredible work your doing and I'm so glad your sharing the build.I won't mention the book again.

Tom

Dear Adam, about your green oranges: at present I am around in Africa quite often. On the markets there the oranges are more often green than complete orange. It is due to the fact that 'we' ( western consumers) get the best quality and not seldom the oranges are waxed. So: your work was certainly not in vain. They look like the real ones. Just wondering what you will invent during the coming weekend!
What about this board you are discussing? Is it a standard part of your vehicle equipment?

I dont think its part of the vehicles CES (Complete Equipment Schedule). For every vehicle I see it photographed having it strapped to the sides, theres 2 more that dont. It might be mission specific store issued depending on the role of the patrol, or, maybe the qualifications of the crew aboard? Either way It certainly makes an appearance that's frequent enough to qualify it appearing on at least 1 of my 3 vehicles. I have also seen a pic somewhere with one pc having 2 strapped to the side one on top of another! So sometimes they even double up (maybe they expected more casualties?).

Good question though. I dont really know the answer and have to speculate. perhaps one of the guys who read this and serve with teh ADF might enlighten us both.

Adam

In regards to the spine board. Each patrol in a Troop was issued one, so two per Troop. Normally it was carried on the PC due to it having more room and more pers. The spine boards are Theatre Essential at this stage for now but they do occasionally use them for Mission Rehearsel Excercises in Oz pre-deployment. I can only comment on 2/14 LHR but when I was there at least one of the PC crew was a Combat First Aider.

In Bushmasters they have one per vehicle due to the number of pers on board and they can be found either stowed inside behind the seats or on the outside.

Hope that helps, John.

Anyone able to tell if the 1/35 Bushmaster kit will have a spineboard in it or on it , if it is essential CES stores to each vehicle? ( the kit that was announced last year and keeps getting pushed back). May need to scratch that master sooner than later.

Adamskii

I should have added that the spine boards come in two colours, green (mainly Iraq) and a yellow (Afghanistan). No real reason other than procurement batches. We also carried at least two of the US/IDF style collapseable stretchers, one per patrol at the minimum, two if we could get our hands on a second one. These were also stowed outside mostly.
We also carried a Kendrick Extrication Device (KED)per patrol. Sometimes it was in a PC or a Gun Car. I think another reason the boards are on PCs is because of the number of pers onboard and the higher chance of spinal injury to a passenger in the back in the event of a roll over or worse, IED. Where as the KED is used more to extract crew from their positions. Not the easiest bit of kit to use especially on a driver.
PCs tended to carry most of the extra stores due to them being able to stow it. Extra kit included the Stinger calltrops, metal detector wands and VCP/TCP stores although the SECDET cars didn't carry to much of this due to their role.

Heres hoping this has cleared the muddy water so its not so obscure but still vague.

Cheers, John

"Anyone able to tell if the 1/35 Bushmaster kit will have a spineboard in it or on it , if it is essential CES stores to each vehicle? ( the kit that was announced last year and keeps getting pushed back). May need to scratch that master sooner than later."

I think that might have been what Jason was alluding to earlier Adam. Now that it has come up it is a pretty important piece for modelling the vehicles on OPs so you might find yourself in that garage business anyway

Sunday night update.

Hey folks. Once again another weekend gone, time to take stock of where I am at and whats left to do . I am feeling a bit more comfortable that this might get finished, but I have to say, I would love a couple of months to 'tinker" with it - buy a few accesories and add to the trash pile or rubble, add to the figures or the things on the street.. but its not to be.

So this weekend I managed to start tying up some of those loose ends. The construction site is now almost complete, the fruit and veg guy is looking great and a few other things are getting the attention they needed after being parked for so long.

So lets get to the pics.

The empty mortar bags. OK these got alot of attention a few pages back .. ALOT. SO I hope I do them justice with this offering. Some of the options suggested were quite inventive including foil and clingwrap. I myself planned on using two part epoxy and somewhere I started making empty epoxy bags.. I think they might of worked but what a decal challenge! My final solution was to use what the bags are actually made of - paper. So I printed a whole bag (the decalled bags are the front only) and cut them out and folded them up. Tedious stuff but gives great posing flexibility.

made 16 bags all up

I glued them on other side of the mixer - once the user had emptied the bag he might just toss them over the sand pile out the way..

In this pic we also see the water drum is glued in place, and are some extra tools.

the bags are alittle white and need to be dulled slightly - some dust wash will sort that out.

The fruit wagon.

Ok so i never want to make another orange in my life. I remade all of them as I was sick of explaining the green orange thing. So I made them all again a bit brighter. I havent decide what else he will have on the ground around him - but it will probably include cartons of bannanas and some tubs or something. the figures are not yet decided on where they will stand, or if the cart will sit in this position.! but heres the idea. (if posing is all I have to worry about, the I am happy at that!)


If I feel this adds to the diorama ( at this stage I think it might, but undecided), then I may include this fella pushing the low cart. he could have an empty cart or he could have one with all sorts of stuff on it from TV's to fruit to rubbish. and he does fit in two or three spots - so he wmight march around the board in the next few days as I test fit him.


overhead view showing test fit. he was one of the guys who was cut from the figures earlier...


SO whats left ?

Well I made a shortlist of things left to do to make the diorama competitive (in other words - tie up the following loose ends). i could develope the scene more and add other elements - but time is against me. Also it might be that point where fiddling will screw it up - I shouldnt stray to far from the original vision. heres the list ( until I add stuff I forgot)
DIORAMA
- power grid ! power pole and all street electrical work, maybe 5 - 10 hours work
- tools for the figures on the scaffold - maybe 2 hours work
- more newspapers and rags in street refuse - maybe 2 hours work
- print and fold street cartons - maybe 2 hours work
- make teh newspapers the group of men are reading - maybe an hours work
- glue down all the figures and carts! - quick job but the final decision on location might be last minute stuff!!
VEHICLES
- paint the figures - at least 5 hours work
- weather the vehicles - at least 8 hours work in sub lots
- equip and apply markings - at least 8 hours work
- make vehicle antennaes folded - TBA
OVERALL
- decide name of diorama and get plaque made - 4 weeks at least prior to show!
- fix broken road edges and match paint - 2 hours
- apply diorama badges etc.
- write the reference book for the judging

So thats an overview of whats left to do just to be competitive. If these things are not addressed then the model will have flaws that may rule it out of competition because a major category in the judging schedule may loose lots of points for being incomplete. Every point counts. And as I said before, my figures are ordinary, so I must make up for it in other areas.

6 weeks to the comp. I might pull this off! I only have about 3 weeks left to order stuff from overseas If i feel I need it, maybe 2 weeks, as some things are taking up to 4 weeks for delivery.. So not much time left for last minute add ons.

Some things not purchased yet but I guess still up for consideration -
1:35 rats would look good in rubbish pile
1:35 dog still wanted but cant see one that looks feral and in the right pose
1:35 loudspeakers would look good on light poles or buildings..
1:35 iraq man pouring coffee/tea figure from Nato in Minature...
1:35 customer in the shop...
1:35 bicycle or modern motorcycle for propping against a wall amongst the crowds
and one or two other things..

I feel that the above would all add to the diorama and not distract from the central theme, but we'll see what happens.

Hope thats enough food for thought. Might be a while before I value add to the blog by way of photo's, my wife goes back to work tomorrow after 1 year off maternity leave, and I scored the 8 hours babysitting while she works each day, then I go to work while she looks after the boy. That is why this weekend was so important to try wrap up as much small details as possible and work out a type of plan of how to finish the diorama - like an exit strategy of my own from Iraq. Otherwise it could go on forever.

Adamskii

Adam,,

I always amazed by this project...today i got the time and look into all of the pages... you got me inspired again ... this is so awesome and beyond sanity... haha...

i hope u can still take this to the comp.... good luck bro....

Hi again,

Just thought this might be of help (if you haven’t seen it), it’s a set of dogs from custom dioramics:
http://www.internethobbies.com/cudidogse.html

If you're after rats Plus Model does a really good set

http://www.plusmodel.cz/karta_en.php?id=182

The only thing I've seen that is able to be made to look like a street cur is the Andrea Miniatures wolf ( they do dogs as well but more friendly looking ).

http://www.andrea-miniatures.com/market/AspsProductos/Detalle.asp?IdProductoDetalle=795

its looking great

GREAT news!

I finally found a dog I like! fantastic pose for an Australian themed diorama, And its a bitsa of a dog (bitsa this, bitsa that).

Problem is getting it - looks like it's from a fledgling company, and its Russian, and it only sells within Russia and Belaruse. thats all I can interpret from the websites, and they dont use paypal..

I want the dog, will overcome the issues. As they say in some movies "adapt improvise and overcome!"

Will send a pic when I confirm an order.. ( wouldnt want to dissapoint if I cant get it..)

Adam

Just a real quick one -

Rust treated power pole with an iron oxide suspension and acid patina for real rust on the surface, no wash, a single coating of mig pigments gulf war sand thinned with IPA..

Adam

Dear Adam, Since you're on your way to perfection with this dio, pls., allow me one small remark. Have a look at the pole, please. Now it looks like it is put on the tiles (at least from the picture), it should be dug in, is it not? ( It's your own fault: you seem to be a master of small detail! )
I just wonder how far you will go. Your dio intriges more and more. You can almost feel the heat of the sun on your vehicle deck and taste the typical smell of dusty, dirty city roads.
You certainly managed to create an "I am back in Iraq" feeling to me.

Salute

Been watching this one with fascination ... don't know if this one is any good to you at this late stage, but I took this snap at As Samawah in June 2005:

Your right on the money there, i simply posed the pylon there to take the pic - my finger is holding it in place as it is not glued. Before i do i plan on uprooting 4 tilesand embedding the pylon in the "gravel" under the tiles, and replace the tiles in a messy uptilted kind of way - as though the pylon has levied them out the ground from being hit.

The corner in this pic givs an idea of the mess it will look like. I would of planned for this if I had figured on it waaaay back at that stage, but only realised I needed this (the power pole/pylon) some weks ago.






Nice pic. Always useful. Although to be honest I want to analyse the pc as much as the cart. I see brush guards are removed including smoke. RWS with 2 crew out of hatches, driver sealed up, typical antenna configuration. Splashboard extension removed..(Jason always nails me on this- i think i am calling it wrong name ), Exhaust has tins removed, and as usual barely any stowage is apparent. Not a 100% but I think that vehicle (03) was fitted with bar armour at some point ( I think a remnant of the mount can be seen on top of the superstructure deck). The tyres are nice black - no sand/ dust buried up in the treads - this is going to cause problems for competition modelling. Oddly I can't see a towing cable across the front deck.

The cart is typical cart - as the pc is typical pc - nothing extraordinary going on that I can see. A good pic for colour of the road though. I been asked a few times when am i painting mine - this pic good reference for road colour..

Would love to see more As Samawah pics if you have them - especially buildings or daily Iraq life

As a side note, was there two places called Samawah - Al and As? or am quite confused becaused i seen a few people calling it As Samawah, and earlier in this blog I recall it being called AL Samawah. Sort me out !

Adam

In Arabic, the "L" sound in "al" is pronounced, or not pronounced, depending upon the first letter of the word following it. If that word begins with an "S" sound, then the "L" sound in "al" is not pronounced. Therein lies some confusion in attempting to anglicize many of the Arabic spellings and pronunciation, I'm 90% sure there is only one location, Al Samawah, pronounced A'Samawah.

That said, in Iraq there are two distinct villages, both named Al Walid.
And in Afghanistan, two different villages called Sharona.
In both cases they are in different provinces, much like us having 37 different Springfields in the US.