@WARCLOUD

Hi Gary,

Don't forget in many cases this is their day job, they get paid for doing these models. With us 'mere mortals' it is a case of fitting it in with the rest of our lives. Just enjoy what you do and use it to relax, don't beat yourself up about finishing stuff. On another forum we have had a thread about unfinished projects and that was seriously scary, it is part of the modelling process I reckon...abandoned projects, the next shiny thing etc. Just enjoy looking at what they do and use it to inspire.

All the best,

Paul

Amen to that!

In one of his interviews Shep mentioned that the important thing in a "hobby" should be FUN!

So let's go back to modelling and have some!!

Cheers

Romain

Never once said it wasn't fun. I don't do anything that isn't fun, not even for money.

In grateful memory of the thousands of American, British and Canadian boys who lost their lives on the beaches of Normandy on 6 June 1944. Respect and gratitude for all of this Heroes !

D-Day diorama & photo by Mariusz Filipiuk



Wojtek
MAKIETARIUM

That is the USS Constitution mainmast fighting top kit originally produced by Meteor Productions (announcement of the kit on Historicus Forma here), with both of the optional figure kits; IIRC, the photo is of the sample built by Joel Labow, the pattern maker for the kit (Alan Ball was commissioned to design the figures). Meteor Productions went out of business some years ago, but the kit and figures are available from Flagship Models

Two another pictures of Mariusz Filipiuk D-Day diorama






Cheers

Wojtek
MAKIETARIUM

There's two or three things I always notice with D-Day dioramas. The landing craft are always way too far up the beach (I think too much SPR inspiration), no-one ever has wet boots or pant legs, and there's never any footprints etc in the sand.

Hi Dean

you are right about footprints on the sand, and wet boots, but you have to remember that in 1:35 scale 100 meters it's about 3 meters. No one of my friends have enough space to do single diorama with area about 3 square meters

Cheers

Wojtek
MAKIETARIUM

I'm still marvelling over the water and waves...yeah, footprints would have been a bonus, but this is still pretty slick..I go crazy just trying to get enough Dragon figure kit helmets that match in size and shape for more than 5 soldiers..consistancy in the older kits is terrible.

Oh alright...I'm nowhere near the talent these artists are, but the "3 meter square" dio comment rang my ears...I'm one of those who WOULD do that...this is a part from a dio under construction now a couple of years on, still in progress..

It's a scene of chaos around a flak bunker on the Atlantik wall..soldiers in process of scrambling to their posts and preparing to repel the oncoming invasion..

the troops scramble to man weapons and unbox ammo..

Gary,

You are lucky one, in Poland in the mid 90 in some exhibitions diorama which was prepared for competition must have less than 0,5 square meter. It's about 70x70 cm or 100x50 It's because people start to build entire golf courses with two or three tanks. Not enough to be realistic, to big to be well exposed

Cheers

Wojtek
MAKIETARIUM

Yeah, I know some would go off the chart on scale..I'm only moderately crazy..

ok, that's enough...

I'm actually in the process of acumulating all the bits I need for an uber-diorama that will measure 3.6x1.5m and have 47 vehicles and 400+ figures. I'm two thirds there on getting together the major components and all the planning is done. Just have to wait another few years until all the kids have left home and I can take over a room and make a start.
It's going to be a ten year modelling sign off.

You kidding?
OMG....you expect to live forever don't you?

Dead serious. I'm figuring on it taking ten years and I'm 49 now with plans to start in 2016. My only worry is my eyesight.

I figure that;s only an average of 5 vehicles and 40 figures per year and a lot will get done alongside each other with the painting etc so can't see it being unmanageable so long as I plan it all out properly and build it as modular components that all come together at the end.

Of course what the hell I'll do with something that big when I'm done I have no idea, but I was careful to make sure the size would fit in a covered car trailer (the big twin axle ones used in motorsport).

Diorama, diodrama, vignette--these are essentially the same thing. Mike's distinction is the best I have heard, but I would not cramp a stellar work with it. I just call them miniatures. Anyone who would restrict the size of one is just a menial beaurocrat.

'Mastery of technique,' and the 'accuracy' of miniatures are provincial peeves. Miniatures GROW in and through the real process that we see in each and every work here--yes, we see landmarks of a growth process--the inner need of the maker to meet the challenge which he senses, the possibilities he sees. Whether paid and awarded, or done just for fun, the maker practices and practices until the work comes alive and speaks--feeds back--and he practices yet more, enchantedly. This feed-back, this inner sense of life and of order, is the realm of composition. Composition is an extension of the human instinct for order and balance. Someone used the word "magical." Someone said they know it when they see it. This is real stuff, and factors more substantially into great work than formulas do.

This guy, JBA, is presently leaping miniatures forward into the realm of personal composition and symbolism, much the way Paine moved miniatures out of mere mechanical artifact with his dust, textured accessories, and five-o'clock shadows back in the mid-1970's.

https://armorama.kitmaker.net//features/2678

Hi Rick,

I think I will invite you to write the Intro in my new book!

That was very well written and I admit that I had to read it a few times to get it all. (or most)

I also did read again Mike's post, congrats on that too, and I fully concur. This is a great description of everything a dio should be.

Thanks guys for that nice discussion. (who got to much distracted by personal projects)

By the way, except Horan's and Paine's works, not one of the other dioramas posted in the discussion yielded any special reaction from me, so I suppose that the most important factor in judging a dio is everyones very personal penchant.

Greets to all

Claude

My "day job" is illustrator..comic books/graphic novels. An artist for life. Also a musician, since my teen years.
Diorama is a 3D artwork. In my view..a combination of painting and sculpture with one purpose. Evoke a reaction, an emotional response..even if it's just "oh that's cool!"..

My goal is that frozen moment..capturing the emotion in a still frame..telling more in a single picture than I could in an hour of speaking. I'm working on it constantly..

Hello Claude! I am honored to have an autographed copy of your fine book: "Capturing Clervaux" on my bookshelf, right alongside "Bill Horan's Military Modeling Masterclass," several Shepard Paine books, and several Verlinden publications, including "Greg Cihlar's Fabulous Military Dioramas." Ray Anderson's "The Art of The Diorama" is a special gem on the shelf, too. Other diorama books have been featured here on Armorama, and I have yet to obtain them.

Claude, I hope your next book covers the awesome and mind-boggling ground-work which you have generously shared here on Armorama.

Wow, Gary, that is some exciting illustration...I used to read "Rat Patrol" comics, years ago...and still remember some particular frames such as one particular image of a clawed Kraut hand sticking up out of the smoking cupola of a Panzer IV.

For me a diorama tells a story and I think there are a lot of talented diorama builders, but not everyone of them is that famous as Sherpard Payne, Bob Letterman and all those other guys. Technics are changes and also now is more material available for less talented builders.
I like to make diorama's, most small but this is one of the bigger diorama I made.