I have began building my first diorama. Which also happens to be my first serious attempt at modelling. The plan(atleast for now) is the following:
It's spring 1945. A cargo truck loaded with supplies heads for the front, passing a group of infantry talking to a jeep driver. Nearby, a 105MM howitzer is in action.
The kits I am planning to use are:
Tamiya 2.5 Ton 6X6 cargo truck (currently under construction)
Tamiya Allied vehicles accessory set (currently under construction)
Tamiya US Willys Jeep (yet to be bought)
Dragon 105MM Howitzer M2A1 (yet to be bought)
Verlinden US infantry Europe overcoat (yet to be bought)
Verlinden US machine gun team at Bastogne (yet to be bought)
I may also buy extra 105MM ammo and a few other things for the base
Will post pics soon.

Hey it sounds awesome cant wait to see your pics.
Remember to have fun and dont rush.
Regards
Horst

Sounds like a great undertaking for a first diorama, looking forward to it and the best of luck!

Regards,

Your plan seems to be a lot of work. Be careful not to get in to deep.
Maybe you should consider using just the truck, Willys and infantery. That way you will reduce the size of your diorama. That meens less work, and less chance that you get sick and tired of it.

Henrik

I want this project to last awhile. I've foreseen the issue of getting bored, so i've divided the dio into 5 sections:
1) Truck and cargo.
2) Base
3) Howitzer
4) Jeep
5) Figures
I'm treating each section as a small project on its own. When all the sections are complete, I'll combine them together into the full diorama.

welcome to dioramas! addictive. very addictive.

Your project sounds quite significant. May I offer some advice? large dioramas are hard for the experienced, and newcomers while full of enthusiasm, may not appreciate the work involved - not the painting and glueing, but the research about story and composition, balance and layout.

specifically what is the story being told? define the main plot and make it obvious what this story is about.. the rest should be sub plots and not detract from the main story, but support it (not confuse the viewer)

Your plan sounds a little confusing at this stage. could we see some sketches of composition and layout ? I know I agonise over every little detail, and something of that scope has man many little details! Is it a story about a fire support mission, a story about lost troops en route, a story about resuply?

maybe consider this,,, if any one part of the diorama could be chopped off and no one would notice that the story is incomplete or missing something, then what value did the rmoved part have to begin with ? for example, remove the howitzer firing, and the diorama of a truck/ convoy with troops mingling still survives in tact.

tthe other issue I think is size of the base - when a howitzer firs im sure you would want to be some distance away dure to noise and heat etc.. not somewhere you would be asking questions of a jeep driver in the vicinity.. so to have all those elements you suggest in a base, would have to be a bottleneck reasonably close to thefront lines for arty to in use, so everyone would be at full tactical readiness. so the terrain would need to tell the story of a bottleneck forcing all those vehicles and action onto a small area, and anything less sthan about 2 square feet would be just insane. although some kind of fire base has merit?

how about the truck towing the howitzer, with all the guns stores and ammo on board, under escort from the jeep? at some kind of road obstacle or junction, with a good bit of terrain like a small creek or culvert crossing, with the troops battle weary taking cover in the terrain as the gun moves forward.,..(maybe troops could be inspecting a destroyed 2cm AA gun on the side of the road...trophy hunyting and the trucks crew interact by looking back at the troops finding cool kit on the ground for souveniers...)
Or how about the truck resupplying the howitzer which is dug in, on an MSR with the troops and jeep provising some subplot such as the troops on the march throwing a baseball back to the gun crew having some time out and playing some stick ball (verlinden do the figures) that way you have all your elements and they intermingle - troops walking past the gun and crew but the obvious throwing back of the ball to the impatient gun crew tells a story, the truck is unloading ammo or stores.. maybe show the gun crew having it a bit easier with a fire and some good rations or even chairs round a fire... while the troops slog it out on foot.. a jeep wizzing past splashing mud just to test their metal that little bit more?(the jeep could be cut from this story very easy..)... develop the story , you have alot of pieces on the table, just make them interact and have a reason to bethere.

I hope you take the time to pull this off. you want it to last, so spend lots of time posing the models and telling storyies, try different ideas like terrain or buildings or ruins or destroyed enemy vehicles (simple ones like tamiya 2cm aa gun).. and if possible draw them and post for critique~!

Hope this helps

Adam

Adam,
Thanks for all that. You make a very good point about infantry being close to the Howitzer. Based on what you've said, I've decided to alter my plans significantly.
This is a rough plan of what I'm going to do:
http://gallery.kitmaker.net/data/500/thumbs/Dio29.jpg
Instead of having a Howitzer and Jeep, I'm going to have the four figures looking at An abandoned Flak 38. I think this simplifies the scene a bit.
So the new list of kits used is:
Tamiya 2.5 on 6X6 cargo truck
Tamiya Allied vehicles accessory set
Tamiya 20MM Flakvierling 38
Verlinden US Infantry Europe overcoat
Verlinden US Machine gun team Bastonge
Plus a few other things for the base.
Thanks for input

I hope my opinions have helped.

One other thing, a good diorama looks like its a 3d photo thats part of a bigger picture , and one of the tricks used to achieve this idea that the landscape continues well beyond the borders of the diorama is to have everything offset by a few degrees, in other words avoid having things parralel to the border. usually 10 - 15 degrees is sufficient to trick the eye, otherwise you risk it looking posed and " toy like"

Adam