Hi again Adam,

It's been a wonderful journy and I really hate to see it end.For weeks all I've done is get home and see if you have another post.As Paul said you have world wide followers.PLEASE consider the book.It could be a nice little retirement saving plan?
I'll bet the last episode of MASH brought in a bundle for the network.

All in all,all the best to you.Frame all the awards you get for this.As Bob Hope would say "Thanks for the memories".

Tom

proof of concept, prototype.



The crews for the vehicles.

The full length fella goes in back of pc, full length due to it's a big hatch hole and will see a bit into it - so added legs to fill the void...
The two guys with arms go into the turret of the type 1.
The two heads with shoulders are commanders for the pc and fitters..




Would post pics of fixed type 1's problem, but the shed keeps blowing a fuse and its getting annoying resetting it every 10 mins..
Sorry for quality of pics - mine never are much hat, but these had extraordinarily bad light- makes them look darker than they actually are.

Adam

I think this is the very last fabrication for the dio..

The prototype was made from paper. it was massively oversize and the final chicken 'cages' are half the prototype size.

bit of old school blogging here..

firstly cut the main frames from balsa wood (1mm), 20x 30mm

then line the frames with verlinden 1:35 mesh, and make the uprights from styrene right angle (10mm long).

Add some more mesh to the uprights, and add a frame lid..

and we have a chicken cage!

now we have 3! I think six would look good, but I am seriously stretched to do 3 and now have to weather them etc...

you can see some of the chickens already on sticks also in this pic - along with a few other critters that will populate the scene..


thats it I'm off to bed!

Adamskii

Somebody stop him! He's a madman!!

what he said!!

I fully agree that once this is finished....I'll miss something in my life!

Fortunately, there will be a couple more postings..!!!

madman here,

just the last pics from the chicken coops.. finished off this morning.

A painted chook - this is from the Tamiya livestock set. ts painted by undercoating in black, then airbrushing white over the top lightly, then a wash of yellow, and lastly a drybrush with white. the comb and beak etc are detailed last.

opening the cages, I insert a suitable straw/hay substitute, I was going to use the long Heiki brand grass but i only have light green and its difficult to paint prior to installation, so I used hair. Grabbed some from my wifes hairbrush (she is a blonde/ sandy colour). yeah I know - my diorama now contains potential DNA samples....

Close the cage up, and most of the chooks detail is lost.

And lastly two cages on the trolly. one cage has the Tamiya birds, the other has the mantis miniatures ones from one of their animal sets. quite a difference in scale, and with more time I would of detailled the birds different to take advantage of scale to how two types of birds rather than just two sizes of bird.


the cages still look big and probably should be half that size again! but i have reference pics of quite large trays/ cages for the birds so i am ok with it. the original trial cage was double the size - fitted the whole base of the trolly!

I have one cage left which is double sided with gauze. Will arrange neatly when I do final fit.

SO glued a tonne of stuff down today, fixed several problems and discovered several more. When I get power back in my shed I will take pics. I need that fixed as I am stuffed without this week. Mostly just doing small tasks now that have been parked fo a while such as making more newspaper rubbish etc.

I painted the stereos - will post pics soon. it occured to me a good reason for the group of men to be standing around is they could be listening to a radio tgether, while reading newspapers.

I really need those two figures to turn up. I ordered/ paid for them 3 weeks ago now and expect them any day. i cannot glue the final women figures down until the new ones turn up - one of themhas an open bag and is buying oranges - how appropriate!!!

Adam

I keep my fingers crossed for those figs to arrive pronto!!!

Love these chicken coops!!!!!

Cheers


Romain

Hi Adam,

i just dropped in on this a few hours ago. Absolutely terrific stuff. This is a real gem of a build and your workmanship is outstanding.

I've only managed to skim over the content so far but I'll be back for a full read and to see how the finish turns out.

This is a real pleasure to view and a lot of very useful infomration and tips in the threads.

Just amazing stuff, hats off to you for such hard work.

Cheers

Al

howdy folks - I am very busy and very short on time. The figures from MAIM turned up, and to be blunt, I wont be using them. They dwarf some of the Verlinden figures...

I have had food poisoning last few days - not a good time, not at all.

Will do some updates soon, am feeling bit better tonight.

Cheers all for kind comments!

Adamskii

Adam ...been looking at your diorama ... holy crap mate ..mind is fully blowin ,,i sat here ,,mouth wipe open .my girlfriend had to close it ,,ok get this ..shes not much into the model world like us blokes but even she was knocked back at what you have done here ..I am building a three part diorama for a mate based on the same sort of thing ..but in afghanistan i;m using a AFV Club Stryker ESV with Blackdog interior ,Tamiya M2 Bradley turning into a A3 with the Legend M2A3 converison set with ERA,Italeri HEMTT fuel truck and L3000 truck ,,Dargon M1 A2 Abrams with Legend M1A2 TUSKII converison set ..huge amount of men to be built ..will be a mix of Blackdog, Trumpeter and anything else i have laying around .seriously impressed with your model mate and its giving me some more ideas for this one

hey mate, absolutely-fan-friggin'-tastic work! it keeps getting better and better!

If you need an M-79 and some smoke grenades, let me know! i have a few lying around! (1/35, not 1/1 scale!) (i wish!)

Cheers Matt for the offer, I found 2 smoke grenades in an old dragon gulf war 1 figure set, and have an M79 from the academy m113a1, 5 in 1 turret kit.

Phill, thanks for the reaction feedback - I look forward to standing back and watching other people have something similar at the expo. You painted the picture well.

FYI you mentioned the girlfriend. I think theres a good thread on its own about this, but i always try to involve my wife ( and prior to getting married) in my projects. Not so much the nuts and bolts of construction, but always asked opinion on balance, layout, etc. She is for the most part ignorant of all things military - as are most people who look at our models, so its a good test case to see what the average punter willl think. ALso, I always get her to "do" some simple task so when its finished she can participate in the conversations with " I did that bit".. even if it was pour the plaster into a mould, or cut the planks from balsa wood, or sprinkle ground cover .. simple stuff that lets them feel involved. ALwaysd good to keep the woman on side or your hobby will be penalized I say.

I got power back to shed this morning - found the offending wall plate that had moisture causing a leak and tripping the safety switch. Can finally take some pics later today.

More updates soon!

PS. I am modifying the ASLAV F ,at the last minute, to include the RWS.... lord help me.

Adam

Adam, I envy your being able to get your wife involved. My wife thinks it is "neat" that I have "my little space" now, but as for getting involved, she'd rather not, at all. My 6yr old however, thinks its pretty cool. So maybe if I can get the kids on my side. . . .cheers, mate and keep up the great work. Good luck at the upcoming show. Cheers.

adam,

this is superb...... the chicken coop was amazing ...

i envy you.... the dio is start to be alive....

just one more thing, do the dude that push the chicken blonde too??

getting wife involve is a good idea.... mine is always supportive but never really get physically involved..... but from time to time she do participant indirectly..

amazing dio... i love the title plate

Adam: super awesome!! Thanks for the SBS on the chickens as I will have a couple coming up a few months from now.

Best wishes for all to go well up to and including the competition. Safe journey for you and the dio.

Happy Modelling, -zon

Adam, though my comments have been few and sparce, I thank you for this wonderful journey you have shared with us. It has been a pleasure watching your work and this dio come together. All the ups and downs, and all the tech's you have shared, just a fantastic job on your part. I have completely enjoyed this build with you and am amazed at what you have done in the time you have done it. My dio which is only two buildings with dual tracks has been an ongoing project of love and hate for 14 years and is only 1/2 done, Though I don't consider time essential for a great dio, yours is just one of the best. The picture story is outstanding along with the craftmanship, showing the very reality of a war zone with everyday life, something that most of us forget. My hat's off to you, and I am sure that when you are done, you will have one of the best ever done.

Adam. An amazing blog, from start to finish. The final model is excellent. You´ve captured the scene really well. Not my era or subject matter, but Ive really enjoyed following your updates. Good luck in the competition.

Thankyou all for the nice words. Frank, I guess thats some thing I really strive for, is appreciation from persons who do not see this as their subject matter or era. One of my tenets of dioram constrction - the real world landscape should have no era or subject matter - it should be a model in its own right. I could pull the ASLAV's off the dio and drop some US vehicles, or a couple of Japanese vehicles.. or Dutch, or British.. or whomever else was there t changethe subject matter, and the diorama would look just as good in context.

The guy pushing the chickens isnt blonde - he has a sandy coloured skull cap thing on his head.

Now, I got power back to the shed today so managed to take a few update pictures as promised. As you can imagine over the last week being sick and without shed power I havent done alot but did manage to tidy up small details and where possible glue everything down. I can say that everything in the picture is glued down. Including the vehicles which meant making 8 wheels per vehicle touch solidly on the road.. cant have floating wheels . All the figures are in their final spots now. Anyways heres the pics.

the ASLAV 25 missing pic

the cat. diorama has cat, dog, mice and chickens. quite the menagerie.

spot the mice which snuck in ?


Another hidden gem for those willing to look for details.. rusted RPG on the roof of the bombed building - maybe the reason the building was attacked??

And a rusty fired RPG on the opposing bombed building.. laying poignantly across a rotting IRAQi flag.. also maybe why that building is no longer much to look at..

Me trying to be clever.. the newspaper / rubbish in the street "dancing" in the air behind the vehicle as it drives over it..

me trying to be artistic now.. emphasis on trying..




almost forgot the workmen have a radio to listen to now..

And the guys in group hanging out reading newspapers have a serious radio to listen to Al jazeera radio to!..

Some final figure layout / positions

And the diorama in its glory.


My name plate I place discreetly to the front side.


I know much better photographer than me with much much better equipment. I will employ thir skills and get some quality shots with good light and focus. It's not quite apparent there but I am upgrading the middle ASLAV to have teh afv club RWS mounted on a seal solutions spider mount and remov mag 58. I am working on that over the weekend, along with the reference pages..

Anyways thats the update hope you enjoy the pics!

Adam

Congratulations on (can we call it) finishing this epic adventure Adam. You have pulled this one off with flying colours. There are so many little dios in the whole thing and they all work so wonderfully well together. People will spend hours looking at this masterpiece and still come away not seeing everything.

The "trying to be clever" newspaper breathes life it the dio. Such a simple yet very effective concept that dipects motion and life. I love it.

You mentioned earlier about the ratchet straps (tie downs) and how you wish that you'd done some in different colours. Don't be so hard on yourself cause that was the only colour that I saw. Unless we stole some AD straps from the RAAF that is .

I want to be like you when I grow up .

Cheers, John

Wow its been very exciting to watch you put together an excellent diorama. I have never seen someone put so much effort and time in to every single detail. This is something to you should be really proud of!

Ok enough superlatives, what are you going to do with it now? Personally i think it should have pride of place in your living room!

Anirudh

Just amazing... I can't really add to what has already been said. I love the suggestion of movement w/ the paper being blown by the passing vehicle. Nice idea.

Bob

Wow.... this looks realy amazing, all those details, the figures everything, it even brings back some memories from my deployment.


awesome job...

Dear Adam,
WOW!
What else is left to say to this wonderful dio? I am convinced that many of us, if not all, who've been on a mission in Iraq or Afghanistan, again feel the heat, taste the dust and hear the noise by just looking at it. It is full of details which recall, each and every one of it, memories, good and bad.
So, whatever the outcome of your participation in the contents may be: you have created just that what modelling, in my opinion, should be, a miniature of the reality. And how you managed to do that! From the bulk of the impressive AFVs to the wheat stealing mice in the shop.
The 'only' thing that is missing now, is a book about this dio, like Andrea did once with their German submarine. For me: I put your picture in the gallery where Shepard Paine and Francois Verlinden are hanging.
Thanks for taken me back with the help of your skills.

Salute!

PS Maybe some of us can write your wife to ask if you may start a new project!!!

Bravo Buddy,

What an awesome way to cover every detail. This is beyond textbook work Adam. Very impressive and monumental work. Too cool brother!


Cheers, Ski.

Hi Adam,

i follow your post here since i found it and it is just amazing to see the whole thing growing !
As a fan of modern afv and especially OIF-vehicles this was just like a dream for me to follow ur build blog in here.

What came to my mind:
Maybe it would be nice to place some US-Marines with Humvees instead of the ASLAV´s i think this would look also very good.

I really love your Diorama. What will you do when this one is finished?
I really hope you have already some ideas for the next one

Greeting from Germany

Martin